Is agriculture the new high tech?

Tribe Awesome - now they are movie stars too

Kirsten Dirksen is a filmmaker living in Spain who makes some really great films about interesting things people are doing to change the world.  Our own Tribe Awesome was fortunate to get her attention and she has just released a short film about them and their work.  She visited them here at Digital Diner over the summer and spent a little time with the kids talking about their work to create new ways to grow plants. The results are the 15 minutes of YouTube brilliance below.  While it may be difficult to mess up with such compelling stars :-), Kirsten weaves together a really nice story just from spending an afternoon with the kids and letting them talk.  Please find 15 minutes to give it a look.

Just a few key points that the kids bring up, which I really love:

• California is in a serious drought.  80% of our water goes to agriculture.  The techniques Tribe Awesome uses take as little as 2% of the water that traditional agriculture takes.
• Aeroponic plants grow much faster than traditional plants.
• When you control the nutrients you control the lifecycle of the plants.  You can promote blooming at just the right time to produce fruit when you want it
• Weeds don't grow in these buckets because there is nowhere for them to take root.

Great job Kirsten and congrats Tribe Awesome!