Is space agtech the answer to great food security? Countries like the UAE — which imports 85% of its food — have increasingly turned to agtech and space agtech to bolster food security. Abu Dhabi’s StarLab Oasis — a partnership between Houston-based commercial space exploration company NanoRacks and the Abu Dhabi Investment Office (ADIO) — was set up in 2021 to conduct space-based agricultural experiments in a bid to apply tech solutions back on Earth. Space agtech is also increasingly being used by agencies, governments, and private companies to address climate change-induced agricultural challenges, from developing drought- and salt-tolerant varieties of crops to finding new ways to grow traditional yields.

Why this matters: The impacts of climate change have decreased food productivity due to “increasing temperatures, weather variability, shifting agroecosystem boundaries, invasive crops and pests, and more frequent extreme weather events,” according to the World Bank. This has resulted in reduced yields, lower nutritional value of major cereals, and lower livestock productivity.

Space agtech is highly efficient: “Astrobotany requires researchers to develop plant growth systems that make the most of the limited resources on the International Space Station (ISS). The resulting hardware and scientific findings of this work can be applied in resource-strained environments on Earth — including deserts — to continue supporting the ecosystems, improving food security, water security, and urban efficiency,” StarLab Oasis agriculture engineer Benjamin Greaves told Enterprise Climate. He adds that StarLab Oasis’ work focuses on studies in off-Earth plant biology, fermentation, and the as-yet undeveloped field of space composting.

And it has birthed innovations in the past: NASA’s Space Food Systems program is credited with the development of LED lights, eliminating soil, creating automated growing systems, advancing controlled environment agriculture, and vertical farming.

Achievements in space: Three varieties of lettuce, Chinese cabbage, a type of mustard, red Russian kale and zinnia flowers are already being grown at the Vegetable Production System on board the ISS. NASA’s Technology Transfer Program is also developing precision agriculture techniques for controlled release fertilizers to reduce fertilizer inputs and minimize runoff which often ends up in rivers, lakes and groundwater.

Creating climate resilient seed varieties: Microgravity and cosmic rays are harnessed by space agtech to develop new seed varieties through a process known as space mutagenesis or off-Earth seed breeding. Mutagenesis entails breeding seeds in space’s microgravity using deep space radiation to create hardier, more climate- and pest-resilient varieties. Unlike genetically modifying seeds, mutagenesis exposes seeds to radiation to accelerate mutations in an organism’s DNA that would naturally occur over generations, potentially halving the development times of new disease- or drought-tolerant crop varieties. A recent experiment by the International Atomic Energy Agency and the Food and Agriculture Organization sent cress and Sahel-native sorghum seeds to the ISS to measure the effects of cosmic radiation and microgravity on the seeds.

China is leading the pack: While research on space mutagenesis dates back to 1946, the commercialization of space coupled with the potential benefits for Earth-based agriculture are intensifying interest and investment in the sector. Over the past three decades, China has developed upwards of 200 space-mutated crop varieties including wheat, rice, corn, soybeans, alfalfa, sesame, cotton, watermelon, and tomatoes, and others. The process has led to improved nutrition profiles of crops and increased crop yields and resilience.

But what about our native date palm? The UAE wants to secure the palm tree’s longevity in space. StarLab Oasis and its parent company NanoRacks collaborated with the UAE Space Agency back in 2019 on an experiment to germinate palm seeds in space as part of the Palm in Space project, which explored the potential of growing the desert-native tree on Mars.

Tags: