Students design counter-top herb gardens to tackle food waste

Could growing salad in our kitchens really be the solution to food waste woes? Megan Townsend meets three budding entrepreneurs who propose we do just do that.

LettUs grow have developed a "Salad Bar" planter to grow vegetables in the home

We’ve all been there. We pick up that bag of spinach with the best intentions, but a few days later it still sits in the refrigerator drawer. We throw it away with a heavy heart, only the repeat the same mistake during our next stop at the supermarket.

Food waste has become a big problem in Britain. We waste around 1.1 million tonnes of food a year, including 45% of our salad - the equivalent of £68 million, thrown in the bin.

How to we solve this problem?. Ocado recently committed to giving away their wasted produce to The Real Junk Food Project, Tesco and Asda have begun selling ‘wonky veg’ boxes to use up some of our less attractive produce and Sainsburys is using gas produced by its own food waste to run stores.

Three students from Bristol University have come up with another idea, which they aim to pitch during Virgins VOOM 2016 campaign, designing a system that will allow you to grow vegetables just metres away from your plate.

Jack Farmer a Biology student, along with engineering students Ben Crowther and Charlie Guy have designed a counter-top planter, using LED and aeroponic soilless technology, that can grow salads and herbs with an interactive interface, providing a minimal-effort alternative to supermarket bagged greens.

LettUs Grow, is inspired by equipment developed by NASA for the International Space Station, with research pioneered by Bristol University. The plants grow through wicking hydroponics a method of growing plants by filtering them through a cavity ( in this case it is made of coconut husk and clay beads) to water below, eliminating the need for soil, and allowing nutrients to easily be replaced for new plants. Utilising LED’s, lighting can be tailored to the particular needs of whatever plant it is you’re growing, optimising conditions for photosynthesis, for faster, healthier growth.

There is a sensor inside the planter, which will send updates to an smartphone app when the plant needs to be watered, setting reminders and even tailoring growth instructions to your seed of choice. They even anticipate there could be a level of automation - such as a system to water plants while you’re on holiday.

Ben, Jack and Charlie began developing LettUs Grow in 2015 (LettUs Grow)

The team even mention that this could include a social element "There are huge communities of growers out there, and we really want to tap into that. Its possible to create ‘growth recipes’ that would be available to share using the app."

But surely growing salad in your kitchen won’t be comparable to the real thing? “I don’t think many people come into contact with truly fresh vegetables” Jack explains, who developed the idea for the project in 2014 upon recognising a gap in the market for straight to your plate produce, “the taste is just so much different to the supermarket stuff, when there isn’t any chemicals and the nutrients haven’t been lost in transit. It's strange that people think that's what salad is supposed to taste like.”

LettUs Grow began in Autumn 2015, and the group have moved quickly to develop a working prototype and designs. They are currently at the stage of crowdfunding their product (they raised 29% of their target in just one week!) in order to aim for a retail launch next spring. The initial range of products available will be a “Herb Garden” planter to grow general kitchen herbs such as basil, parsley etc, and then a “Salad Bar”, a bigger planter that can grow around 16 plants. Though they do plan for expansion “we really want to be able to start growing chillies” Charlie laughs.

They explain that one of their main aims is to get the planters into schools, so they can educate school children about where their food comes from “if there's one thing this campaign has taught me it is that you have to be true to your principles” comments Jack.

The disconnect with people and their food is currently being addressed by Jamie Oliver in his Food Revolution campaign, launched yesterday, aims to change the relationship between kids and their food, developing a greater understanding of production and to get schools out into gardens, growing vegetables.

“The thing is inner-city families/schools, they don’t have the room to grow their own vegetables in their gardens, or the conditions for them to thrive” explains Ben “with one of these planters you can set it up anywhere with access to the mains. It reduces the space needed for urban farming, which is good for the environment as well as your diet.”

Though this surely won’t accessible to low-income families? Right? The team explain that they aim to create a low-impact economically friendly design to be placed in inner-city dwellings “of course we’re open to the idea of creating more bespoke designs, but for us we really just want to bridge the gap between people and their food, so we’re looking more toward the lower end of the market. We hope initial sales will give us the ability to make the product cheaper and get it out to the masses.”

Bristol being named the European Green Capital in 2015 has definitely had an impact on the team, Charlie explains: “there's an open-minded movement in Bristol, people understand motivations toward eco-friendly business ideas and they are really supportive”.

LettUs Grow have had a lot of support not just from their university but the local area as a whole, in particular from the Better Bristol and Grow Bristol projects who are performing similar research into sustainable food growth within the city. “Everyone is pretty happy to help each other out, they will share data they generate with us and we will do the same.”

So will we see a Salad Bar in every kitchen in 10 years time? LettUs Grow hope so. Its difficult to not get on-board with their vision, of wanting to find a way to reduce food waste, get people more in-touch with their food and to make it so fresh vegetables don’t have to cost a fortune - or the earth.

To support LettUS grow head to www.crowdfunder.co.uk/lettus-grow, the team have entered into the Virgin VOOM 2016 competition, with the aim of pitching their idea to Richard Branson, you can vote for them on www.vmbvoom.com/pitches/lettus-grow