THERE is a chance for humans to do it right and subsist upon the earth in cohesion with the environment.

This was the main gist behind the talk facilitated by Dr Keith Cowan – who is director of the Institute for Environmental Biotechnology, Rhodes University (EBRU) in Grahamstown. Cowan gave an eye-opening lecture on the biotechnologies used in creating a sustainable food-water-energy nexus in our country at the Forum for Astronomy, Science and Technology (FAST) meeting in Port Alfred last week.

Cowan’s focus was on remedial biotechnologies, which speaks to establishing means and ways of reusing and preserving water resources in ensuring that there is a mitigation in the current water management wastage situation, such as mis-administrated sewage works; reduction of GMO (genetically modified organisms) products being used for human consumption; as well as commercial scale land rehabilitation.

The aim of remedial biotechnology is to create means of sustainably minimising the wastage of water supplies. Currently, Cowan explained, water is available, bought, used and sent to water treatment plantations; and what Cowan advocates for is that we begin to reuse treated water.

Full story in this week’s Talk of the Town

Source: https://www.talkofthetown.co.za/2017/09/16/algae-use-can-ease-crisis/