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A new project on Cowessess First Nation is taking the food cycle full circle by taking food waste in the community and rapidly composting it.

Raj Behari, co-founder of B-Nature, the biotech company leading the project says this is the first composting sea can that’s going to be built in Canada. “We take a 150 day composting process and we shrink that down into five days,” Behari said.

Once processed, the compost will be turned to soil and put into a greenhouse, allowing the community to use the soil to grow fresh food year-round.

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Behari says this method of composting could be spread across places like Saskatchewan that are rich in freshly-grown food and vast farmland, allowing for bioeconomic sustainability in the region.

“Half of waste is organic. So, most of what we put in the waste bin is actually organic. And when it goes to landfills, it rots and creates methane. It pollutes the water and it pollutes air. So composting is the real recycling,” said Behari.

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Cowessess First Nation Coun. Terry Lerat, who has been a farmer all his life, says projects like these ties in with Indigenous traditions.

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“People don’t realize the importance of keeping soil health alive and active,” Lerat said. “How it’s fundamentally connected to survival of not only human beings, not only mankind, but every living thing on earth goes back to the health of the soil.”

With the project currently underway, they are expected to be fully up and running by the fall.

“I really would like to see one of these systems set up on every First Nation in the province, and why not every First Nation throughout Canada? It just helps our food succession, our food sovereignty, and mainly, most important, looking after Mother Earth,” said Lerat.

Watch above for more on the Cowessess composting project and how this promotes Saskatchewan’s bioeconomic sustainability.

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