In this episode of the Discover India 101 Podcast, I speak with **Dr. Rimjhim Agarwal** about the fascinating intersection of **agriculture, food, research, innovation, technology and market intelligence**.
We explore how scientific research can move beyond laboratories and create real-world impact through **research translation, innovation and entrepreneurship**.
In this conversation, we discuss:
• Agri-food innovation and the future of agriculture
• How research can be translated into practical solutions
• Market intelligence and understanding emerging opportunities
• Agriculture, food systems and technology
• Innovation and entrepreneurship
• Organic farming, seeds and agricultural research
• Technology and AI in agriculture
• Education, careers and opportunities in research
• Life and work in Australia
• Farming and agriculture in Australia
• Differences between agriculture and food systems in India and Australia
• The journey from education and research to real-world impact
• Opportunities for young people interested in agriculture, science and innovation
Dr. Rimjhim Agarwal was also a **7NEWS Young Achiever Awards Semi-Finalist in 2026**.
This conversation is particularly relevant for students, researchers, entrepreneurs, agriculture professionals and anyone interested in the future of food, farming, technology and innovation.
🎙️ **Guest:** Dr. Rimjhim Agarwal
🌱 **Topics:** Agri-Food | Agriculture | Food Systems | Innovation | Research | Research Translation | Market Intelligence | AI | Technology | Australia | Farming
If you found this conversation interesting, consider **liking, sharing and subscribing** to Discover India 101 for more conversations about education, careers, technology, society, entrepreneurship and life around the world.
#DrRimjhimAgarwal #AgriFood #AgriFoodInnovation #Agriculture #Research #Innovation #ResearchTranslation #MarketIntelligence #FoodInnovation #AgriculturalResearch #Australia #AI #Technology #Podcast #DiscoverIndia101
**Disclaimer:**
This podcast is intended for educational, informational and conversational purposes only. The views and opinions expressed by the guest are their own and do not necessarily represent the views of Discover India 101 or its host. Information discussed during the conversation should not be considered professional, scientific, agricultural, financial, legal or medical advice. Viewers should independently verify information and consult qualified professionals where appropriate.
Some statements may reflect personal experiences, interpretations or opinions and should not be treated as universally applicable facts.
We explore how scientific research can move beyond laboratories and create real-world impact through **research translation, innovation and entrepreneurship**.
In this conversation, we discuss:
• Agri-food innovation and the future of agriculture
• How research can be translated into practical solutions
• Market intelligence and understanding emerging opportunities
• Agriculture, food systems and technology
• Innovation and entrepreneurship
• Organic farming, seeds and agricultural research
• Technology and AI in agriculture
• Education, careers and opportunities in research
• Life and work in Australia
• Farming and agriculture in Australia
• Differences between agriculture and food systems in India and Australia
• The journey from education and research to real-world impact
• Opportunities for young people interested in agriculture, science and innovation
Dr. Rimjhim Agarwal was also a **7NEWS Young Achiever Awards Semi-Finalist in 2026**.
This conversation is particularly relevant for students, researchers, entrepreneurs, agriculture professionals and anyone interested in the future of food, farming, technology and innovation.
🎙️ **Guest:** Dr. Rimjhim Agarwal
🌱 **Topics:** Agri-Food | Agriculture | Food Systems | Innovation | Research | Research Translation | Market Intelligence | AI | Technology | Australia | Farming
If you found this conversation interesting, consider **liking, sharing and subscribing** to Discover India 101 for more conversations about education, careers, technology, society, entrepreneurship and life around the world.
#DrRimjhimAgarwal #AgriFood #AgriFoodInnovation #Agriculture #Research #Innovation #ResearchTranslation #MarketIntelligence #FoodInnovation #AgriculturalResearch #Australia #AI #Technology #Podcast #DiscoverIndia101
**Disclaimer:**
This podcast is intended for educational, informational and conversational purposes only. The views and opinions expressed by the guest are their own and do not necessarily represent the views of Discover India 101 or its host. Information discussed during the conversation should not be considered professional, scientific, agricultural, financial, legal or medical advice. Viewers should independently verify information and consult qualified professionals where appropriate.
Some statements may reflect personal experiences, interpretations or opinions and should not be treated as universally applicable facts.
Category
🛠️
LifestyleTranscript
00:00:00ही गैस इहीं सोय दोरिम्जी अगर्वाल वेल को नुट कर से इस थाइँ है
00:00:12है आप से वी जुट श्टिक न कर देए बइसलेश थे फोर्बरा निए वाकना गाध्त
00:00:26and so basically biotech was my main choice of subject because I was interested in plants
00:00:35in general and basically using genetic engineering or those kind of things to make plants like
00:00:43pest resistant or have some nutritious fruits through plants using gene editing so after
00:00:51finishing my high school I was looking into what is the most suitable field to do this kind of work
00:00:59so I came across various kinds of bio related technology work biophysics biomedicine bioengineering
00:01:09a lot of stuff but biotech was something that I thought that probably what I wish to do I will
00:01:16be
00:01:16able to do through this particular degree so I started I started my bachelor's doing that and
00:01:23then I realized that biotech is quite broad and biotech can be used in plants animals humans for
00:01:31some reason I did not think that vaccine generation was part of biotech I was thinking it would be part
00:01:39of medicine or something so when I was going through those courses over the for over the four
00:01:44years time I realized that I'm very much interested in food and plant biotech other
00:01:49than animal and human biotech so even when I was doing my bachelor's degree thesis project I chose
00:01:58something to work with food so that was some traditional wine making using some traditional
00:02:07knowledge and him from Himachal Pradesh it was quite exciting even at even during that time I
00:02:15was quite interested in something called plant tissue culture I'm not sure if you have heard of plant
00:02:19tissue culture yeah I heard about it but I don't know deeper inside yes plant tissue culture is good
00:02:28growing plants in labs instead of doing outside so it's quite interested in that but you can say
00:02:34fortunately or unfortunately I didn't get that project and I got this wine making project so after
00:02:41that I was like I have to like specialize further and also like working day in day out in lab
00:02:47I was
00:02:48feeling like I was losing the touch with nature because it was very secluding work so then when I was
00:02:56thinking of like doing my further studies I was like probably masters of agriculture science sounds like
00:03:03like something that I'm interested in anything related with plants that was my main criteria when
00:03:09I was choosing from masters and the reason why I chose masters or even PhD for that matter it was
00:03:16because I wanted to be a scientist since like forever I wanted to be a scientist and that was
00:03:22the pathway that I had to take so while looking for masters courses I was like applying in US I
00:03:31applied in
00:03:31Netherlands I applied in Australia and New Zealand so there were like a lot of things happen I think just
00:03:41by
00:03:41the flow of it there were many universities in US which were going to start a year later just because
00:03:48the bachelor degree finishes in May or June so probably their intake would have happened the next year when I
00:03:55graduated I wasn't aware that Australia does two intakes for all the masters programs so they
00:04:03do two semesters and you can join in any time so that was a surprise and in doing so I
00:04:10actually got an
00:04:11offer letter from University of Queensland University of Melbourne and there was another one in New Zealand
00:04:19Lincoln University so all these three came like within a short frame of time and then I also got
00:04:27rejected from some universities because of my background in biotech they thought that I wasn't suitable for
00:04:33agriculture and needed to have botany as my subject to qualify for their masters program so I think like
00:04:40while choosing for masters program it's much more about like you might be interested in some subjects but a lot
00:04:47of times
00:04:49for some reason you don't meet their criteria it can be any criteria it can also be English criteria a
00:04:54lot of people don't
00:04:55make it to master's program because they don't satisfy the English requirement or some grade requirements so I think a
00:05:03lot of
00:05:03these things play when you're choosing a masters you might want to go to Howard or places like that Cambridge
00:05:11but then you need to
00:05:13need all the criteria to be in those universities so then when I got the offer letter from Australian and
00:05:24New Zealand
00:05:24Uni's I was just looking at things like what kind of ranking the universities have what kind of courses I
00:05:34would be doing over the course of two years so looking at all those things I kind of chose University
00:05:42of Queensland
00:05:43where I did my masters it was just that the subjects were a bit more interesting and that's what I
00:05:50wanted to do and learn about so that was one reason why I chose University of Queensland for doing masters
00:05:57and then so
00:05:59so maybe something about when I moved to Australia it was it was quite shocking for me honestly because a
00:06:11lot of agriculture kind of fields happen in rural campuses of the universities so you might see a lot of
00:06:18things online which talk about the main campus of the university
00:06:25and so that might have all the facilities and so that might have all the facilities it might be the
00:06:29most multicultural place to be and a lot of student facilities but many times the rural campuses don't have that
00:06:37so specifically moving from India where you have a lot of services
00:06:43it was kind of shocking to go to the campus that I went to 100 kilometers from Brisbane it's the
00:06:50agricultural campus of University of Queensland
00:06:53I was taken aback by it I didn't imagine that Australia is going to be like that in my I
00:07:00think in my memory most of it was what I had seen through videos YouTube and movies so I had
00:07:08a different image of it
00:07:10so I would say that probably the first three months of the first semester was quite challenging coming here everything
00:07:17was like probably I would say 1990s in that campus and also it was my first time like being surrounded
00:07:27by like actual agriculture like I haven't been
00:07:32on the field on field yeah so like because I did biotech and then I grew up in Delhi so
00:07:40of course there was a disconnect between water and water
00:07:44so actually Australia have a lot of landscape open landscape compared to India and Brisbane is also agriculture hub right
00:07:53in Australia they grow lots and lots of things
00:07:56and do lots of research as well compared to Sydney Melbourne and Perth
00:08:02yes so for various reasons of course the university had better ranking as you said the weather here is very
00:08:09similar to that of India like northern India so we can grow like heaps of fruits and vegetables here
00:08:15while if you compare it with Melbourne it's quite cold it's it falls under temperate region so most of the
00:08:21time it's winter there so that makes it really hard for them to do anything
00:08:25and with Sydney agriculture and with Sydney also it's quite metropolitan they do some kind of things but I would
00:08:31assume that's going to be more lab specific than actual field work
00:08:36so I think yeah that was my first impression of it having courses all around the campus there were people
00:08:43still using voicemail having a tape recorder using FM and stuff like that so that was really an unusual experience
00:08:53for me to see it
00:08:57and then after three months I actually decided that I would move to Brisbane and I would go to that
00:09:05campus as in when required just looking at all the facilities that were there in Brisbane and I thought it
00:09:12would be easier for me to actually study rather than just trying to adjust to the place
00:09:18did you live on a campus or you live in Brisbane and go to the campus like that by car
00:09:28or something like that
00:09:29yes so the first semester I lived on campus the campus was Gatton University of Queensland's campus so the first
00:09:37three months were on campus and after that once I had seen how easily I can commute between the two
00:09:46campuses
00:09:47there was like a inter-campus bus that the university had so I was like I might as well live
00:09:53in the city in Brisbane and a lot of other colleagues of mine were also living in Brisbane and they
00:10:01were doing the same thing so I was like okay most of my classmates are living in Brisbane I will
00:10:07also go and live in Brisbane so for the next one and a half years I stayed in Brisbane and
00:10:13then there were a lot of courses that were being
00:10:17taught in both the campuses so I could attend the class either in Brisbane or at the Gatton campus and
00:10:24there was some which I could zoom in into so I didn't have to be physically there so mostly it
00:10:31was like once a week if I had to go for a practical or something so that worked out okay
00:10:39it wasn't that big of a hassle once a week was doable and
00:10:44if anybody wants to do agriculture science and they haven't spent a lot of time on sale or the quiet
00:10:52life I would suggest to them also to probably live in Brisbane and then commute on and off
00:11:04so what is the exact difference because in India we can't get a time to go for a job while
00:11:13studying but if you study abroad anywhere probably you get a little bit of time not little bit you can
00:11:21work and study together so how it's possible if you can explain or I also
00:11:29I also heard about that people apply for university and after one or two semester they shifted to colleges so
00:11:37they can work more because they have less project work or assignments is it true or is it true
00:11:44okay so for both the questions for the first question yes you can work while being on student visa but
00:11:52the number of hours are capped it's 20 hours
00:11:5820 hours fortnightly if I'm not wrong or 20 hours weekly something like that they keep changing the requirements so
00:12:07during masters you can do 20 hours of work your visa allows that but for the second question that you
00:12:15asked about students coming here and then changing to their different lower level universities and colleges that actually has been
00:12:24banned
00:12:25and recently like last month it has been banned because a lot of people were using these kind of loopholes
00:12:32to not come and study but to work and earn money so they have actually completely shut down that you
00:12:39can no longer do that so whatever uni you come in you have to study in that uni and finish
00:12:45that course
00:12:47and also they have shut down the fact that you cannot move from one bachelor degree to another bachelor degree
00:12:52a lot of people used to do that so sideway jumping in courses has been completely stopped you can do
00:13:00a higher degree if you're doing bachelor's you can do a master's and master's to a PhD but you cannot
00:13:05move sideways
00:13:08so but how people get a time you know if you're an example if you study in jp new city
00:13:16so can you go for a job
00:13:22do you get a time to go for a job yeah so to answer that i think universities in india
00:13:31are a bit more structured
00:13:33in the sense that they have a fixed timetable so when i was in jp i was i had classes
00:13:389 a.m to 5 p.m which leaves me no time to work if probably i was living off
00:13:44campus in india
00:13:45maybe if someone hires me after 5 p.m maybe i can do it but being on campus you cannot
00:13:51leave campus
00:13:53after 6 p.m or 7 p.m and then also because i've my university was in a very remote
00:13:59area in india also
00:14:00it was close to solan and shimla and himachal pradesh so there weren't many avenues for you to
00:14:07be doing such kind of work and i also think in india a lot of people look down on you
00:14:11if you're working
00:14:13maybe because of the finances or social status or whatever but a lot of people in india do not
00:14:19are not in the support of people working if you can manage your fees i feel like whereas in australia
00:14:26i mean a lot of immigrants um international students work as well as domestic students work
00:14:34and like kids started start working here when they are 15 years of age so they are quite used to
00:14:41the
00:14:41fact that i have to earn some money if i'm going to do something extra other than the basic things
00:14:46that
00:14:46my parents can support but for example you want to go for a holiday or if you want to do
00:14:52some
00:14:53extracurricular competition that is costing a lot of money so a lot of kids go and work in
00:15:00mcdonald's and places like that to make their own money and sponsor themselves so they are in a habit
00:15:06of doing that and as far as international students um i feel like as i said so i had to
00:15:15go
00:15:16to the gatun campus only once a week other classes were also there but mostly classes are
00:15:21there three to four days maximum it's never five days a week so there are a few days where you
00:15:28either
00:15:29are studying on your courses your subjects you're exploring something else you're working on your
00:15:34assignments um and even on assignment front it's very like it's very free as compared to india in india
00:15:42you would know that this is the question someone has asked me and i have to just answer
00:15:47it there is only one way to answer it whereas in australia i feel like most of the universities give
00:15:52you
00:15:52very open-ended assignments so for example if you are interested in um say growing plants just for
00:16:00example so you are free to choose any plant that you want to study nobody is going to force you
00:16:07that you
00:16:07have to do an assignment on rice or you have to do an assignment on wheat maybe you're not interested
00:16:11in it
00:16:12maybe you're interested in something like flower growing or fruit growing or something like that
00:16:17so you're fully like free to choose whatever subject interests you within the scope of that area
00:16:26and then you can go to the libraries and you can find more information about it i'm not going to
00:16:31say
00:16:31that it's a very easy job it is quite hard as compared to doing assignments in india because you
00:16:37you really have to invest your time and you have to think about so basically you can't do
00:16:42yes you cannot do that and also there is a policy in most of the big public universities
00:16:52so there is a plagiarism software which checks for all the plagiarism that you have done
00:16:57but it's also in india right um i'm not sure how many universities use it mine didn't use it
00:17:06um and also a lot of our assignments for many times written also handwritten as compared to here
00:17:12where everything is digital so it's easy to check for what has been copied and pasted so if if you
00:17:19are
00:17:19flagged for a high plagiarism for example 10 20 percent or they see a paragraph has been copied
00:17:24from somewhere your lecturer is actually going to like ask you to come have a chat with them and
00:17:31they will ask you why have you done this have you copied it why haven't you paraphrased it so it's
00:17:38it
00:17:38has quite serious repercussion here so and how they implement artificial intelligence means uh
00:17:45or adapt in university because now people can use it you know to do their yes assignment or job
00:17:53research work as well specifically people uh indian people who are not comfortable comfortable with
00:18:01english language so they can use it so do they allow it or they want everything
00:18:07do it from your mind like something so as far as i know because ai has come in last
00:18:14three years and i did my masters 10 years ago okay so um i know that ai is welcome but
00:18:22the thing is
00:18:23the idea should be original of yours they don't have any problem for you to polish your english using
00:18:28that kind of software there were such softwares before also like grammarly was one of them you could
00:18:34use it to fix your english but as as long as you are only fixing your english rather than
00:18:39generating ideas through ai which i know is going to be really hard going forward because the ai
00:18:45algorithms are becoming smarter and smarter and they can do a lot of idea generation also
00:18:50so i can't speak much on that but there has been like a lot of policy work happening in universities
00:18:56even in schools because in schools also here a lot of people use
00:19:00uh most of the homework is done using digital platform so so maybe teacher is also making it
00:19:07hard using ai to kids do or students do using ai you know teacher also maybe use the artificial
00:19:15intelligence to make a little bit harder maybe i don't know yeah that can be done but we'll have to
00:19:22see how that ai goes and uh universities yeah and how is uh about like uh uh i guess uh
00:19:32in india
00:19:33north indian universities are specifically himachal university solan university uh in solan there are
00:19:40also very big agriculture universities also there right other than jp yes yes so himachal pradesh parmar
00:19:50university is shulini universities there are heaps of agricultural universities there
00:19:57so i guess uh there are a lot of agriculture students from there they are doing a lot of work
00:20:03but
00:20:04one one question is that do they grow things from seeds or how do they grow or hybrid seeds or
00:20:14do they have
00:20:14seed banks because in india now a lot of people so actually uh american uh companies uh want us to
00:20:23grow uh using their hybrid seeds uh so basically we our natural seeds will go away and after that we
00:20:32have
00:20:32to buy from them so the same kind of concept is implemented over there like you need to buy seeds
00:20:38from
00:20:38company every time every year or how it works yeah unfortunately that's the reality of the world and
00:20:46most of the countries are forced to do this because of the monopoly that people have on seeds so yes
00:20:54you
00:20:54cannot re-germinate if there was like a plant breeders right on one particular variety to be grown in one
00:21:03particular region of the property but if for example that seed has fallen into neighbor's property
00:21:09so you have violated the plant breeders right there in australia this is something like that
00:21:15yes okay yeah so the biosecurity laws yes no seed bank or something like that i mean even the seed
00:21:28banks
00:21:28are made from hybrid seeds they're collecting seeds some of them the professors that are working
00:21:34on breeding they have their seed banks they can do crosses for one generation one generation two generation
00:21:42three but that has to be used for research purpose only they can't sell it to normal people to grow
00:21:48and
00:21:50and means is there any kind of research happen like effect of this hybrid food on
00:21:58people's health right is there any kind of research happen in australia what means have you ever seen
00:22:06i haven't come across it but i'm sure people must be looking in means i have seen that
00:22:13in the usa they protest against this kind of hybrid food this food generator generated from hybrid
00:22:21seeds so a lot of lobbies are also opposing this kind of thing that natural seed should not be destroyed
00:22:29even if you want everything seedless or something like that so one question on that so by hybrid seeds
00:22:37do you mean only any kind of hybrid seeds or do you mean gmos yeah gmos like you cannot reproduce
00:22:44from or you cannot get the seed actually so um so genetically modified seeds are different to hybrid seeds
00:22:53genetically modified seeds are not in use in australia they are not legal there are no gmos
00:23:00um but for um hybrid seeds hybrid seeds is just a breeding way of creating to make it one parent
00:23:09the second parent make another hybrid seed um that is there and that is how even in nature hybrid seeds
00:23:17are used so i i don't see any issue there until and unless is genetically modified australia is okay with
00:23:25but from the customer perspective yes there is a big push against not having any hgmo products in australia
00:23:33and how about organic because i feel in india organic farming is kind of different compared to
00:23:42australian organic farming right so in what terms like in india we have a lot of local
00:23:49uh way to make up uh fertilizers for you know but i have never seen this kind of thing in
00:23:58australia
00:23:59so i guess they just control control the pesticides so that is all for farming
00:24:07i don't know there has been there has been a move to go towards organic farming and in last few
00:24:14years a
00:24:15lot of organic farmers have also popped up but again they are very localized as you said because
00:24:21they cannot do mass production and all often their product is quite expensive as compared to
00:24:28a large field that has produced tons and tons of fruits and veggies so at this point this organic
00:24:36segment of fruits and vegetables is very premium and mostly rich people like to buy that but if you come
00:24:44to normal people who are having like middle class salaries and stuff like that they still are happy to buy
00:24:51the pesticide or insecticide food just because of the cost of growing those kind of products
00:24:58so basically i just want to ask that you know as an example in india people use this plant maybe
00:25:05i don't
00:25:06know how does it called in uh hindi it's a calatrophy plant giant calatrophy plant maybe i don't know you
00:25:17heard about it or not or it's grown in uh north part of india or not i don't know
00:25:24so i haven't heard its name c-a-l-o-p-e uh t-r-o-p-e okay so
00:25:35this is a they use it for maybe potassium or
00:25:39something after maybe a week they do fermentation or i don't know but they use it very much they use
00:25:48it
00:25:51uh good jaggery uh for organic farming but i never heard in australia they do it this kind of
00:26:02local stuff you know actually they provide this kind of training
00:26:06gaubutra yeah they use gaubutra for organic farming and so that's in that terms uh i just want to know
00:26:15that means what kind of things they do you know they just don't use the pesticides and whatever
00:26:21they grow they sell something like that because production will reduced that's why production will
00:26:28reduce yeah so um they do a lot of like manuring and stuff they have composites in their own fields
00:26:39the people who are doing organic farming so they kind of use those kind of things
00:26:44like warm compost vermicompost and stuff like that i haven't heard of cow dung specifically
00:26:53um i haven't been to an organic farm so i can't really speak about it but i do know that
00:26:59vermicompost
00:27:00is quite popular even among people who have um garden in their backyard they would use that kind of
00:27:07um manure for their uh house gardens
00:27:13okay um so this award is actually given by um a channel here called seven news
00:27:21um and it is focused on people who are under the age of 30 who have done some achievement or
00:27:30who
00:27:30have created some real world impact so seven news does a lot of categories it can be anything from
00:27:39from social help to social and legal justice a lot of um those kind of awards are also there and
00:27:46they do do it annually in all the states of australia in different fields
00:27:52so this particular one yes so there are around six to seven categories like mining then women
00:28:02health empowerment and then there was the food industry one which i was in but these were the
00:28:11main fields for this particular award there are specific other awards also um depending on what you're
00:28:19interested in interested in like woman and technology award which covers a lot of um tech
00:28:26kind of awards so if you're looking for computer science or ai or those kind of fields that can
00:28:32be one of the awards that you look into so um the the food innovation award is actually um sponsored
00:28:44by
00:28:44one of the food companies called turossi they do a lot of aviation meals and so they were also the
00:28:51sponsor of one of this young achievers award so basically um you have to be nominated for this award by
00:29:01someone you can also self-nominate yourself but many times it's someone else who is nominating you for this award
00:29:10and so then you have to like go through the application process pretty much like how most of
00:29:15the competition works and you need to have like reference letters from your managers or someone you
00:29:21have worked with showing the credibility of your work and then there were multiple rounds like the top 20
00:29:31top 10 and then the finalist who actually won the award um it's a very rigorous process very difficult
00:29:39process i guess uh not everyone can uh participate uh this of uh people also tried it right something like
00:29:51that i mean people do all of people smart people you can say something like i would say it's both
00:30:01it's
00:30:01being smart and also being able to position yourself as the award one set which is the case with most
00:30:07of
00:30:08the awards it's not really awards don't really judge you on your intelligence if i may say so it's my
00:30:15experience but they also want to see how you present yourself and that is most of the world today so
00:30:27even at
00:30:27work you can be the most smartest but if you're not presenting yourself in a way your boss wants to
00:30:32see it you might not get the promotion it's true so pretty much i that's my experience with the award
00:30:40yeah yeah so when uh how about uh like means did you get into data science or something like that
00:30:48data analytics or data science did you yeah study in those field or something like that yeah
00:30:59so um actually after my masters and my phd which was also in similar field agri-food tech
00:31:07i actually worked in commercialization field which is research translation so doing so i saw a
00:31:19different side of research which i wasn't aware of i always thought that scientist was the only way
00:31:24impact could be created but while doing phd i realized that that might not be the case actually
00:31:31even if you're a scientist but if nobody is using your science it's useless which i learned
00:31:38during my phd i did some project but nobody is using it so what's the point of it it's a
00:31:44waste so
00:31:44what impact i thought as a kid that i want to do through science did not happen so then doing
00:31:51research translation with commercialization i realized that there is like another
00:31:57you may say segment in the middle segment of people who actually work with businesses and with
00:32:05researchers so that both these parties can talk and that was research translation space so while working
00:32:12there i was introduced to my recent job that i was at it was the accelerator program in australia
00:32:23for food and beverage industry and so when i was applying for that job basically it was about
00:32:30someone who knows science and someone who knows how to take it in the market so i kind of fit
00:32:36in the bill
00:32:37and i got that job but that job was very focused on using data analytics to help the businesses
00:32:46of course i wasn't trained in it my background is not in it my background is in biotech and i
00:32:52have learned
00:32:52some little bit of research translation through my last role so most of the data analytics actually
00:32:58that i learned was on my job during doing my job it's a kind of self-study plus experience-based
00:33:07learning
00:33:08right experience-based learning peer-based learning there was a data scientist in our team who i would ask
00:33:15help for so yes i don't have any formal training in data science but i have worked
00:33:23quite a bit quite extensively but now you can train a data scientist
00:33:28i wouldn't say that means you have experience practical experience
00:33:36practical experience but yes i would i wouldn't compete with them i understand what data science is but
00:33:42if you are going to ask me to generate some code or something it's not my forte i can know
00:33:48how to use
00:33:48it so basically in my role my job was to bring in my food science knowledge and work with data
00:33:54science
00:33:55people to combine both these sectors a lot of times in today's world i feel like data analytics is only
00:34:05useful when it's combined with another specialized field so for example in hospitals if you will do it or
00:34:11if you're doing data analytics for some companies or businesses looking into their marketing sales for
00:34:17example youtube you need to have data and you need to analyze it to see how your platform is working
00:34:24so pretty similar to that i had data analysts who were working in my team they were the they were
00:34:31masters of
00:34:32data science student but they were working with me so it was a lot of communication across
00:34:40the segment to make that thing work and yeah so i just had to bring in my food science hat
00:34:47tell them what makes sense what doesn't make sense because data can say random stuff until and unless you
00:34:53put it into context it doesn't really mean anything they're just numbers so yes working on that
00:35:00and i can say now i know something about it architecture and stuff like that and means how
00:35:08do you feel when you go inside a vegetable market or food market do you see this field as a
00:35:16scientific
00:35:17way or just buy and go cut and eat something like that so for me it's a very funny question
00:35:26that you ask
00:35:27because i keep like because uh because you know as an example uh i there was one of my friend
00:35:34uh who
00:35:35was studying botany so he wherever he go with me he collect leaves and seeds and cut it and watch
00:35:44it in
00:35:45uh microscope and you know he make notes of kind of everything yes means vision is different you know
00:35:57yes i would say it's quite similar to me because my my phd has been so even though i have
00:36:03like my
00:36:04background in agriculture but my focus has been really into like nutrition specifically in nutrition for
00:36:09humans so in my phd also i was looking for um nutrients in orange capsicums that can help
00:36:17people in their eye health so reading all those things all about like vitamins and stuff like that
00:36:26my let's start explaining you start explaining about uh anatomy of everything to someone
00:36:34something like that you know it depends who wants to hear it so not always most of the times
00:36:40i don't even talk about my phd to a lot of people specifically when working in a business kind of
00:36:45a environment which i have worked a lot of people are not interested in science but a lot of times
00:36:50when
00:36:51i'm going to science festivals science event i do a lot of science communication also so if someone is
00:36:57interested in those kind of aspects definitely whenever i go to a grocery store definitely i'm
00:37:03reading the label i know what means what and then i'm like i'm not going to buy this so i
00:37:07have the lens
00:37:08that you're talking about your friend it's quite similar but it's for like the packaged food because
00:37:14i'm looking for the nutrients in it fruits and veggies i'm pretty happy with them all the fruits and
00:37:19veggies do their own thing in nutrient space so i'm pretty happy with that i don't have anything to
00:37:26judge in there it's good if you're having which is the useless food in vegetables or fruits
00:37:33or and what is the best food you know like uh uh recently i watched one reel that they said
00:37:41that
00:37:43as we used to say one thing that uh eat apple a day keep doctors away you know something like
00:37:50that so this trend they implement to sell more apples from usa yes so yes something like that so
00:37:58but as an example for you if you go to supermarket what do you think which is the best or
00:38:04which is
00:38:04the worst food or useless food we like these days everybody say in india that uh i don't know it's
00:38:13a
00:38:13it's a protein selling market they do it they say don't eat wheat it's just carbohydrates indian
00:38:21needs protein you know so yeah eating uh rice and uh uh wheat is useless something like that
00:38:31so from my perspective i don't think so any of the any of the fruits or vegetables is bad per
00:38:39se
00:38:39they have their different properties and most of the times this this might sound very contradictory
00:38:45do you eat uh do you eat rice and wheat or you don't eat i do i do i do
00:38:52eat so i think the main message
00:38:55that i wanted the people to get is that all fruits vegetables and the grains you have been eating are
00:39:04fine it just has to be diversified the problem that we have had with wheat and rice is that
00:39:11we have used wheat and rice for everything but if you look traditionally we would have a lot of other
00:39:19things like millets would be there ragi would be there corn flour would be there there were so many
00:39:24others other types of grains and same with lentils also it has become very narrow like if you
00:39:30look at how people are eating avocados in india it's really shocking i'm like you guys have the
00:39:38best fruits in the world why do you want to eat something which doesn't taste like anything
00:39:42and you are ready to pay a premium for it just because western people eat it so my whole concept
00:39:48is to like eat local stuff but nobody would do that everybody wants to follow as you say avocado
00:39:56there is one another level that people also eat dragon fruit like yes both of them like both of the
00:40:04both of the fruits grow here so i understand people eating them because people here do not have
00:40:10chico they do not have guava there are no good mangoes there are so many other fruits that we don't
00:40:16have ears so we have limited fruits and we eat them similarly with us also so a lot of
00:40:23i think most of the things that happen with food is marketing like you said about the apple it is
00:40:30pretty similar with other things also that you would hear for example kiwi it has been said to be
00:40:36very rich in vitamin c that's fine but guava is the richest source and indians have it
00:40:41but because there is no need yeah okay that i don't know i also don't know
00:40:51yeah guava is the richest it's just that in india i think we don't do a lot of nutritional research
00:40:57for our own fruits and vegetables and grains so what happens is people from abroad come and take such
00:41:06kind of fruits they're interested in it they find it interesting and they're like oh my god super
00:41:11food that is what has happened with most of our fruits it happened with uh i've recently seen with guava
00:41:18there are some people studying guava here and they're like vitamin c it's so good in vitamin c but
00:41:24guava doesn't grow here so what's the point but they will sell it back to the people be it india
00:41:30be it
00:41:30africa be it other culturally rich country they will sell it back to you with a premium price because
00:41:36then you will be buying seeds from those companies who have done this research and you lose the authority
00:41:42of growing your own food so that's the other perspective that i have means uh australia also grow
00:41:50millets because i heard they have started they grow pulses because uh when i talk with uh this
00:42:00panda australia uh he said that uh actually they don't want too much diversity means they don't want
00:42:08to import seeds because it it also carries some disease you know like a rubber plant so i i i
00:42:16don't
00:42:16know this is true or not uh actually rubber plant was native in brazil or somewhere around it but
00:42:22because there is a very big uh fungal disease or something like that uh britishers shifted all rubber
00:42:30plants because uh those time is uh industrial revolution so they need a lot of rubbers to make
00:42:36attires so they shift in uh asian countries like thailand or malaysia or kerala or in india yes
00:42:45so uh australia even aust in australia you can't bring food uh food sorry fruit or food from
00:42:53one state to another state right they have fines there are strict biosecurity rules here you can't
00:42:59bring any food inside the country some states are also very strict like south australia quite strict
00:43:07they check every bus that's crossing the border um northern territory western australia all of them very
00:43:12strict uh strict because all of them have very they're trying to protect their native crop and
00:43:19a lot of times when we are bringing in another plant so what is native what is native fruits if
00:43:25you know
00:43:26because i i have seen you know i feel jealous when i have seen anjeer uh i don't know how
00:43:32to call it in
00:43:33english pig so yeah so a lot of parrots are enjoying lots of anjeer and uh it's a it's like
00:43:43a normal plant you know everywhere and they are also growing khajoor right they also grow khajoor they
00:43:51are in at least premium quality of uh khajoor in uh desert part i guess they are also growing lots
00:44:01of
00:44:01policies as well india is quite popular chickpea is quite popular here that has taken up the pace
00:44:09but just to answer your question so for australian native plants there are a lot of seeds which
00:44:15indigenous people of australia used to use so for example there was there is something called lemon
00:44:22motley plant which is an equivalent of lemon but its look and feel is different and it's quite
00:44:28sour also similarly there are some seeds like water seeds so they have like a very nutty flavor
00:44:36so for example you can compare it with smaller seeds in india and i cannot recollect the name of
00:44:43some seeds which are native to india but they will do the job so you don't really need to have
00:44:49almonds
00:44:49per se you can have water seeds here so indigenous people used to eat those kind of things there is
00:44:56another one which is like uh it's called millipilli so um there is strawberry gum so strawberry gum has
00:45:05very similar taste to strawberry that's why they named it strawberry gum it's indigenous name is
00:45:11something else but all these plants are already here which people used to eat
00:45:16the other things is also native or fig is not native of australia fig is not native the plants that
00:45:23are
00:45:23native native to australia are very different and you might not have heard them ever what kind of
00:45:31things they eat like this in indigenous time indigenous people used to eat rice or wheat or they don't
00:45:38they just eat meat and things like that the meat was the popular one they would do hunting it it
00:45:47depends
00:45:47like how far we go if we go into into 1800s before britishers yes so that's when britishers came
00:45:55here in 1800 so they brought all the stuff that they brought to the rest of the world
00:46:00i guess coffee is also brought right coffee planting is also coffee is not native right no
00:46:10no it's not um so yeah before that a lot of different kinds of meat they would eat and a
00:46:18lot
00:46:18of people were tribal so they will keep on moving there's something called banya nuts which is quite
00:46:23popular um it's similar to cashew or something it has that kind of rich flavor people used to eat that
00:46:31heaps of banya trees here and then macadamia nuts is another one i don't know if you have heard of
00:46:40it
00:46:41maybe the marketing would make it very popular somehow but yeah i have seen only hybrid hybrid food
00:46:48in australia means i visited australia i always see hybrid food means big big things lemon is also very
00:46:55big and everything is big in size yeah i guess australian people i mean so white people they eat
00:47:03lot of food compared to indian their beer is very big and everything is big the size is also big
00:47:10size is
00:47:11big that's true but that comes back to the fact that a lot of people who came here to australia
00:47:18were
00:47:18convicts of britishers so they chose people who were tall and they could do road building and
00:47:26mining and stuff like that uh pretty similar to what britishers did with people from africa they took
00:47:33all the strongest or strong to us to do the similar kind of work so yes they're quite big but
00:47:40coming to
00:47:40the portion size i'm not really sure what the exact reason is for them to be making everything huge
00:47:47like onions are this big watermelon is this big you cannot really eat it but for me i feel like
00:47:55it's more to optimize the agricultural process so that you can maximize the productivity rather than
00:48:04focusing on the taste many times there things can be very good looking there is this one mango here
00:48:11calypso when you have time have a look at it it looks beautiful it has a pink blush and you
00:48:17would think um that it's going to be very sweet and tasty it's not like that it's flat yes it
00:48:24looks
00:48:24good yes it has a pulp basically they they grow for pulp maybe yeah something like that yeah
00:48:35interesting so actually brisbane is a kind of heaven for agriculture or farmers you know for indian
00:48:43farmers like uh i guess uh lots of people uh have a kind of desire to go to israel to
00:48:51learn farming
00:48:52advanced farming i guess indians should also consider brisbane
00:48:58i guess they have a lot of things uh they do a lot of farming and process yeah process and
00:49:08yes things like that primary production yes a lot the reproduction is also very big so means how is the
00:49:15uh protein marketing going over there they the people start eating protein powders or it has been going on
00:49:25for a while in australia and i think so means white people eat protein because they don't need
00:49:31right or they also need protein yeah so so everybody i think in the world is eating protein at the
00:49:38market
00:49:39regardless of what they eat so as you said aussie people have like already a lot of meat red meat
00:49:45is
00:49:45a good source of protein and they primarily eat red meat so they also have eggs and milk and cheese
00:49:53they
00:49:53also eat a lot of cheese here but they still do have protein powders and it's not you know as
00:50:00an
00:50:00example it it's like uh you know if you get a clean water how can we sell a water purifier
00:50:08you know
00:50:08something like that honestly if i tell you i think it's more to do with the marketing and the second
00:50:16thing
00:50:16is people do not have that much time to think about it so they're just like oh someone said it
00:50:21let's just do
00:50:22it rather than actually going into it because everybody doesn't have expertise for example if
00:50:27you ask me if someone is telling me okay have this software in your computer it's going to help you
00:50:32maybe i will take it i don't know if it's going to be worth it or not it's pretty similar
00:50:37with food also
00:50:38people have lost touch with their food they don't know what they're eating so as i said you might be
00:50:46already eating protein but because you don't know where it is coming from what it has you're
00:50:52ready to buy the product so with protein market it has been so saturated in australia that it's not
00:51:00not only protein powders it's protein snack bars protein yogurt protein x protein y anything you can
00:51:11sell in this country by saying protein in it there's also something like protein lassi kind of thing
00:51:19so like a milk product but actually protein lassi is also a milk product in india so maybe they try
00:51:25to
00:51:26do it in australia indian people try to yes so not lassi but like it was a milk beverage yeah
00:51:33and
00:51:33it had like 30 grams protein but a lot lot of people don't understand that when you have that much
00:51:39protein your kidneys can also suffer yeah and so a lot of people are like hospitalized with kidney stones
00:51:47and stuff like that so i think it's just marketing gimmick
00:51:53and uh you know as an example uh in western countries like miss cold countries where they
00:51:59have a less sun exposure so they uh uh eat extra supplements like vitamin d
00:52:07so i guess in australia they don't need it right because they don't need they don't need it there's
00:52:13they need sunscreen to protect from sun rather than yeah yeah but i i think people still do take
00:52:24vitamin d supplements here again it's just a mass concept that everybody taking vitamin d so i also
00:52:29need to take vitamin i guess uh multi-vitamin is uh popular everybody think in that way that uh if
00:52:39you
00:52:39take multi-vitamines uh it will balance all vitamins i guess recently i get um uh sleeping
00:52:49uh gummies are also getting popular you know you get a melanin yeah melanin right yeah melanin is used
00:52:56for sleep right yes yes that's right so that is also improper this kind of marketing is also started
00:53:04in australia or it's not like you will get a better sleep yes yes we have all of that and
00:53:12like
00:53:12this is not like a recent trend that has come up here it has been there for a while nowadays
00:53:18there has
00:53:19been like magnesium take magnesium for better better sleep then i have also seen products which are
00:53:26having ashwagandha at the moment and they're selling ashwagandha for similar kind of results so
00:53:34you can sell whatever you want you just have to do good marketing for a mass number of people
00:53:40better sleep is there better hair is there you might have heard of collagen which has been going
00:53:45on for years and years and people are just taking collagen supplements even with collagen i have seen
00:53:51collagen supplemented water people are also ready to take collagen in their water which makes no sense to
00:53:59but uh yeah if you have a pain point like for example in today's world sleep is important and
00:54:07many people suffer from it they're selling it for sleep um there is recent trend which is coming up i
00:54:15don't know if you have heard of it it's not even recent i think it has already been trending it's
00:54:21called
00:54:21fiber maxing so they have people have started focusing on their fiber intake now so protein is
00:54:29like a long one protein is the old trend fiber maxing is the new one and people are taking like
00:54:36heaps and heaps of fiber so if you look so do they have a problem because uh i used to
00:54:44hear that
00:54:45indians eat a lot of uh masala so they have a acidity and uh this kind of problem but uh
00:54:53western people
00:54:54don't eat but i guess they eat meat so i guess that creates undigestion right yes so fruit and
00:55:02vegetable intake in australia is quite low based on the facts based on the statistics that i have
00:55:08seen they eat really less number of fruit and vegetable they would eat meat that is fine but as all
00:55:17i would say countries that become rich they move into a lot of packaged foods which kind of removes a
00:55:25lot of fiber from things most of the things so if you look into like having
00:55:32protein through dal in that case it would also have some amounts of other vitamins and minerals
00:55:38which is going to help it to be absorbed but if you just take protein powder a lot of protein
00:55:45powder
00:55:45actually just goes through your digestive system without getting absorbed because it has been
00:55:50separated from its original state so that happens quite a lot here and also i think work stress is
00:55:59that is another problem okay yeah it creates everything yeah what kind of structures collapsed
00:56:07even if you eat uh most expensive water drink most expensive water most expensive food
00:56:14if you're stressed nothing is useful yes exactly so i think with stress digestion is the first one
00:56:24that you can see how about isabgul i don't know what is the english name of isabgul do you know
00:56:30isabgul um yes i know i heard that that is also getting marketed by a lot of people they try
00:56:39to sell
00:56:39isabgul in western world natural it's true it's true i have seen some products here as well in premium shops
00:56:48and it just makes me laugh right in australia it is a premium product
00:56:57do they grow or they don't grow no i don't think so they grow it i don't think they grow
00:57:04it it was just
00:57:05a product in a grocery store which has like products from all across the world so they have started
00:57:12selling it but a lot of people who have been who have been to india who are experienced or exposed
00:57:20to yoga and stuff like that they would hear it from their indian friends or their teacher would talk
00:57:24about it and then they would start doing such kind of things there was this one particular thing i don't
00:57:30know if you have heard of it but in yoga there is something called nasal cleaning uh with water
00:57:41that has picked up in australia i was so shocked looking at it that some people had it and i
00:57:48was
00:57:48just asking this woman where did you buy this uh mug from and she's like oh you find it in
00:57:54the
00:57:55so and so store so i was quite amazed i thought it was very like an indian thing and like
00:58:02people
00:58:02who even do yoga in india don't know about it but she was doing it she said it helped her
00:58:09with her
00:58:09sinuses so there you go yeah actually i visited himachal so i i i have talked with uh australian
00:58:17people who come for certification so they can practice uh or professionally they do it in australia
00:58:26i guess it is a basic thing means they teach in uh yoga yeah like initially i would see that
00:58:36in maybe
00:58:3780s or 90s in india uh in our schools we just uh read it in books but we never do
00:58:45it practically
00:58:45a little bit yeah i mean that has been i think that has been the issue with india for very
00:58:51long
00:58:52time like you would have known that uh when turmeric was being sold as capsules by us and they got
00:59:00a
00:59:00patent on it anti-inflammatory it was such a big deal like maybe they will have a patent in
00:59:07isabgul in future i feel trifola is isabgul everything will be patent in future trifola is
00:59:14also very useful for in digestion you know in digestion yes they also sell it interesting australia
00:59:25isabgul in a very very different culture but yeah it's a multi-culture country i guess
00:59:31everybody have in so actually chinese people also have this kind of medicine but uh never explore yeah
00:59:40i don't know yes something like that yeah i think a lot of people who are becoming aware western
00:59:48people who have been becoming aware about natural medicine and stuff like that they are either going to
00:59:53chinese medicine or ayurveda so like i was saying ashwagandha and stuff like that people have
00:59:59started taking so it just depends like who they are interacting with who's telling them what to use
01:00:04and they see oh my friend did this and it worked out for them and then there is a growing
01:00:08market or also
01:00:10there is marketing campaigns from bigger companies who would tell you that this is going to help you and
01:00:15some people are quite um innovative and they're happy to try so if it works for them it works for
01:00:23them
01:00:23you don't really have to hard sell them they are already willing to try it so you know there
01:00:28is one uh because uh there is a lot of uh uh sleep uh related uh medicines and uh supplements
01:00:36available
01:00:37so i guess uh maybe after some time uh you will see poppy seeds you know poppy seeds uh i
01:00:44don't know how
01:00:45how do you call it in hindi but uh it will be also going to be sold you know it
01:00:52gives a very good
01:00:53sleep yeah i'm not sure if i've seen it already but it seems like people start using ashwagandha but
01:01:02this thing is a more powerful than ashwagandha for better sleep it's a kind of alcoholic thing you know it
01:01:10create effects like that that's why you will get a very deep sleep that's why a lot of uh
01:01:17mithai they use poppy seeds so when you eat you go sleep
01:01:23okay i didn't know about the mithai i guess after talking with uh you means this thing come in mind
01:01:30my mind that in future people should start selling uh poppy seed as a sleep sleep supplement you know
01:01:38end of thing now that you say that it just came to my mind have you seen how makhana is
01:01:44exploding in western market makhana is also getting popular yeah in india even i also started
01:01:51it's becoming really popular there are so many startups here who are working in fox yes
01:02:01yes that is also getting popular yeah i think we just missed the opportunity yes we kept moving
01:02:10towards um like pepsicos products like yeah we are we are shifting towards uh mcdonald's they are shifting
01:02:18towards makhana something like this yes yes that's exactly what has happened but i think it just takes
01:02:24time and it's uh only human nature to like go through something and realize what we had was
01:02:31good go back to nature something like that people start moving towards rural life because now they realize
01:02:39the city life is not good for their they disturb all your cycle you know yes yes i have seen
01:02:49a lot of
01:02:50couples moving back people who had like jobs in singapore usa going back to their hometowns in
01:02:57utrakhan and living like a very basic life in himachal pradesh started growing their own food
01:03:03so it's quite nice to see but you need to have a lot of backing to be able to do
01:03:09that not everybody can
01:03:10do it yeah yes everybody can do but you need to stop watching instagram and so you can do it
01:03:17otherwise you
01:03:17never do it because instagram make you uh you know capitalistic on more money travel or more
01:03:26money travel they can't settle you down like that i guess yeah yeah i was just saying there are a
01:03:37lot of
01:03:38like uh australian people that have seen in youtube videos also who have started living in uh what's that
01:03:45ashram in south india in kerala um yeah i think it's um tamiladu one yes tamiladu the city which is
01:03:56in itself there so they go there and live there they love it there
01:04:02so yeah so basically indians want to go to western world and western world go to
01:04:08they enjoy western life so they want to live a real life something like that
01:04:14i wouldn't say all of them no i wouldn't say it's all of them like some australians love living here
01:04:22they do not have they don't need to any desire to go to any ancient country for that matter um
01:04:29but some
01:04:30some people are inclined you know recently one australian australian man is getting popular
01:04:38by talking hindi maybe you have seen the real there are heaps of them there are heaps of them and
01:04:44most
01:04:44of the it's not even only australian i think there are people from across the world who are trying to
01:04:50speak either in chinese or hindi because there is maximum population there so they can get a lot of likes
01:04:57so i have seen both these languages being spoken by people in russia people in ghana or people in
01:05:05any other country they would do it and they would get mass dialogues yeah bollywood dialogues and bollywood
01:05:11songs so a few things come in my mind so basically how do you see uh research or career you
01:05:21know is it
01:05:21good or it's better uh to work in professional field or and how do you see yourself after maybe
01:05:29few years like do you want to become a kind of uh ceo or cfo not cfo but uh this
01:05:37kind of career path or
01:05:39a dean of a university or how do you see yourself like as an example in india if you do
01:05:47research work
01:05:48there is no means people do it for just job so is it similar thing over there or there as
01:05:55you already
01:05:56said whatever you do research is not implemented in practical world but still
01:06:03there is some worth yeah um so i think in australia you can have
01:06:10you have both kinds of profession in the sense after phd you can be a professional in an industry
01:06:20you can be you can study on business you can be a researcher you can be a lecturer and take
01:06:27the
01:06:27academic route um i'm not sure how it compares with india but um as far as i know generally in
01:06:36india it's not
01:06:37very easy to change your professions and merge into other things take into new stuff once you have
01:06:43a label you have a label and most of the time you have to stick with it until and unless
01:06:48you take
01:06:48other credentials formal qualifications you cannot move but in australia it's quite
01:06:56easy and it's quite usual a lot of people do that
01:07:00and they do it quite often you would see people coming from random sectors they want to do
01:07:07agriculture now and it is okay you can start your career again as far as for me i think
01:07:16i see myself more working towards maybe industry organizations or those kind of places like
01:07:25industry big bodies where i can of course work with research i like it and then but i can also
01:07:33have some real world impact so i do not see myself as someone who is just sitting in a lab
01:07:41trying to
01:07:41find a very fundamental biology question that's not for me some people like finding that but i think my
01:07:50focus was more to create some change with the research for me that's not a pathway so i don't see
01:07:56myself as a professor or a dean of a school but probably ceo yes sure why not director at some
01:08:04organizations or maybe buy some land and start farming or build a kind of you know
01:08:13uh your own laboratory and do research work to uh make a patented uh seeds you know something
01:08:21like that means have you thought or it's very expensive path i have thought of it um that i want
01:08:30to
01:08:30do it it can be just my mental block that i think i need more experience as you said you
01:08:36can start
01:08:37anytime so maybe it's just a mental block that i wouldn't be able to do it but i have thought
01:08:41about
01:08:42that also but it wouldn't be i don't think so it's going to be lab based it's going to be
01:08:47organic farming if it if it ever comes to fruition and uh how is your experience or how
01:08:59western people or minister people who live in uh australia they think about china means china is growing
01:09:06very fast i guess maybe compared to usa as well right how do they see china if ever you have
01:09:15seen
01:09:15any kind of discussion so in what respect like uh in the technology field or in agriculture field as
01:09:25well because i feel that in india because i am from uh agriculture background so people people's lands are
01:09:33getting shrinking you know uh because uh after independence some families get 100 bigger so
01:09:41they divided into five they divided into five and now people have a five you got two bigger so basically
01:09:49a lot of people say that in future like reliance and this kind of company will have a land they
01:09:57industrialized it so as we go in factories and produce that thing happen and this thing is also
01:10:04started happening in china so they have a private companies who do farming in uh vertical farming and
01:10:13things like that so yeah uh but i i guess uh in australia uh right now uh in the individual
01:10:22farmers
01:10:23have had uh lots of land and they do a farming right now but maybe in future they will also
01:10:29go
01:10:30in this uh path i don't know how is your experience industrialization or agriculture or something like
01:10:38that um so there are two things one is that the farmers in australia
01:10:49have quite massive amount of lands which land is not an issue land is not an issue people have
01:10:59i don't know hectares yeah like even even
01:11:07my colleagues can be saying oh we have a 15 acre property and they would still not count it as
01:11:12something for farming so it's very natural to people for people to have 15 20 acres of land they
01:11:20grow up in there but they still don't call themselves farmers so one is that that they have a lot
01:11:26of
01:11:28power the farmers they have a lot of power they're very financially secure i wouldn't let's not say very
01:11:35because a lot of farmers are also struggling here because of climate change and stuff but as compared to
01:11:40india whatever i'm saying is in comparison to india if you look at if you think about indian farmer
01:11:47you would have an image but if you think about australian farmer it's going to be absolutely
01:11:51different he might have like a big house he might also have multiple cars and those kind of things so
01:11:57financially they are quite different so one thing is that the second thing is that um because australia is
01:12:07so big the manufacturing sector in australia is quite poor so they are dependent on china or vietnam
01:12:17maybe because i have seen that they imported most of the thing from china so lots of startup based on
01:12:26that in agriculture sector as well but they have a farming equipment companies as well right like they also
01:12:36produce their own tractors something like that sorry i don't know about that but um imports are
01:12:45there but australia also is a major exporter for a lot of asian countries including vietnam and china
01:12:52so we do sell a lot of raw products to asian countries there are one of our biggest markets
01:13:02and the thing with industrialization of farming is that the person who is or the company who is
01:13:08going to do that they have to invest a lot of money in infrastructure it has to be quite massive
01:13:14because labor is quite expensive construction is quite expensive and you need to have some supply chain
01:13:20to basically move around stuff so it has to be some very big company that is able to do it
01:13:26to move
01:13:27things and have refrigeration like small small distances like people might say small distances here for
01:13:35three four hours but it's fair way away if you have to travel three four hours so in that regard
01:13:41because
01:13:41of distance and the labor cost value addition for fruits and vegetables is quite difficult here
01:13:49so a lot of times what happens is that india sells sorry australia sells a lot of their products to
01:13:56other countries which have well established processing units for example most of the tomatoes that we have
01:14:05here go to spain to be canned and they are imported back to australia as canned tomatoes so that is
01:14:16the
01:14:17level of difficulty that i'm saying in processing in australia is you would you would wonder that a tomato
01:14:27has gone on to spain and it has been only canned there and come back to australia as opposed to
01:14:33to australia doing it over here that would be cheaper but it's not it's more expensive so
01:14:42i think with industrialization of fabric culture we would need a lot of capital basically
01:14:48and how about this in india we have a mondi right to sell means they decide the price so
01:14:54is this the same kind of concept in australia do they have a mondi kind of setup or farmers can
01:15:00decide
01:15:01their own price um i'm not sure about it but we do have farmers markets here there is a wholesale
01:15:11place also from where small small markets are set up in different suburbs but i'm not sure how the
01:15:19prices are set in these markets but as for as i know for grocery store and retailers i think the
01:15:27uh big companies calls and uh they directly uh you know do contract whatever you produce we buy
01:15:37something like that according to their uh dimensions like specification as a specifications yeah uh and one
01:15:45more thing like in india uh i visited few uh agriculture expo so they are trying to rent or sell
01:15:53a drone
01:15:53plus uh plus uh automated uh ai not ai but gps enabled tractors and things like that but when i
01:16:01say
01:16:01them uh people don't have this much big farms what is the purpose of two like three like of a
01:16:08product you know
01:16:09but i guess in australia they have a big farm so they can have a helicopters and but i guess
01:16:15helicopters are
01:16:17are outdated because of drone now people don't need uh helicopter trainings because they i have seen in
01:16:24adelaide uh farmers uh get training in helicopter for pesticides yeah but a drone solve this problem right
01:16:36yes yes yeah we do have a lot of um farming like agriculture people both animal and plants
01:16:46use um such kind of equipment um there are also companies that do service for like a you you
01:16:56don't have to purchase you don't necessarily have to purchase drone you can just do like a service
01:17:01contract and they will come and help you do it so those kind of things are there but i'm not
01:17:07sure how
01:17:07big the uh uptake is but i have also seen in agricultural expos that there are all these kind of
01:17:13drones and
01:17:14other kinds of weed killer automated machine physical removing of weeds that um companies talk about
01:17:25but yeah the bigger ones i would have to go and see you know actually i have seen one uh
01:17:33service uh
01:17:35a promotional video of one company in australia that uh basically if uh there are some uh pigs or
01:17:43you know animals like that uh get into this lots of this kind of uh animals get into your farm
01:17:50so they just eliminate you know from helicopter they shoot them basically so this kind of service i
01:17:58have seen for first time because uh yeah it's very interesting you know
01:18:07that's the land is so big that's that's what it is the land is really big and even for one
01:18:12farmer
01:18:13and their family to be able to do everything by themselves it's really hard so they rely quite a lot
01:18:20on seasonal workers who are here on working holiday visa yeah they offer it for indian as well
01:18:30but i don't know they are start giving it or not but yeah yes i heard when uh modi was
01:18:37here i heard
01:18:38that they started that but i don't know if anyone has used it i haven't come across any indian
01:18:43on that visa yet and how about i guess in future ai enabled uh tracking system like this kind of
01:18:54predators come into your farm they can directly kill them you know with laser or i don't know something
01:19:01like that because a lot of places are in australia as well they started implementing enabled cctv cameras so
01:19:10if even if your phone is on your lap and you are using it you will get a fine yes
01:19:17this kind of
01:19:18thing also uh may be available in the agriculture sector this kind of thing yes at the moment um i
01:19:29have
01:19:30seen some kind of robotics happen in banana farms where um de-handling the banana is quite risky job
01:19:39a lot of people get injured doing that and it's quite heavy also so i came across this one
01:19:47technology recently it was like a robotic arm i don't know how much uptake would be there for that
01:19:54tech but that was one that i recently saw something new last year that they're doing yeah and how is
01:20:02your
01:20:02uh local australian they are adapting artificial intelligence means uh because it's a kind of a
01:20:09power you know now you can build something by yourself maybe have you ever think to build
01:20:18something to solve something you know like building an application or software or anything like that have
01:20:25you have you any desire that i will solve this problem because in early days i need to hire
01:20:312050 software engineer but now maybe i can do it using artificial intelligence means have you ever
01:20:37thought about it or how do you use artificial intelligence
01:20:44so i used artificial intelligence quite a lot when i was doing the data analytics work
01:20:50that really helps it accelerates your work quite a lot but um what i have been recently getting
01:20:59interested in is basically i feel like there is a lot of research that has already happened there
01:21:05are a lot of technologies that are already existing it's just that it's not reaching to the people that
01:21:12it should be reaching to so my main um concern or idea or vision you can say is going to
01:21:21be working in
01:21:22organizations that actually do this kind of work so for example world food program is something
01:21:30set up a rules for using artificial intelligence
01:21:33not really like ai is okay i used it for the work that i had to do but i think
01:21:43there is a lot of ground
01:21:44work that needs to happen so when i look into a lot of uh world food programs work in india
01:21:50also they do
01:21:51things like um grain atms they are doing other things to help supply chain logistics using
01:21:59sensors and cameras so that the food that is produced is not wasted so i feel like these kind
01:22:05of technologies are helpful but the fact is that they're already existing people haven't implemented
01:22:13them so we are still losing so much food one third of the agricultural produce that is produced by
01:22:19world goes into waste so i am coming from a food security perspective it might not sound very
01:22:25interesting technical savvy but the thing is that you have to think in that way food that is getting
01:22:34wasted also there are so many yes so basically so yeah there are so many people who still can't afford
01:22:41a
01:22:41meal why not so food distribution channel and food security so no waste of food yeah
01:22:52yes it would be good like even in australia there are as you spoke about coals and woolverts they
01:22:58have specific standards and they reject the most of the produce which doesn't fit in that standard
01:23:06it's a heavy amount of food that goes into dump so nowadays people have started like making
01:23:13businesses out of it there was this one business i think funky foods australia or something so basically
01:23:19all the misshaped fruits and vegetables um yeah i was just saying that so yes they are trying to rescue
01:23:27the
01:23:27food rescue vegetables but uh i guess uh they have a vegetable markets right they means people can uh a
01:23:37lot
01:23:37of people asian people or sometimes uh white people also buy from uh west means in the vegetable market
01:23:45or farmers market at a little bit of chicken because calls is little bit expensive calls is definitely
01:23:54much more expensive i guess uh us and australia and maybe china they produce more food because of
01:24:04implement processes and you know they have a lot of land maybe they are producing more than india i don't
01:24:11know
01:24:13they have lots of surplus because us also want to push their produce everywhere china's don't want
01:24:22to buy it so now they are they want other countries to stop their agriculture and they won't start buying
01:24:30from usa because they are producing so much because they they have a yeah infrastructure like that yeah i think
01:24:38it's also the research that helps them produce that much they have reduced a lot of pest and disease
01:24:44which leads to wastage of a lot of plants on farms so in both these countries specifically in australia
01:24:54the focus of research is pretty much on increasing the yield quite a lot so there is less food wastage
01:25:03at
01:25:03that stage and also the population australia is not that big so naturally we produce a lot more food
01:25:13than we actually need while for india there are a lot of products produced that india is number one producer
01:25:21of but we use a lot of it and means do australia export their food to china or you don't
01:25:31know about it
01:25:32have you ever heard a little bit of what kind of instead yes i guess coffee definitely they sell
01:25:39coffee because but yeah in china they don't drink coffee right they drink tea yes and also australia is
01:25:46not a big producer of coffee so no we don't have the capacity to be doing that we have only
01:25:52recently
01:25:52started growing coffee in australia also otherwise most of our coffee was coming from africa or brazil or
01:25:58other countries that grow coffee but i think most of the uh export that we do to china and japan
01:26:09is mostly beef um australian beef is quite highly regarded so that has a premium market for australians
01:26:18there i am not 100 sure of any fruit or vegetable in particular that goes to these markets but australian
01:26:27beef definitely goes to both chinese market and japanese market and how about seafood do they sell
01:26:35seafood or it's restricted i guess there are a lot of environmental constraints right
01:26:43um australia for seafood i don't know if there is in environmental restrictions so but like japan and
01:26:54china both are near to the ocean so they do a lot of seafood yes they do it a lot
01:27:01by themselves and their
01:27:02produce is also quite healthy and rich so don't need it okay but yeah china is as you said is
01:27:12a very
01:27:12big uh agricultural products producer and they are just going on and on with it they have one of some
01:27:21of the biggest aquaculture farms or other things that i have heard they're doing an amazing job so i think
01:27:28slowly and slowly they are trying to reduce their reliance on usa or australia they would be
01:27:34fully catered to by their own produce maybe indian farmers should stop thinking about israel now maybe
01:27:42they have to go and see how china is or go for you know and agriculture courses over there and
01:27:50study how
01:27:51they do it i don't know maybe it will be more helpful i think so i would highly
01:27:58recommend it actually they're doing quite well in tech do they produce wheat have you heard i guess
01:28:04they just produce a rice or no i don't know i don't know about i don't know i don't know
01:28:13about
01:28:13wheat but i know that they produce everything so if there is a market for something they will produce it
01:28:19do they produce a chiku and guava and mangoes i guess no idea
01:28:28i think for mango the largest producer is still india just because we have so many
01:28:35and thailand i guess yeah mangoes yeah but they do not have as many varieties as india india has
01:28:46it is the most varieties in the world
01:28:49it is free to provide