Agriculture sciences

Sugar is an integral part of many foods and it is hard to imagine a household without it. The white crystalline sweetener is obtained from sugar cane, but also from the domestic sugar beet. However, the cultivation of the sugar beet is laborious, because weeds have to be removed regularly and is therefore declining in some regions. In conventional farming, pesticides are used that are harmful to the environment. In organic farming, the pests are removed with a hoe. Both methods are not only time-consuming, but ultimately expensive.

Even though more and more people are adopting a vegetarian or even vegan diet, for many, meat products are still an integral part of their daily diet. In the EU alone, per capita consumption is around 80 kilograms of meat per year. For a long time now, it has not only been environmental organizations that have been campaigning for a reduction in meat consumption and pointing out the consequences of animal husbandry. Numerous studies have also established that eating less meat is not only healthy, but also sustainable.

Bioethanol is a bio-based alternative to petroleum-based fuels or fuel blends. A European research network with the participation of the University of Hohenheim has developed an experimental project whose process is even supposed to be more climate-friendly than merely climate-neutral. The focus is on the giant grass Miscanthus × gigantheus and the storage of carbon dioxide (CO₂). 

Blueberries are in demand: their acreage has more than doubled in recent years to over 3,000 hectares. However, as with many perennial plants, insect pests are causing difficulties for fruit growers. The cherry vinegar fly, for example, lays its eggs in the berries, rendering the fruit unusable for trade. And the larvae of the chokecherry weevil and white grubs eat the blueberry roots, causing the plants to suffer or even die. The HOPE collaborative research project aims to develop sustainable, non-chemical solutions to both problems.

The black soldier fly has long been identified as a valuable building block of a bio-based circular economy: it can use a wide variety of residual and waste materials as feed, its larvae gain weight quickly and contain high-quality proteins. As a feed additive and soy substitute, they are therefore already approved in pig and chicken farming. Other applications - including for food - are under development.

Heat, drought, storms and pests have taken their toll on the forest in recent years. Spruces, pines and Douglas firs in particular are suffering massively from the ongoing drought. Reforestation is therefore a key task to make the ecosystem fit for the future. Mediterranean plants could be an alternative that will soon populate native forests, as researchers from the Bavarian Office of Forest Genetics (AWG) and the Forest Research Institute Baden-Württemberg (FVA) have shown.