Aquaponics: A sustainable solution to urban food insecurity

The COVID19 pandemic and subsequent recession demonstrated a weakness in the American food system by breaking of many of the established food chains. The result was a dramatic increase in food insecurity in the United States.  Though the recession and pandemic may be abating, the food issues will leave a residual impact.

One of the solutions tested to address the food issue was to revive the WWII Victory Gardens that in 1945 produced 40% of the food in the nation from individual back yards. The challenge today, however, is that the modern back yard is a postage stamp compared to the yards of the past, thus not providing enough space to produce the food necessary to feed a family. This session follows a recent case study in Phoenix testing if aquaponics can provide a solution to this dilemma allowing the Victory Garden business model to be revived.

FREE ADMISSION to the 2 hour session on Tuesday, June 8, 2021  

08:00 PM Eastern _ 07:00 PM Central  _ 06:00 PM Mountain _ 05:00 PM Pacific Time

This session is complimentary however a donation today helps DRBI continue to offer exceptional content to you. Thank you in advance. Please donate here.

DRBI is delighted to host George B. Brooks, Jr., a visionary, thinker, doer, environmental, economic, transformational, political leader and living technology developer. He is the Founder, President & CEO of NxT Horizon an AgTech (Agriculture Technology) consulting firm focusing on sustainable solutions to real world problems and is an expert on the urban aquaculture (aquaponics) of tilapia (fish) and giant freshwater prawns. He is a frequent writer and contributor to magazines including Aquaculture Magazine and Arizona Green Living.  He was the first Executive Director of the Arizona Commission on African American Affairs for then Arizona Governor Janet Napolitano and President of the Board of Directors of the Arizona Green Chamber of Commerce.  Appointed by the mayor Greg Stanton, he served as Vice-Chair of the team that wrote the new general plan for Phoenix Arizona, America’s 5th largest city, and he is the past Chair of the South Mountain Village Planning Committee, part of the city of Phoenix Planning Commission. He is also a past member of the Board of Directors for the Central Arizona Project, the organization that supplies 1/2 of the water used annually in Phoenix and Tucson and a past member of the board of the Arizona Black Chamber of Commerce. He is also an Adjunct professor of Horticulture at the Mesa Community College Center for Urban Agriculture where he developed and teaches the course on Aquaponics, one of only 3 such college-level courses in the United States. In addition, he was part of the group that in the 1989’s developed the rules and regulations for Aquaculture in Arizona most of which are still in effect today.

A powerful public speaker he is an award-winning writer for scientific and popular publications including Aquaculture Magazine.  As a graduate student in the 1980’s, Dr. Brooks was part of the first class of Ebony Magazine’s 50 Under 30 series and has been quoted in Black Enterprise magazine for his knowledge of the new green economy.  He was recently nominated to be a member of the new USDA advisory board in Urban Agriculture.

Dr. Brooks holds a Ph.D. in Wildlife and Fisheries from the College of Agriculture at the University of Arizona, Tucson.