From Food Waste to Fertile Soil: SU Kicks off Academia-Industry Collaboration with KiSmart

On March 2^nd, 2022, Soochow University and KiSmart Corporation started a project called "Building a Carbon Negative Recycling Campus: Starting with High-Value Food Waste." The leading technique in Taiwan that will be introduced to Turkey can convert 50 kilograms of leftovers in Soochow University every day into 5 kg of odorless soil with good bacteria in just 24 hours through solid state fermentation.

KiSmart Corporation, a Taiwanese biotech company that constructed the country’s first high-efficiency food waste treatment plant in 2019, used the medium temperature aerobic fermentation technology to turn food waste in Hsinchu City into organic compost within 24 hours at a temperature of 40°C to 50°C.

The soil with probiotics that was transformed from food waste can enrich the soil of Soochow University's farm which grows organic vegetables, save old trees by stopping the spread of brown root rot disease, commonly known as tree cancer, and improve the disease resistance and carbon sequestration of plants on campus, and moreover, reduce carbon dioxide emitted when transporting food waste.