Dr. Aharon Arakel, the director and chief technologist of Pact Renewables, said, “Our mineral-based planting containers, collectively known as dPOT planting containers, offer wide-ranging applications from household gardening to horticulture, reforestation, and mine site land rehabilitation, and we are pleased to coincide our announcement with World Day to Combat Desertification and Drought, that we celebrated on 17 June, and highlights the need for increasing resilience of agricultural practices in many drought-impacted regions and countries, while reducing the use of plastic planting containers burdened with high life cycle costs.
Dr. Arakel went on to say, “As we announced in our January press release, we have over a number of years developed, systematically assessed, and confirmed the applicability of our mineral-based composites technology for the production of degradable feedstock for the manufacturing of plantable containers. An overriding objective that we have now largely achieved is generating a microenvironment within these degradable containers that offer high water retention capacity for healthy and uninterrupted plant growth, from seedling to mature plant stage. We have found that having a seedling pot with the ability to provide a controlled pH and a low watering frequency requirement is ideal for healthy plant growth in remote areas, whether it is an arid zone or a mine site requiring rehabilitation; and we believe that our seedling pots are the right solutions for such applications. This has necessitated undertaking a rigorous product performance assessment program, using a variety of prototypes of seedling pots and self-watering pots that incorporate old plastic pots as outer lining, as well as pots for growing herbs and flowers that thrive in certain soil pH ranges. Based on our findings earlier this year, we finalized the micro-engineering design of the products for various market segments before completing the related techno-economic evaluations. I am now pleased to announce that commencing from July this year, the dPOT seedling pots, as our introductory product line in both standard and nutrient enriched versions for domestic use in Australia, will be available through our affiliated business arm, dCore Australia.”
Dr. Arakel went on to conclude, “With a high technology readiness level for our degradable planting containers and a rigorous IP protection strategy already in place, we are now ready to provide access to our technology to interested parties for worldwide commercialization of dPOT planting containers via technology licensing, product-based JV partnership, contract R&D for product optimization, related advisory and training services or any other mutually acceptable arrangements. I welcome inquiries and requests for further information from the interested parties; we are particularly keen to partner in projects where our soil degradable planting containers and our in-house skills for design rethinking of agricultural pots can be beneficially applied to address the menaces of climate change, such as water shortage in agriculture and reduction in reliance on plastics in mine site and forest revegetation projects.”
For more information:
Pact Renewables
www.pactrenewables.com