Hello Loci| Food for Thought
Awards & Nominations
Hello Loci has received the following awards and nominations. Way to go!
Food for Thought
Hello Loci: Bridging Local Farmers to Local Customers
Summary
Say Hello to Local Agriculture, our platform will focus on creating a meaningful connection between local producers and farmers, to their local community—aiming to strengthen local agricultural economies, while simultaneously seeding a safety net to global agricultural instability. We do not expect for global agricultural exports to stop, but rather local communities invest in produce made locally, instead of outsourcing it.
How We Addressed This Challenge
The COVID-19 pandemic has threatened food security by affecting crop and commodity prices, health, harvest, distribution, and accessibility. This pandemic challenges producers, such as farms and fisheries, due to diminished labor, resulting in spoilt goods. This then affects consumers, as resource hoarding and decreased accessibility become an issue. In short, the demand for food and goods has increased, while supply has decreased simultaneously. Due to the production of renewable resources being cyclic, these COVID-19 effects will likely be experienced in future cultivation-harvest cycles until supply and demand of crop and commodity reach equilibrium.
Until then, it is vital to human welfare to attempt to meet consumer demand in alternative ways. Hello Loci addresses this by shortening the bridge between producers and consumers in a sustainable manner. Our platform is designed to operate by making producer and consumer connections and reduce strain on mass food production. By building a platform that allows one to buy straight from local producers, consumer needs may be met independently of supermarkets, while strengthening respective local economies in a time of economic hardship. This may also result in a decrease in unemployment, as local production facilities expand with lifting restrictions. With the strain on consumer demand alleviated, large scale supply operations may return to pre-pandemic production easier and faster, regardless of reduced labor.
Additionally, we see a need for an operation like Hello Loci beyond the COVID-19 pandemic in areas of socio-economic hardship. Many communities were financially struggling pre-pandemic, however; with Hello Loci, these areas can stimulate their respective local economies. Local production and consumption also address food deserts through the increase in local distribution and accessibility and may potentially lead to decreased consumption of processed food. Hello Loci is committed to addressing these global challenges while supporting sustainable agriculture.
How We Developed This Project
Our project was developed by considering the challenge every step of the way. We identified which COVID-19 related issues we wanted to address, such as decreased accessibility to food, production disruptions, and strain on local economies. We then thought about our audience and who our project would serve. Our consensus was to serve local communities, on a global scale. To bring this to life, we considered what platform we, as consumers, enjoy using, leading us to envision a web-based community farmer’s market, where local consumers are connected to local producers. This allows one to buy straight from local producers, and consumer needs may be met independently of supermarkets while strengthening respective local economies in a time of economic hardship. We also considered our project beyond this pandemic, as it may address other global food challenges, such as food deserts, dependency on processed foods, and obesity.
We then considered the data component of this challenge. Our goal was not to just crunch data but to consider how we could potentially bring a more digestible form of data to those using our platform. While exploring different NASA, ICAR, and ESA Satellite tools, we realized that the free tools could have an amazing impact on how farmers can manage large crops, and plan out agricultural endeavors using state of the art science… We also realized how difficult it is to navigate and interpret satellite tools. We understood how complex it is to monitor crops from space, Hello Loci took it upon itself to be able to create a user-friendly collection of these resources. Our platform will demonstrate how after integration of the tools, farmers can spend less time trying to read through manuals and clicking around, and instead have accessible and easier use of tools, where icons, guidance, and visually informative steps can immerse a producer into using the tools in their daily life.
To bring the Hello Loci platform to life, all collaborators contributed to various flow charts and vision boards, while tackling challenges such as navigating new software and conflicting time zones. Though there were hardships every step of the way, our motivation and enthusiasm never faded. We were able to complete our project by working around the clock and using each individual’s unique strengths. As a team, we continued to envision our project long term, past this weekend. Hello Loki's mission is to strengthen local production and consumption relationships, strengthen local economies, and contribute to efforts to make agriculture more sustainable.
We have a team of six, with a wide array of skills. Team creator, Jairo, is an undergraduate at the UCF and this is his first hackathon; he has been guiding overall strategy and looking after the submission side of things. Cassie is a graduate research assistant at NYU and has skills in policy analysis, this is her second hackathon and she has been looking at areas where our solution aligns with different countries. Thomas is a UX designer in San Francisco and has been flushing out our main prototype mockup; this is his third hackathon. Mary is a post-grad from Pennsylvania State with experience in the agricultural sector; she has been adding her skills in coding and design. Emily joins us with experience in genetics in agriculture and this is her first hackathon. With skills in graphic design and social media management, she has helped get our idea out to a wide audience in anticipation of further development. Matteo is our international
Project Demo
Alternate Link if above does not work:
https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1PRS52knNUSxGcMgLRdMypNpefL-w_cmasnopoBZSXwo/edit#slide=id.gc6f80d1ff_0_0
Data & Resources
- VegScape (Vegetation Condition Explorer) Map, part of the NASA SMAP (Soil Moisture Active Passive)
- Vegscape is a U.S. crop vegetation condition assessment and monitoring application. It allows users to constrain crop areas using geometric tools
- IrriSAT - An application that monitors weather-based irrigation and NDVI (Normalized Difference Vegetation Index) using Landsat and Sentinel
- IrriSAT is a weather-based irrigation scheduling service which is used to inform farmers how much water their crop has used and how much irrigation they need to apply based on their plant canopy size, which can be determined by the crop coefficient (Kc).
- Global Corp Monitoring Tool (India)Through ICAR (Indian Council of Agricultural Research)
- This experimental tool is an initiative by Indian Environmental organizations which uses data from MODIS (Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer) Terra, as well as ESA’s PROBA-Vegetation Satellite, and lastly, the GFSAD (Global Food Security Support Analysis Data).