Institut Teknologi Bandung

The event was held with the aim to initiate and introduce urban farming as easy and popular. “We want to carry quadruple helix concept to this event that involve academics, industry, community, and government,” said Novi, a committee member and a lecturer in SITH ITB.

The quadruple helix concept is implemented boldly, and each element display their innovation and research attractively during the event. Many industry players carry urban farming as the idea. One of them is MusHome, a platform for education about oyster mushroom farming. The package of this mushroom breeding house are fancy, just like a doll box.

“Seeing the raising demand for mushroom, we carry the idea to give every household the opportunity to grow and harvest mushroom, even though we also industrialize mushroom and sell them to market or restaurants,” explained Widya Putra, an alumni of Microbiology study program of ITB and the CEO of MusHome.

On another booth, PT. Galtiva display their aqua recycling system that adopt bio-filter concept. The aqua recycling system is classified into urban farming because the water does not need to be replaced for about a year. “This is done by utilizing bacteria as the bio-filter that change nitrite into nitrate,” explained Nina who is also an alumni of Microbiology study program of ITB who works as a researcher of biofilter for Galtiva.

Students unions in SITH ITB also displayed the result of community services. Bioengineering Student Union has succeeded in empowering the community in Cibeusi to process coffee bean skin as a material for marketable tea ingredient. “We try to bring benefit to our fostered village by giving the idea to process coffee skin, because the price of coffee skin overseas reach 900,000 Rupiahs,” said Ferly, a student of Bioengineering ’15.

Microbiology Student Union display their innovation in drawing using bacteria.  Fresh graduate student also display their works such as modern mushroom home and development of pond with aquaponic approach. “We want to show that urban farming is not something to be afraid of. This kind of farming even significantly raise the survival rate of fish in aquaponic pond and 20% raise in mushroom production,” explained Ira and Astrid, alumni of Agriculture Engineering ’14.

The Local Government of Bandung and Bandung Regency also took part in the event. such as Parongpong.com—a  community turned start-up—and golimbah.com, which has concern in turning waste into beneficial products such as liquid fertilizers and solid fuels.

“This atmosphere is what we want for this event. We really hope this event can be a meeting place of those 4 elements, sharing inspiration, and initiate urban farming concept in Indonesia starting in Bandung,” said Novi.

The 70th commemoration of Biology Education will see other events, such as Bandung Bioindustry & Lab EXPO, Indonesia Biology Consortium Workshop, Asia Pacific Symposium for Life Sciences, etc. Hopefully communities are interested and participate in this fun and educative activities.

Reporter: Ferio Brahmana