"I love that you've brought this to attention. An extensive database of uncommon but resistant and hardy plants/foods could be developed and organized by climate. Ease of growth and processing should also be taken in to account. I will try to…"
A crash course in changing the world.
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I chose to write about Jill Farrant. She is a professor of molecular and cell biology at the University of Cape Town. I read a lot of stories about interesting projects and people. I chose Jill Farrant because with her research she is trying to solve one of the biggest plant problems in Africa - and therefore combining her profession with an approach to improve the biological situation.
Jill Farrant is working at the Research Chair of Molecular Physiology of Plant Desiccation Tolerance and is a world leading expert on resurrection plants. These plants literally come back to life once they are dehydrated. Professor Farrant investigates the ability of many plants to survive without water for a long time. Her ultimate goal is to find applications that will help to develop drought-tolerant crops to feed people in arid, dry climates -especially to help people in Africa. Besides the goal to make possible the development of drought-resistant crops, her research may also have medicinal uses.
Although she lost her senses of taste and smell since she suffered a head injury she is still doing her research with happiness and passion. "I would like to understand what plants are doing, how they do it, what their signaling molecules are, how they talk to each other. I would, of course, love to find a solution to world problems like food security. That would be a big thing for me. But you get there slowly, step by step", she said in an interview for the UNESCO and L'Oréal foundation "Women in Science". This foundation also honored her for her lifework in March 2012 in Paris.
The video from the L'Oréal-UNESCO Laureare For Africa and Arab States can be seen below:
Who is Jill Farrant?
For me, Jill Farrant is definitely a social innovator. She is tackling one of Africa's biggest problems: food security. She handled to combine her interests in plants with a way to deal with an urgent problem. To do so, she did not need an organization or something special but her interests and intelligence and the will to change the world.
Professor Farrant has no blog to follow but on the webpage of her chair one can contact her and stay up to date regarding her research.
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