Well, it is pretty simple. This is my great-granddaughter Elowen. She has no idea what gut biota is, but she knows instinctively that she needs a good old suck to build up her gut biota from her mum, my granddaughter.
But she will grow up and ask herself, “What sort of world have my parents, and their parents and their parents created for me to live in? Did they do a good job—or were they just obsessed with getting a private jet, a yacht, or a Lamborghini?”
I am not one of those people who go on about the good old days. My very first memory—only a bit older than Elowen—is being carried down to the air-raid shelter during the Blitz. Searchlights sweeping the sky, flashes and bangs everywhere, and houses simply disappearing. But that’s not why I remember it—I dropped my teddy and they wouldn’t go back for it.
I never actually went hungry, but I do remember the fight for food: digging up the lawns to grow vegetables, keeping chickens for eggs, and collecting their valuable manure—really the main source of fertiliser that kept us alive.
Now I wonder: what sort of life will baby Elowen have? And to understand that, I look back on my own life—during which technology has changed more dramatically than in any other period in human history. The big question is: are these changes truly for the better? Especially as I have been part of that revolution.
When I left university—studying engineering—I saw plastics as an exciting new material. Learning how this material behaved seemed like a great opportunity for a young engineer.
Later, still early in life, I encountered computers—back in the era of punched cards, which most people today have never even heard of. But I could see immediately that computers would totally transform engineering, allowing us to calculate things we used to guess, and leading to better products with fewer materials.
I taught myself computer programming and eventually solved the incredibly complex problem of how plastics flow inside moulds. That led me to build a company that grew into a multinational, multi-million-dollar operation—the leading exporter of technical software from Australia.
This made a lot of money for the venture capitalists (and much less for me), but I was selected as one of the top one hundred technical innovators by the Institute of Engineers.
This could have been the pinnacle of my career—until I asked myself a simple but uncomfortable question:
“How much better is the world because of these innovations?”
The honest answer was not encouraging. Just look at the problems: climate change, pollution from plastics and chemicals, environmental collapse—and you cannot say with a straight face that technology has been an unblemished benefit.
So, what would I say to Elowen if I live long enough to explain all this?
I doubt she’d be impressed.
Technology can deliver enormous benefits—but only if those benefits flow to the community, not just to massive corporations or tech billionaires focused on profit instead of people.
So what is the biggest problem Elowen will face in her lifetime? Most people immediately think of global warming. But a couple of degrees of warming is not the real killer.
The true existential threat is the food crisis.
Not famine—we already produce more than enough calories. The real threat is the rise of what I call “plastic food”—food that is full of energy but desperately lacking in minerals, nutrients, and biology. Food that fills us, but does not nourish us.
It’s not just climate effects on crops—it’s the destruction of our soils. At the current rate, scientists estimate we have only about 60 years of topsoil left—well within Elowen’s lifespan.
Elowen won’t die from starvation, but without nutrient-dense food her body will lose resilience. She won’t be able to withstand whatever challenges the future brings.
The Gbiota technology—breeding beneficial biota in organic waste and rock dust—is one technical solution. But technology alone will not save us.
What we need is a community-based food system.
Growers and consumers working together. People understanding the biological principles behind gut health. People producing and sharing local, living food that genuinely nourishes us.
That is the foundation of the Gbiota system. If this resonates with you, then join the Gbiota club—learn, cooperate, and help build a real food system before Elowen grows up.
