Bahçeşehir University Gastronomy and Culinary Arts Program students and academics started to grow seasonal vegetables and plants as a part of soilless agriculture, which they put into practice on the terrace of the building located on the campus, based on the idea of sustainable agriculture. Students will use the products they grow in the soilless agriculture field in the food they will prepare in the kitchen of their departments.
Bahçeşehir University Gastronomy and Culinary Arts department students and academicians started to grow seasonal vegetables and plants as a part of soilless agriculture, which they put into practice on the terrace of the building located on the campus, based on the idea of sustainable agriculture.
BAU Chairman Of The Board Of Trustees Enver Yücel, academician, students, and agriculture volunteers attended the opening of BAU Agriculture Garden created within the project where food waste is used as fertilizer and “from the soil to the kitchen, from kitchen to nature” awareness.
Yücel, who draws attention to the importance of agriculture and describing that he went to his hometown Giresun for many years and made observations, said that: “As an Anatolian kid I also plant fruits, vegetables and share it with everyone. I want our tradition to continue as before. Agriculture underlies making food and spreading the food culture. We are all following the developments of agriculture in Turkey and around the world. At our university, gastronomy takes a bigger look at it and also works in the field of sustainable agriculture instead of being a department that only cooks. We always talk about Turkish cuisine and Turkish Culture but we should also want our country to gain something from them. Wherever we go in the world today, it is very possible and powerful to go there with Turkish Cuisine. The gastronomy department of Bahçeşehir University will not only raise good and excellent chefs but also raise people who do diplomacy. We will lead in gastro-diplomacy”
BAU Rector Prof. Dr. Şirin Karadeniz express that the pandemic period was not easy for the gastronomy sector and agriculture and that they discussed the education again during this process: “When we look from an educational point of view, just as gastronomy is not separate from agriculture, and agriculture is not separate from artificial intelligence, and artificial intelligence is not separate from law, we have a goal to see all of these from 360 degrees and to bring together different working groups on this subject. Therefore, we see agriculture as an area that touches all other areas, intersects horizontally, and reveals its projections together, rather than an area that we see vertically as a single compartment; because we need that.”
Applied Sciences Dean Dr. Dilistan Shipman, Opinion leader of BAU Agriculture Project, expressed that there is no place for soil, trees, or anything in the increasingly urbanized world: “They say that ‘This Z Generation doesn’t understand soil, doesn’t care about plants. How can they, they don’t see the ground. At the BAU Agriculture Garden, we grow plants according to the season without soil, both in greenhouses and in small soil areas. We make fertilizers ourselves from food waste. Students will look after them, harvest them, and realize what excruciating time parsley takes to grow. They won't just cut it and throw it away. In this way, we will raise students who can empathize, are sensitive to other people and everything, and love their surroundings.”
After the opening speeches attendees visited the BAU Agriculture Garden. BAU Assistant Professor Agriculture Engineer Kevser Üner Öztürk informed the attendees about how they grow plants at BAU Garden Project.
TR
