WEBVTT

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Yeah,

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I studied at the school sustainability
and got my master's of science

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there graduated in 2011 and I focused
mainly on kind of the playoff

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between economics and environment and
social justice. So kind of the

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realms of sustainability and how they
interact in kind of the modern

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business world, especially in the
developing room. Ryan was one of the

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master students in our program and he
came to us with experience in mining

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and one of the things that he found is
that it really wasn't satisfying

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his mission to make the world a better
place. He understands that money is

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important for providing raw materials
and resources that can advance

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livelihoods. But he thought that there
might be other ways to help us

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achieve human well being. So as a
graduate student in our program, he had

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the opportunity to take a systems
perspective on what's necessary to

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improve human well being and also to
maintain and protect life supporting

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ecosystems. So with that systems
perspective, he was able to bring that to

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this organization and find ways to
create and develop these win win

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situations. My biggest influence came
from my professor said I had a

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wonderful group on my thesis committee
and they worked very diligently

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with me to really help me find my
focus with my studies. And when I said I

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wanted to go to Haiti and start
working there, they said, well that's a

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little crazy you realize that but they
were very good at working with me

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to kind of shape my expectations and
prepare me for what it was like to

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start a new company in a country like
Ryan came up with this idea, it's

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called the biochar and it can be made
from food waste, you know like sugar

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cane after it has been processed, you
can get those waste from the

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refinery. So he came up with a method
to process that waste into charcoal

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and involve the local people in the
production of the charcoal. And then

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they also found out that that same
charcoal could also be applied to the

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soils. So in this way they were trying
to tackle to environmental problems

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, deforestation and then the problem
also of restoring soil fertility.

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Right now we have a factory on the
outskirts of patients in Northern Haiti

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Right there were employing in total
about 150 people. So at this factory

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right now in our first factory we have
capacity for about 20 tons of

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charcoal per day. Uh but that's the
first of many factories and by the end

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of the year we hope to have two more
factories in Haiti closer to Puerto

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Prince, which is the biggest market
and therefore the biggest consumer of

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charcoal. And the biggest reason for
deforestation. A issue to me really

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means that that community that support
that that collection of interesting

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dynamic people who bring ideas
together and then make them happen in the

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real world

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godevils