FROM STARTUP NATION TO IMPACT NATION

BY TOBIAS MENDELOVICI

Israel is a model for tech investments and entrepreneurship, turning local and global environmental challenges into market opportunities. Examples include leading initiatives in water sustainable infrastructure; advancing sustainability in food security and nutrition; restoring the environment; and creating deep science-based innovation ecosystems that combine public-private partnerships, capital investment, climate technologies, and community-building.

Tel Aviv is a lively city, but it is also one of the world’s greatest innovation and technology hubs, with some of the highest number of startups per capita. But the most important thing that Tel Aviv has: people. It has entrepreneurs and creatives that, with passion and perseverance, never stop. In the last few years, we’ve seen a rise in new kinds of purpose-driven entrepreneurs; they’re building enterprises that are solving some of society’s greatest challenges. We call them impact entrepreneurs.

But entrepreneurs do not work alone; they’re part of a larger ecosystem. Innovation ecosystems in Israel are not limited only to Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, or other big cities. They have also been established in smaller cities in the countryside. For example, a small city in northern Israel has established a large food technology hub with research and development centers, startup incubators, accelerators, and laboratories. It attracts scientists, entrepreneurs, investors, companies, and other players to the region, enhancing the local economy and creating quality jobs. But not only this, visitors come from around the world to learn about innovation.

One of the key ingredients of a successful startup ecosystem is its ability to create partnerships. We need smart collaborations to tackle some of the huge issues that society is facing.

One of these issues is water scarcity. Israel is in one of the driest, most arid, and hottest places on the planet. Water scarcity has always been a challenge for the population. I remember from my childhood in Israel that people panicked each time the water levels in the Sea of Galilee went down because most of the freshwater used to come from this lake. People even prayed that rain would fill the lake in dry winters. But today, the population doesn’t worry anymore because there is a new source of freshwater that provides abundant water: desalination, which treats saltwater and transforms it into drinkable water. Due to technological improvements that made it more affordable, large desalination plants were installed along Israel’s Mediterranean coast. Today, these plants provide a large portion of the nation’s freshwater. Israel today has a surplus of water. It has more water than it needs. This is quite amazing in a region that is so dry. There are plans to refill these lakes with water treated from the sea.

Another major achievement for Israel’s water sector and water security is recycling nearly 90% of its wastewater. This makes Israel the world leader in water reuse. I think in the U.S., it’s about 10%. The second one, after Israel, is about 40%. This is largely thanks to the construction of a big infrastructure project that collects and treats the sewage of Tel Aviv and its surroundings. After the sewage has been treated, it is transported through a long pipeline to the southern desert in Israel, where farmers use this water to irrigate their crops. About 70% of the water used in agriculture in the southern desert comes from this treated water. And with this, the desert flourishes, and the farmers produce plenty of fruits and vegetables consumed locally and exported worldwide.

Food security and water are important, but so is the resilience of our natural ecosystems. With 700 startups and record investments over the last two years, it was big for Israel’s climate tech ecosystem. There are companies turning waste into energy to avoid waste going into landfills. Companies are using high-tech satellite technologies to monitor weather events, talking about alternative ways of creating energy. A lot of companies in the hydrogen space are trying to produce electricity in off-grid areas. And this is just the tip of the iceberg.

I hope that next year, we will build alliances that can contribute to your local ecosystem and that more and more people like us can work together.

Mendelovici is the managing partner of the Tel Aviv-based Ocean Business, which provides consulting services for innovation-driven entities interested in promoting projects and business from Israel to global markets and vice versa. His focus is on serving entities that are putting sustainability and technological innovation at the core of their strategies and are addressing some of the planet’s most critical challenges. Mendelovici is one of the key architects of the first Israel project to be accepted to the IFC. He graduated from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in agronomical sciences and with a master’s from the University of Sydney in environmental science.