VOI - Voice of Indonesia | RRI - Radio Republik Indonesia

Banoo, a startup managed by Indonesian students at Imperial College London, becomes the first Indonesian representative to take home the grand prize of WE Innovate, the prestigious accelerator program at Imperial College London. Banoo was founded by a number of Indonesian students; one of them is Selly Shafira, an MSc Innovation, Entrepreneurship & Management student at Imperial College Business School. He and his team won the £15,000 grand prize at the WE Innovate Finals last June 22 for the technology, which they created to support fish farmers in Indonesia to be more productive.

According to Banoo co-founder, Lakshita Aliva Zein, climate change has affected water quality in aquaculture practices, and increased the risk of fish mortality and inefficient aquaculture. He also said that fish farmers or cultivators can no longer rely on traditional methods to predict weather or water quality because the risk of loss is higher if they don't use technology for direct problem solving. In addition, Indonesia's water quality is also low because ponds do not have a good oxygen circulation system, resulting in unhealthy fish and toxic waste. Therefore, Banoo Solutions is an affordable and integrated aquaculture technology for fish farmers to monitor and solve water quality problems in real-time through Internet of Things (IoT) systems: microbubble aeration systems, water quality sensors, and mobile applications that enable farmers to monitor their pool remotely.

The Banoo system is aeration that produces micro-sized bubbles to increase dissolved oxygen and improve water quality. This increase in dissolved oxygen improves the fish's metabolism as well as their appetite. With the improved metabolism, fish will eat more so that less fish food will end up as waste at the bottom of the pond and produce water waste that may damage the environment. The Banoo Internet of Things sensor is the brain of the Banoo system that can monitor water quality and automate the operation of microbubble aerators. With the Banoo mobile app, fish farmers can monitor and control their ponds from anywhere, save transportation costs and reduce the risk of crop losses due to delays in handling problems.