{"id":9337,"date":"2026-04-27T21:30:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-27T21:30:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/staging.openvaluefoundation.org\/?p=9337"},"modified":"2026-04-27T21:30:09","modified_gmt":"2026-04-27T21:30:09","slug":"blog-post-74","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/openvaluefoundation.org\/en\/2026\/04\/27\/blog-post-74\/","title":{"rendered":"Blog post 74"},"content":{"rendered":"

Carol Rius, co-founder of HUSK Ventures<\/a>, in this interview, tells us how their adventure of launching a circular economy model as a business strategy began. In 2018, our foundation contributed to the pilot of this project in Cambodia with an investment of \u20ac40,000 for the purchase of a pyrolysis machine needed to produce biochar and a donation of \u20ac10,000 to support its founders. In 2019, we supported them with a donation of \u20ac15,000 which was allocated to expanding the pilot project.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

OVF: <\/strong>What does HUSK do?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

CR:<\/strong>\u00a0HUSK Ventures<\/a>\u00a0It transforms an agricultural residue, rice husk, and turns it into fertilisers, substrates, and biopesticides.
<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

OVF: And what's innovative about that?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

CR:<\/strong> Rice husk management is not very efficient. It is a very abundant waste product, around 150 million tonnes per year globally, and it is very low in density and bulky. It has some uses, but none of them add value. If it is not used, it ends up degrading or, in the worst-case scenario, it is burned, producing toxic fumes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

HUSK transforms waste husks into a new material, biochar, through a pyrolysis (carbonisation) process. Biochar is a product that is very rich in carbon (C) and extremely porous, possessing very interesting properties for agriculture. HUSK biochar is organic and is used as the basis for all our agricultural products.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As a process that prevents rice husks (or other biomass) from degrading and releasing carbon into the atmosphere, HUSK prevents that carbon from combining with oxygen and producing CO2. For this reason, the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) in 2018 declared biochar as a NET, Negative Emission Technology. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ultimately, we can say that HUSK is a climate-positive company because for every tonne of biochar we produce, we prevent 1.56 tonnes of CO2 from being produced.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

OVF: And what benefit do you have as a company by being classified as a NET, Negative Emission Technology?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

CR:<\/strong> HUSK may have an additional source of income alongside the sale of our products: our carbon credits. There are many companies and individuals who are committed to no longer being an environmental burden on the planet and who want to reduce and offset their carbon footprint as much as possible. They can do so by purchasing our carbon credits on the online shop.<\/a> This is how they contribute to our project and to the planet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

OVF: And is biochar something new?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

CR:<\/strong> No, not at all. Biochar is an ancient product that was already being used in the Amazon to improve the rainforest soil and make it suitable for agriculture. Without biochar, there might not have been any settled communities in the rainforest, as they would not have been able to grow crops. However, this knowledge has been gradually lost over time, to the point where it has all but disappeared in some regions, such as Europe and the United States. Fortunately, in Asia and Africa, people still remember the product and its benefits.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What is new, or what we would say is renewed, is the production of biochar in an industrial, safe, and clean manner. Very few companies in the world have managed to implement production and distribution models for biochar-based products.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

HUSK is the first company to achieve economic sustainability in an emerging country context with a clear commitment to social and environmental impact.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

OVF: How do HUSK\u2019s products benefit farmers?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

CR: <\/strong>HUSK increases agricultural productivity by between 30% and 100% and, as a result, improves families\u2019 livelihoods: in some areas of Cambodia, the quality of arable land is so degraded that yields are very low, and there is also a significant loss of nutrients. The resulting production of fruit, vegetables and rice is not only lower but also of poor quality, which has an impact on farmers\u2019 incomes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Climate change adaptation thanks to the porosity of biochar material, which is like a sponge. It absorbs water during torrential rain, thus preventing fields from becoming waterlogged. In times of drought, the sponge's absorption capacity has a water-reservoir effect for the roots.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Chemical-free soil improvement not only improves the lives of farmers but also those of consumers who eat produce grown in natural and safe environments. Supporting smallholder farmers is crucial, as they account for 80% of food production in Asia and Africa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

OVF: How did it all start?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

CR:<\/strong> In 2016, I met my partner, Heloise Buckland, at the annual Social Innovation day at Esade. I recall approaching her after her talk thinking, \u201dwell\u2026 it will probably be a typical networking chat with a business card exchange that ends up gathering dust in a drawer.\u201c I was wrong. We actually really enjoyed the conversation and felt aligned in our values and motivations. That so-called \u201ccoffee break\u201d ended up being the start of a fascinating project. HUSK.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

OVF: What was crucial at the start of your adventure?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

CR:<\/strong> Our recipe includes: experience, for better or worse, we have over 15 years' experience as consultants, so we like to follow a method. Our network of contacts who share the excitement: a pinch of madness to bet on projects without guarantees. Finally, having the support of organisations like the Open Value Foundation has been crucial during the company's first year of existence. In 2017, we only had an idea, well-documented and with potential, but the loan from the Open Value Foundation allowed us to go from an idea to a pilot, to test if it was viable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

How did you come up with this business idea?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

CR: All <\/strong>The story begins with a clear definition of our purpose. <\/strong>I know it sounds cheesy, but that's how it is. We can say we're a purpose-driven business. We both aimed to work with rural communities. I was more inclined to address income generation, while Heloise was very interested in ecosystem protection. So we kept thinking of ideas to contribute in both ways.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Our initial thoughts were gathered in a virtual brainstorming session where we posted ideas, thoughts, contacts, and reflections. Drawing inspiration from some case studies, we began analysing different types of waste that could be harming the ecosystem in rural communities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We intended to shortlist 5 of them, to research each one of them deeply and systematically to understand their potential and select the winner. Well, I admit it, we did pre-select five, we researched one (which was rice), and here we are. It is highly probable that if cow dung had been the first material we researched today, I would be speaking on behalf of DUNG rather than HUSK.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Carol Rius, cofundadora de HUSK Ventures, nos cuenta en esta entrevista c\u00f3mo empieza su aventura de lanzar un modelo de econom\u00eda circular como estrategia de negocio. En 2018, nuestra fundaci\u00f3n contribuy\u00f3 al piloto de este proyecto en Camboya con una inversi\u00f3n de 40.000\u20ac destinada a la compra de una m\u00e1quina de pir\u00f3lisis necesaria para producir el […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9337","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog-post"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/openvaluefoundation.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9337","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/openvaluefoundation.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/openvaluefoundation.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openvaluefoundation.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openvaluefoundation.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9337"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/openvaluefoundation.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9337\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9340,"href":"https:\/\/openvaluefoundation.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9337\/revisions\/9340"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/openvaluefoundation.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9337"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openvaluefoundation.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9337"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openvaluefoundation.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9337"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}