YAGRO joins Frontier Agriculture

Agri-TechE Article

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Agri-TechE

The agri-tech ecosystem is maturing: YAGRO, which featured as an early-stage company in the second REAP Start-Up Showcase in 2015, has just announced that it has joined the Frontier group of companies.
The Cambridge-based company is a pioneer in the development of analytics for agriculture and released a ground-breaking new product in 2020 that aggregates on-farm business data into a simple online tool, and gives the farm manager incredible detail and insight on the farm’s current and historical performance.
YAGRO has worked closely with a steering group of progressive farmers to ensure its technology meets the needs of farmers; joining Frontier will help to secure its future as a leading provider for the whole industry.
YAGRO will continue to trade as an independently managed, stand-alone subsidiary.

YAGRO joins Frontier

Dan Jolly, Co-founder and Head of Business Development, said: “This is an exciting day for the whole of the YAGRO and our customers. With the backing of Frontier Agriculture, we can forge ahead with our plans for team growth and new analytical tools, supercharging the proven impact we’ve been delivering since 2015. We look forward to accelerating our developments with our farm users and our Partners.”
Gareth Davies, CEO and co-founder, said: “Today’s announcement recognises the quality of the team and capability we have built at YAGRO, that genuinely empowers our customers to better understanding and better decision making for the farm. Now anyone across our industry – from farmers to agribusiness to Government – can be confident in navigating the hard changes ahead, with YAGRO as their trusted and proven data partner to empower insight and decision making. This also marks a hug step forward for UK agri-tech and its role in driving the whole industry forward.”

Part of the Agri-TechE ecosystem

YAGRO is a member of Agri-TechE and many of its National Steering Group are also members, such as Sentry Ltd, Elveden Farms Ltd, and Greens of Soham Ltd.
Greg Colebrook, Director at Greens said: “I’ve been working with the YAGRO team and technology for the last 5 years, and believe that they are on the right track. They’ve already delivered some great products, and this news means that they’re sure to produce new products even quicker. We really like the team there, so it’s great to hear they will remain at the helm and most importantly the business will remain an independent entity.” Mark Aitchison, Managing Director of Frontier Agriculture, said: “We are excited by today’s news that YAGRO will be joining the Frontier group as an independent, stand-alone subsidiary company. YAGRO has quickly gained a strong reputation for nimble design and deployment of practical software solutions for farmers, advisers and the supply chain. Today’s announcement will enable YAGRO to fast-track their strong pipeline of products currently under development, which are much needed for the whole industry.”
More information about YAGRO

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Aquagrain – The first commercially viable water absorbing soil improver?

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Aquagrain

The views expressed in this Member News article are the author's own and do not necessarily represent those of Agri-TechE.

Despite the variable global weather Biomation’s Aquagrain has turned in some impressive results in its 2021 Covid restricted commercial demonstration programme.

Aquagrain™ is a unique, organic based soil improver which can absorb up to 30 times its mass in water providing food and drink for plants. Aquagrain incorporates organic waste from the food industry into a biodegradable, carbon chain polymer.

Its organic content, with enhanced micronutrients, not only supplies crops with valuable nutrients, cutting the requirement for inorganic fertilisers, it also significantly stimulates microbial activity in the soil and is ideal for regenerative farming practices. Aquagrain biodegrades over 12 months to leave just water, CO₂ and organic matter in soil.

Controlled environment trials have shown Aquagrain can cut irrigation requirements by up to 50%, reduce leachate by 60%, proven plants survive up to 16 days longer without irrigation if planted with Aquagrain and can increase crop yield by as much as 3 times, but those results needed verification in commercial growing scenarios.

Covid and the withdrawal of DfID funding saw Aquagrain trials with the South African Western Cape Province Agricultural Research Department and the Nigerian Centre for Dryland Agriculture cancelled but rainfed trials with Winter Wheat in the Middle East, Winter and Spring Barley in Suffolk as well as a “Bumble-Bird” crop trial to improve biodiversity on another Suffolk farm.

Aquagrain works best in hot, arid lands, with free draining soils and would be of little use on much of the UK farmland. East Anglia does have appropriate soil types, as well as receiving lower rainfall than the rest of the country. Commercial demonstrations with rainfed Winter and Spring Barley were set up on a Breckland farm with free draining sandy soil over chalk. A further Bumble Bird demonstration was set up on a patch of sandy, dry headland at a farm just outside Aquagrain’s R & D centre in Needham Market.

Aquagrain’s Chief Scientific Officer and inventor, Dr Arjomand Ghareghani was very pleased with the demonstration results despite weather events suggesting conclusive data might prove elusive. Arjomand reported ”It was good to get some demonstrations going after the disappointment of the main trial programmes in South Africa and Nigeria being cancelled, but both winter cereal trials were hit with heavy rain. In the Middle East there was biblical level flooding in the trial area, killing civilians and threatening to wash away the crop. In the Breckland trial it rained for three months post drilling nullifying the benefits of Aquagrain. After Christmas the weather in the Middle East turned from flood to drought and East Anglia suffered weeks of cold dry Easterly’s in the spring. I was not hopeful of significant data from anywhere.”

In the Middle East Aquagrain treatments yielded 720 kg/ha compared with inorganic treatments which yielded 520 kg/ha. Arjomand indicated that typical yields of 800 kg/ha in no ways compares with UK yields and could not be met because of the drought (85% lower rainfall than average) but Aquagrain could be considered an insurance policy against failure.

On the Brecks, despite the wet and dry periods Aquagrain achieved Winter Barley yields of 6.6 ton/ha compared with standard inorganic treatments which delivered 5.9 ton/ha an increase of 12% without an application of Chafer N30 + S fertiliser at 200,000 L/ha. Spring Barley results reflected better Aquagrain properties with an increase in crop yield of 27% from 4 tons/ha to 5.1 tons/ha.

On the Bumble-Bird crop outside Needham the farms wildlife manager reported the difference in Aquagrain, Non Aquagrain field strips as “like walking across a black and white Zebra crossing.” He added that “the headland is so dry nothing has survived in previous years but Aquagrain has transformed the area.” The farm owner was so impressed with Aquagrain performance he requested 35 tons of Aquagrain for his 70 hectares of rainfed cereals planned for 2022.

Aquagrain’s Head of Business Development, JP Dorgan, was pleased with the summer results, but pragmatic about the technology’s immediate widespread adoption. It is great that despite the climate challenges, these results indicate Aquagrain can add value to commercial growers. It is fantastic that even before the Brecklands results were received, after one trial a farmer is so convinced with results that they want to order 35 tons. Unfortunately, our production capacity at our R & D facility is only one ton a month, so it may take us a while to deliver that order. We are expecting the Breckland trial debrief shortly and if the quality of the grain, in addition to the quantity is improved, this could suggest that there is a rainfed crop market in the UK as well as the overseas, high value irrigated crop markets we intend to target when we have secured some investment.

“What we have done in the last couple of months is target a market we can penetrate. We have good trial results from pots, hanging baskets, trees and shrubs, so we have introduced two additional versions of Aquagrain. As well as AquagrainCrops for agriculture, we have AquagrainTrees and AquagrainPlants, to penetrate the retail ornamental market and the landscaping, desert greening and forestry markets. It was a huge effort but in only a few weeks we rebranded, rebuilt the website and prepared a stand for the UK’s largest Garden Centre trade Exhibition, GLEE (Gardening Leisure Entertainments Exhibition) held last week at the NEC. The AquagrainPlants stand attracted a lot of attention, in addition to interest from a number of smaller retailers and distributors we had interest from 3 of the largest players in the retail garden centre arena and have already agreed evaluation programmes with them. We could not really have hoped for a better reception. “

Asked about the future development plans JP added “It has been a great year to date, but there is still lots of work to do. We need to continue to find global farmers and landscapers to run commercial demonstrations with, find investors to fund those demonstrations and scaling up production facilities as more orders are received.”

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Aquagrain

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“You need to know what the future will look like” – regenerative farmer Tom Pearson speaks at REAP

Agri-TechE Article

Agri-TechE

Farmer Tom Pearson is transitioning his farm to regenerative agriculture. Here he talks about the benefits of participating at REAP.

I took advantage of the bursary last year and found REAP really interesting. You can’t go to REAP and say “I like that, I’ll go to the website and buy it” but it makes sense, from a business point of view, to understand what the world might look like in ten years’ time, so that you can purchase the right kit and hire the right people.

REAP gives insights into direction of travel

Last year we bought a combine – it was a major decision, a big amount of money, but I’m expecting to have that combine for 10 years plus, so these are long term decisions. Grain storage is another example – do I want a big 1,000 tonne grain store, or do I want lots of 100 tonne silos for specialist crops? You have to watch the market, the direction of travel – and technology is a big part of that.
I might need to buy a sprayer soon because ours is packing up, but because I know a bit about technology in the pipeline, I have realised that in five years’ time, I am likely to be using a sprayer far less; so I might be more inclined to look at a good value second hand sprayer rather than a new one.

I want to be ready for investment in natural capital

It’s the same with carbon. If someone comes along and says: “We’d like to do a big collaborative natural capital project; where is your base-line data? How can we prove its money well spent?” I want to be ready by understanding the technology associated with that: how to measure carbon, understanding the depths for sampling, using GPS positioning to get the same geopositional reading. It is important to be keeping an eye on the future, and technology is obviously going to be a big part of that.
It is incredibly helpful, if you’ve got the time, to attend a conference like REAP and get a feel for what’s going on, some things might work for you now and others give an idea of where things are going.

Opportunity to provide input to get the tech right

The nice thing about being part of Agri-TechE is that you can see these tech guys are putting in a lot of effort, however it’s impossible to create these products without some input from farmers.
I’m from a science background myself and I understand how difficult it is to evidence a product and get it to market, so I’m happy to help out. I don’t want to be faced with a bunch of poorly designed products down the line when I know I’ve had the opportunity to provide that input.
Farmers have a lot on their plates and a lot to do, so it’s easy to think: “I haven’t got time for this, it’s too far down the line”. But I’ve still got the energy and enthusiasm for this so I’m keen to learn what technologies are out there.

Balancing agri-tech with regenerative agriculture

Tom Pearson is one of the farming leaders of the H3 project (Healthy soils, Healthy plants, Healthy people), which is comparing regenerative agriculture to traditional farming and looking at biodiversity, soil quality and food quality. He says: “Measuring each of these elements is becoming possible. There has been a lack of clarity over the future, but the wait is coming to an end. Interest in carbon sequestration, for example, is gaining momentum. We want to establish baseline data now, to be ahead of the curve when someone comes along asking to do a big collaborative natural capital project.”
He is also part of the farmer advisory group for the Small Robot Company, which launched in the REAP Start-up Showcase and has since gained funding and widespread industry support. The company is one of many that have benefited from the Agri-techE ecosystem and will take part in the exhibition in this years’ virtual REAP conference.
“In a nutshell: REAP is fantastic. It’s a lovely, friendly conference, with really enthusiastic people. It’s ag tech, it’s still on the fringes of what farmers do in our day-to-day lives, but it is another interesting aspect of my daily activities. I enjoy it from all those points of view.

Farmer? Grower? Student? Click here to apply for the REAP 2023 Farmer Bursary sponsored by RNAA

REAP brings together people from across the agri-tech ecosystem who believe that innovation is the engine for change. The conference bridges the gap between producer needs and technology solutions and showcases exciting agri-tech start-ups.

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Clock-wise

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October marks the onset of winter in the UK, with the clocks moving back by an hour and heralding later sunrises, earlier sunsets, and colder temperatures.
For some this marks a depressing demarcation to the end of summer, but this shift in day length and temperature is a vital cue for plants and animals to move into the next stage of their life cycle. Many animals begin hibernation as the days shorten, trees and other plants shed leaves and appear to die back, where they will spend the winter drawing on the precious reserves built up over the summer. Seasonal migrants arrive and depart, next year’s cereals are in the ground, and sugar beet is harvested.
Farming has, of course, always been closely aligned to the timing of Nature and the passing of seasons. Winter wheat, for example, is drilled in the autumn and requires a prolonged period of cold in order to trigger flowering in the spring – this is due to a genetic process (identified at the John Innes Centre in Norwich, UK). But climate change is causing disruption of the seasons – as discovered by phenology studies of these recurring biological events. Historic farm records from the late 19^th Century, for example, show that the growing season in parts of England was around 244 days, yet by 2015 it had reached 280 days. This is likely to be linked to increase in UK temperatures since the 1960s of an estimated 1°C.
But as well as seasonal changes, living things respond to a day/night cycle as well. So it is also possible to tap into this internal ticking “clock” in plants and animals to help with productivity, efficiency and welfare.
The frequency of egg-laying by poultry, for example, is heavily influenced by the light regime, and similarly the performance of many crop plants in controlled environment conditions is closely regulated to prevent “bolting” and to ensure consistency of production.
A more intricate understanding of how the daily clock ticks is revealing new insights into better ways of managing agricultural systems. For a start, there are some indications that application of inputs on broadacre arable crops is more effective at particular times in the day-night cycle (we’ll be hearing more about this at REAP 2021).
Understanding the minute changes that take place within individual plants throughout the day and night can help with better understanding of when crops might be more responsive to management regimes, and to help build resilience. Breeding programmes which incorporate the genes which control the daily – or “circadian” clocks might be enable production of plants which perform better in different climates and – as have greater resilience to climate change.
The UK is hosting the global COP26 conference in Glasgow in November, where hopes for commitments to halve emissions by 2030, and to limit global warming to no more than 1.5°C. Nature is responding to the pressures it is under – in some cases it is providing opportunities for new agriculture in fresh ways and in new locations. In others it is resulting in serious irreversible challenges.
Join us at REAP 2021 to discuss the impact of time – hourly, daily and seasonally – on agriculture and how this can help with mitigation of the impact of climate change.

REAP 2021: Changing Time(s) for Agriculture – 10th November 2021

Imagine a world where agriculture is not constrained by time. The ability to manage and manipulate time is increasing and REAP 2021 will explore the advances in technology and breakthroughs in science that is making this possible.
REAP brings together people from across the agri-tech ecosystem who believe that innovation is the engine for change. The conference bridges the gap between producer needs and technology solutions and showcases exciting agri-tech start-ups.

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Backpack LiDAR used for the first time in field phenotyping

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field phenotyping with CropQuant — This is the first time that plant researchers used backpack LiDAR to provide phenotyping for large-scale field trials.

LiDAR is used by the Environment Agency and others to visualise gradients and recreate 3D landscapes – now this technology is being used for crop phenotyping, to show the physical characteristic of plants obtained by breeding.
Prof Ji Zhou is Head of Data Sciences at Niab, his latest published paper explains how LiDAR has been used to provide large-scale 3D crop phenotyping in the field.
He says: “The lack of high-quality phenotypic data has prevented researchers and breeders from fully exploiting available genomic resources and this has become a major bottleneck. To address this Niab has developed the CropQuant-3D technology to provide an in-field solution for large-scale crop phenotyping for breeding, agronomic services and agricultural production.
“We utilised a backpack LiDAR device to overcome limitations in mobility and scalability possessed by other phenotyping platforms and performed large-scale phenotypic analysis to characterise key agronomic traits such as crop height, canopy development and 3D canopy structural changes in response to different nitrogen (N) treatments for wheat field trials, which are imperative to yield- and development-related crop monitoring.”
The LiDAR device carried in the backpack obtained hundreds of millions of 3D data points from wheat in field trials. The CropQuant-3D platform provided automated 3D trait analysis revealing the relationship between key agronomic traits with the yield and N responses.
Additionally, the CropQuant-3D platform could also provide a unified analysis pipeline to analyse 3D point clouds obtained by different sources – such as drones and gantry-based LiDAR sensors – demonstrating its great potential in large-scale field phenotyping and open-source trait analysis.
This work has been published by one of the top plant research journals, Plant Physiology in its breakthrough technology column, entitled “Large-scale field phenotyping using backpack LiDAR and CropQuant-3D to measure structural variation in wheat”.
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B-HIVE RECEIVES FUNDING TO DEVELOP CUTTING-EDGE TECHNOLOGY FOR FOOD WASTE REDUCTION

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B-hive Innovations Ltd

The views expressed in this Member News article are the author's own and do not necessarily represent those of Agri-TechE.

Leading Agri-tech company B-hive Innovations will host a Future Leaders Fellowship and lead a research project, which will early detect potato diseases and defects before they hit supermarket shelves.

Awarded by UK Research and Innovation (UKRI), research scientist Dr Barbara dos Santos Correia has been successful in her application for a Future Leaders Fellowship and will receive nearly £675k to support her TuberSense project – a four-year research programme that aims to detect diseases and defects in potato crops, using volatile biomarkers and innovative gas sensors to reduce food waste across the supply chain.

The project will help to establish a framework for crop disease prevention and precision detection from farm to fork by developing new gas sensors that will have a high impact of reducing crop waste and increasing food safety.

Barbara said: “I am delighted to have secured this UKRI funding with B-hive’s support. This funding will support our latest research project, which can transform the agri-food industry.

“We’re incredibly eager to commence our research activities with our project partners – Branston Limited, UWE Bristol, Warwick University and the James Hutton Institute. Our TuberSense project will help to identify emerging climate-driven and disruptive diseases that affect potato farming and storage across the UK and create innovative decision support tools based on volatile sensing.”

The Future Leaders Fellowship is a highly competitive and flexible scheme that supports ambitious and challenging research and innovation and provides training and career development, to maximise the leadership potential of talented early career researchers.

UKRI chief executive, Professor Dame Ottoline Leyser, said:

“I am delighted that UKRI is able to support the next generation of research and innovation leaders through our Future Leaders Fellowship programme.

“The new Fellows announced today will have the support and freedom they need to pursue their research and innovation ideas, delivering new knowledge and understanding and tackling some of the greatest challenges of our time.”

Vidyanath (Vee) Gururajan, managing director at B-hive Innovations, said:

“It’s fantastic that Barbara has received this funding. Not only will it support her development as a research scientist, but projects such as TuberSense can be undertaken to help transform the agriculture industry.

“We’d like to say thank you to UKRI, for providing us with this opportunity, and to our partners who will be working alongside our team during this transformational project. We look forward to research getting underway and the results it will bring.”

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This story has been submitted by an Agri-TechE member.

B-hive Innovations Ltd

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Showcase update: Xampla creating plastic alternatives from pea powder

Agri-TechE Article

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A plant-based alternative to micro plastics is being developed by Xampla. When it took part in the REAP 2020 Start-up Showcase the company was making edible plastics but saw a bigger opportunity in creating biodegradable products from non-food crops and waste streams. We asked about progress of the last year.
CEO Simon Hombersley says that business is going well: “Since we launched at REAP2020, Xampla has received a £6 million seed investment to commercialise its first plant-based plastic product, microcapsules. This product provides a biodegradable alternative to the single use plastics which are currently used in the fragrance industry.”

Plant-based alternative for microcapsules

Microscopic plastic capsules are used in home and personal-care products to gradually release the active ingredient, such as an enzyme or fragrance, but as the capsules are currently made of plastic, they build up and remain in water systems as a major environmental pollutant.
“Our microcapsules can store a range of cargos from fragrances to food grade ingredients, replacing hidden single-use plastics added to a multitude of products,” explains Simon, “the aim is to get the plant based microcapsules to market later this year.”
In June 2021, the research and process behind Xampla’s plant-plastic material was published in Nature Communications, making clear the scientific breakthroughs that allow Xampla to turn plant proteins into a material with the same properties and functionality as plastic that can decompose fully without harming the environment.

Welcomes former Unilever Chief

The company also welcomed Jeff Seabright as Chair of Xampla. Jeff is the former Unilever Chief Sustainability Officer and Coca Cola VP of Environment & Water Resources. He also worked in the White House as climate advisor to the Clinton administration.
This year of success has followed from Xampla’s launch in the Start-Up Showcase at REAP2020. To get the first look at this years’ Start-Up Showcase participants, book your tickets for REAP2021 now!

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The Land App is an easy to use digital mapping platform that enables land managers to benefit from new agri-environmental schemes, connect with Natural Capital investors and design integrated estate plans that support best practice. The company presented in the Start-up Showcase at REAP 2020 we caught up with the team to find out what has happened since.
Having recently partnered with three Environmental Land Management trials The Land App aims to help groups of landowners prepare for natural capital investment and to design integrated estate plans that support best practices to benefit from agri-environment schemes.

ELMS Trials

One of these Land App trials is in the Surrey Hills, where 22 landowners are working in collaboration with advisors on a combined 4,500acre project to improve natural capital.
“The Land App allows land managers to work collaboratively with advisors to build independent land management plans,” explains Partnership and Growth Manager, Dan Geerah, “but crucially the plans from multiple holdings can be brought into a single view to ensure the projects are aligned and deliver maximum benefit.”

Landscape level change needed

The Land App has embarked on a series of ambitious projects bringing landowners together. With over 1.2 million hectares of farmland now represented, the digital mapping platform is being used to help steer land managers to best manage their assets over large land areas.
Dan explains:
“Landowners are making good progress with countryside stewardship at an individual holding level, with wildflower meadows, buffer strips etc, but for actual ecological restoration we need those meadows and buffer strips to be connected across the wider landscape.”
“In Surrey we’re trialling a more user-friendly Land App dashboard which shows the overall farm plan, aggregated across all participants in the study, and indicates the total area eligible for habitat enhancement (e.g number of trees that need to be planted in each location / area for wildflower creation), and approximately how many biodiversity credits this will generate – and all of these elements update as individual land managers in the project update their holdings.”
“We’re asking the farmers what aspirations they have for their land, and then we have this ‘what-if’ approach – what if by 10 years’ time, all of the land management plans in this project have been completed – what benefits would that bring to the landscape in terms of: habitat connectivity; carbon sequestration; floodwater mitigation; and biodiversity.”

Supportive community

The Land App has now grown to over 7000 users and according to Dan the user base is starting to develop into a community of its own: “Most of our clients are very self-sufficient, with some key individuals helping to train other users on the app. We want this to be a platform for consultants and land managers to use side by side without intervention from the Land App team.”
This year of success has followed from the Land App’s participation in the Start-Up Showcase at REAP2020. To get the first look at this years’ Start-Up Showcase participants, book your tickets for REAP2021 now!

REAP 2021: Changing Time(s) for Agriculture – 10th November 2021

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Showcase update: Glas Data makes analysis of on-farm sensors accessible to all

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Agri-TechE

Glas Data presented its farm-centric dashboard, GlasCore, in the REAP 2019 Start-up Showcase. GlasCore allows you to input agri-data from any source and offers fully customisable visualisation and modelling without the need for specialist skills. The company has grown since then and we asked about its progress.
GlasCore, can now combine data from over 70 types of remote sensor as founder Robert Sanders explains: “Farming operations can benefit from being able to detecting patterns across all variables on the farm, and this is what our array of sensors allows them to do.”
Robert’s aim is to make sensors easy to use and affordable for all: “Given the low cost of sensors on the GlasCore platform, there is no limit to the variables that can be measured – we’re actually in early conversations with a local council to establish up to 10,000 sensors.”

Funding accelerates progress

Shortly after REAP the company raised seed funding to allow them to expand commercially. Robert continues: “This year things have really started accelerating, as we bring more sensor types online and widen what we can offer to farmers – and just in the last three months we’ve brought out our new data analysis package.”
“Our sensors feed data to the GlasCore for analysis, but they can also be used to provide remote operation and automated responses,” Robert explains, “when the pattern of incoming data changes suddenly, the wobble in the data is detected by GlasCore and the software sends an alert, which can either be picked up by the farmer, or sent directly to another piece of equipment to action a feedback response.”
“An example use case of Glas Data sensors is in the poultry shed – a sensor can monitor and automatically refill the feed bin and water trough, keeping them fresh and free of disease,” Robert explains, “Or simple sound and temperature sensors can detect ‘huddles’, which is a sign of a welfare problem, as the birds group together and end up crushing each other – so the feedback system allows the farmer to detect that early and intervene.”
“The next step for Glas Data is prediction – for example if you’re looking at egg yield as your key performance indicator (KPI), GlasCore will soon tell you how you can improve that by changing the conditions.” This year of success has followed Glas Data’s participation in the Start-Up Showcase at REAP2019. To get the first look at this years’ Start-Up Showcase participants, book your tickets for REAP2021 now!

REAP 2021: Changing Time(s) for Agriculture – 10th November 2021

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Connecting sensors anywhere – Wyld Networks to discuss the tech at REAP 2021

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Gold Exhibitors Wyld Networks to discuss sensor-to-satellite connectivity at REAP 2021

“I attended Agriculture 101 a few years ago – it’s a fantastic opportunity to get together with early-stage agri-tech companies, and people from outside farming,” says Eric Hewitson, Business Development Manager at Wyld Networks, who was so inspired by the event that he joined Agri-TechE as a member and will be exhibiting at REAP2021.
The workshop format of Agriculture 101 provides presentations by experts from different parts of the agricultural value-chain and gives a deep insight into the industry for those that are new to the sector.
There is also an opportunity to network with others and it was this that Eric found particularly beneficial.
“We just had a chat about what we do and how we can work together – to help each other with that ‘other bit’ that complements what we do.” Networking at Ag101 has achieved results and going on to engage in further Agri-TechE activities has led Wyld Networks to work with partners on a soil moisture sensor that connects to the cloud from anywhere. “Most agricultural land currently lies on the 85% of the earth that doesn’t have cellular connectivity,” explains Eric Hewitson, Business Development Manager, Wyld Networks. The company is a Gold Exhibitor at REAP 2021 and will use that opportunity to discuss how enabling sensors to connect via satellite will be beneficial.
“At the moment if farmers want to use a sensor and transmit data to the cloud for analysis, they may have to install a wireless (LoRaWAN) network on the farm. However, they will still need to have access to broadband or mobile data. As well as sensors, additional costly infrastructure in the form of gateways is required which rely on line of sight between sensor and gateway. Such a network requires significant power and the whole network needs to be installed and managed – so a huge investment of time and hardware.” Eric explains that the new generation of low earth orbit (LEO) satellites will very soon provide near global connectivity, and this will offer a huge opportunity to deploy sensors in remote areas – such as the fens – where there is little cellular coverage.
“Wyld Networks are developing connectivity solutions that send data directly to LEO satellites – at low cost, low energy and minimal investment. We are looking forward to talking about this at REAP 2021.”
The LEO satellites pass overhead daily – an array of 24 of these LEO-satellites would give hourly data coverage. This low-cost data suddenly opens the doors for a range of applications and opportunities for sensor developers and their customers.
Wyld Networks became a member of Agri-TechE after being inspired by the Agriculture 101 event, explains Eric: “I attended Ag101 a few years ago – it’s a fantastic opportunity to get together with early-stage agri-tech companies, and people both inside and outside farming. It’s a great community looking at technology to solve key issues in agriculture such as increasing yields and improving biodiversity and sustainability.
In the company’s next step as a Gold Exhibitor at REAP 2021, Eric is looking forward to meeting sensor developers, agronomists and farmers with an interest in deploying, and finding new use cases for remote data collection.

Agriculture 101 – Thursday 9th September @ 9:30 am – 3:30 pm

The unique one-day introduction provides some insights into the agriculture sector, the opportunities it presents and some of the challenges that are still seeking solutions.

“Attending the Agriculture 101 event gave us an insight into what was a new sector for us, and it gave us the confidence to further explore applications within agri-tech. We have since embarked on several new collaborations and have really appreciated the introduction to the sector and subsequent support of Agri-TechE “
– Liz Jenkinson, CEO, Biocleave
“An impressive blend of different presentations discussing the future of farming, farming politics and the technological drivers. Exchanging knowledge and expertise”
– Agriculture 101 attendee, anonymous, 2020

REAP 2021: Changing Time(s) for Agriculture – 10th November 2021

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Arable Wins 2021 AgTech Breakthrough Award For “IoT Monitoring Solution of the Year”

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Arable has won the 2021 “IoT Monitoring Solution of the Year” prize in the AgTech Breakthrough Awards, which recognize the best agri-tech companies, products, and services around the globe.
Arable, a member of Agri-TechE , is based in California, and its products include a portable weather station, Arable Mark 2, which provides localised weather and plant health status in real-time via a mobile phone.
In the UK Arable has partnered with xarvio to combine its hyper-local crop and weather data with xarvio’s powerful crop production optimisation, to support more precise in-field decisions Jim Ethington, CEO of Arable, said: “We want to thank AgTech Breakthrough for validating our focus and vision with this award. Many of the challenges in agriculture today come down to a data problem: lack of accurate and reliable data costs farmers and enterprises billions in sub-optimally applied inputs, lost yields, and unmanaged risks. Arable’s goal is to offer one centralized, scalable digital solution for the full range of agricultural stakeholders, from farmers and agronomists to global agribusinesses and food companies. The team at Arable is proud of the progress we’ve made towards this vision, and we are proud to receive recognition of that achievement.”
Arable is a data and analytics company that delivers more productive and sustainable outcomes in agriculture through an integrated IoT platform that helps food and agriculture businesses gain visibility and insight into their farming operations. Arable works with the world’s most innovative farms, agriculture input providers, and food companies in over 40 countries.
Read more at arable.com.

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New government report on genetic technologies recommends gene editing trial

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Breeding of new varieties of crop takes many generations. With the rapid changes in environmental conditions and the withdrawal of key plant protection products, this may not be fast enough to provide food security. A new government report on genetic technologies is recommending changes to regulatory frameworks to support development of new breeding techniques.
Dr Belinda Clarke, Director of Agri-TechE comments: “Our knowledge of the genome has increased significantly since the legislation was first passed and it is time to review the regulations. Opening up the discussion and creating a test-case enables different stakeholders to provide their perspectives. This will help provide consensus on the way forward that balances a proportionate view on the risks and benefits and provide an environment that stimulates new thinking.”

New report on Genetic Technologies

There are many emerging genetic technologies that don’t involve the transfer of DNA from one species to another (genetic modification) and that could accelerate the development of new varieties.
However, the current ‘one size fits all’ regulation of genetic technologies does not allow the use of techniques such as gene editing, even when the end product could have arisen in nature or during conventional plant breeding.
The government ran a consultation earlier this year to gain inputs to advise potential changes to the legislation, and it has reported this week (1st September 2021) in the document Regulatory Horizons Council – Report on Genetic Technologies.
The report identifies that genetic technologies developed within a sensible precautionary environment can offer opportunities to transform agri-food systems through nutritionally healthier crop varieties, disease resistance, reduced insecticide and fungicide use, reduced greenhouse gas emissions, improved climate resilience, and contributions to sustainability and biodiversity conservation.

A new regulatory approach for genetic technologies

It makes a number of recommendations, stressing the need to take a more proportionate approach to applications based on the potential risks.
The report says that “A guiding assumption should be that similar products (phenotypically and genetically) arising from different genetic techniques would not be expected to have different risks and so should be subject to similar regulatory scrutiny.”
The report clarifies the underlying principles of good regulation: ensuring safety; balancing precaution about future hazards with ambition to gain future benefits; taking decisions in a timely, proportionate and predictable manner; being adaptable to future innovations; and ensuring improvements in the quality of animal welfare. It concludes that data requirements should be proportionate to the nature and scale of potential risks, should include information on potential benefits, and should not require the collection of data that do not relate to a clearly specified policy.

Gene Editing as a test case

It proposes to use ‘Simple Genome Editing’ as a test case for the new approach as this process generates varieties that could be produced by conventional breeding.
The authors comment: “Given the scale and extent of the potential benefits from all genetic technologies, it is important to ensure that the UK regulatory approach adopted for products of simple genome editing does not create regulatory precedents that would restrict our freedom to act in the near future on the regulation of all genetic technologies.”
Dale Sanders, Director of the John Innes Centre, comments: “I welcome publication of this comprehensive report which takes an evidence-based view of regulatory reform that could enable sustainable crop improvement through deployment of modern genetic technologies.”“The Regulatory Horizons Council Report on genetic technologies is extremely timely. With COP26 on the horizon, and with the UK pursuing its own independent trade policy while rebuilding from the COVID-19 pandemic, businesses need to be able to make the most of innovations that stand to benefit the environment, consumers and the economy.
Paul McGrade, Senior Counsel on Brexit and Trade, Lexington Communications comments that the report is extremely timely. “With COP26 on the horizon, and with the UK pursuing its own independent trade policy while rebuilding from the COVID-19 pandemic, businesses need to be able to make the most of innovations that stand to benefit the environment, consumers and the economy.”
He says there is a “case for a science-based, proportionate approach to regulation. Such an approach can unlock investment in the UK and create new opportunities for those who wish to do business here.”
Agri-TechE has an event on 23rd September – Advances in Breeding for Agriculture- New tools for new solutions – at which will be a discussion of the new genetic technologies that are emerging and the implications of the new report for innovation.
For more information, also take a look at our briefing page on new breeding technologies.

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“You need to know what the future will look like” – regenerative farmer Tom Pearson speaks at REAP

Farmer Tom Pearson is transitioning his farm to regenerative agriculture. Here he talks about the benefits of participating at REAP.

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B-HIVE RECEIVES FUNDING TO DEVELOP CUTTING-EDGE TECHNOLOGY FOR FOOD WASTE REDUCTION

Leading Agri-tech company B-hive Innovations will host a Future Leaders Fellowship and lead a research project, which will early detect potato diseases and defects before they hit supermarket shelves.

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