Agtech Action | Week of 10.14.23 - 10.20.23
Agtech Action is a weekly newsletter highlighting and commenting on current events in the world of agtech
Saudi Arabia has the world’s largest farm, ethically sourced produce and gene-edited super chickens. Anti-avocado militias, Arkansas orders Syngenta to sell its U.S. farmland, and a new price fixing suit aimed at Big Beef.
Digitization is the theme of the agtech week. Much of the buzz around agtech is centered on food and agriculture becoming more digitized. But does digitization mean more technology and does that create more value? I’ve got some thoughts on that in this week’s newsletter.
Food and the World:
Walmart Announces Plans to Build $350 Million Milk Processing Plant in Southern Georgia
Winter wheat has emerged in every state, except California
Corn Belt riding a temperature rollercoaster
Claim: USDA’s ‘incredibly shrinking’ conservation program a warning about the farm bill
The U.S. And Europe Are at Odds Over Trump-Era Tariffs, And It's Now Causing Strained Relations
Harvest Update: Corn and Soybean Progress Ahead of Average
USDA Crop Progress report: Soybean harvest over 60% complete
First-ever global estimation of the impact of disasters on agriculture
The U.S. And Europe Are at Odds Over Trump-Era Tariffs, And It's Now Causing Strained Relations
‘Ethically sourced produce is having its moment,' says Fair Trade USA's Paul Rice
New Price-fixing Suit Aimed at Big 4 Beef Packers
China third-quarter pork output hits highest in at least a decade
Expect another round of ‘WOTUS whiplash,’ warns senator
EU can’t reach decision on prolonging the use of chemical herbicide glyphosate
Warming and habitat loss shrink pollinator numbers. That may hit coffee, cocoa crops hard in future
Agtech in the News:
AgTech Sector in the UAE: An Ambitious Goal To Boost Local Food Production
Bayer Introduces Direct-Seeded Rice System
Measure to Improve launches software solution for growers working with Walmart, other retailers
Saudi Arabia breaks Guinness World Records for world's largest farm
The Farms™ Sign MOU With Priva Horticulture
Syngenta Introduces First Biologicals Service Center for Seed Treatment in Germany
Farm on top of Fenway Park produces thousands of pounds of produce annually
St. Louis Collaborators Launch Cultivar STL (a great LATAM agtech initiative!)
Pioneering a Sustainable Future with Container Farming
Trimble and Ohio State University Open Technology Labs to Foster Agriculture
US adoption of GMO commodity crops inches towards 100%
Super-chickens to the rescue: Scientists show how CRISPR gene editing can combat bird flu
APHIS Announces Partnership to Improve Early Detection of Emerging Animal Diseases
Tyson Foods partners with insect ingredient company Protix
Fun:
Florida Company Breaks Record for World’s Largest Charcuterie Board
At breakfast, this group always leaves at least a $1,000 tip
Mississippi Hunter and Florida Trapper Survive Wild Pig Attacks (tough guy!)
Seedbox Solution Creates Pink Seed Box Fundraiser for Cancer Patients
Helpful Resources:
Q4 2023: PitchBook Analyst Note: Global VC Ecosystem Rankings
Q4 2023: PitchBook Analyst Note: Increased Antitrust Scrutiny and Complexity for M&A
Q3 2023: European Venture Report
Interesting Reads:
Bridging the Age-Driven Gap in Mental Health Support for Entrepreneurs
How a Fertilizer Shortage Is Spreading Desperate Hunger
Arkansas orders Chinese-owned seed producer Syngenta to sell U.S. farmland
New York’s Hottest Steakhouse Was a Fake, Until Saturday Night
Carbon Pipelines Clash with State Governments
Lebanon and Iraq: Where food delivery can provide a return on investment
Sony Ventures earmarks $10M to invest in African entertainment startups
500 Global, ITIDA launch Scale Up Programme in Egypt
How a Ugandan startup wound up in Mexico
Israeli tech leaders to boycott Web Summit after CEO tweet (follow the money)
New World Bank president signals that time is up on €1B subsidies for fossil fuels
Oklahoma’s New Lunch Program Puts a Twist on the Farm-to-School Model
Cooking oil has a deforestation problem. A startup says it has a solution
Stouffer's Releases Its First-Ever Advent Calendar, and It's Filled With Frozen Food
Government’s Grip on Private Land Boosted by Court Ruling Against Hunting Clubs
Agriculture Leaders Struggle with Tech Anxiety: A Growing Concern
The ongoing evolution of plant-based cheese
Can shrimp farming restore mangroves? This scientist is making it happen
Researchers develop organic nanozymes suitable for agricultural use
Carbon market no longer serving small-tract forests
The anti-avocado militias of Michoacán
Shipping Food Is Dirty Business. Can Sailboats Fix It?
Finance:
Ronin Equity seeks add-ons after merging six companies to craft Lotus
Moolec Science Secures $30M in Funding
Plug and Play Topeka Accelerator Program Selects 24 Startups in Animal Health & AgTech
Timberland needs a figurehead to rally all stakeholders
Nongshim Invests $7.4M in Food Tech Startups
Australian farmland values flatline in H1 2023 – Rural Bank
Ocean Rainforest Secures $4.5M For Offshore Giant Kelp Cultivation
Orbem Closes On €30M Series A For AI-Powered Scanning Technology
MIT, Columbia endowments post negative returns for PE, VC portfolios
London-based FlexSea raises €2.3M to replace single use plastic with seaweed-derived material
Australian Plant Phenomics Facility Receives $60M for Crop Development
UMIAMI Secures $34.7M for Plant-Based Chicken Innovation & U.S. Expansion
Theme of the Agtech Week: Digitization
This month marked the 10 year anniversary of Monsanto’s acquisition of The Climate Corporation. That acquisition was the first domino to bring food and agriculture technology into the mainstream. It also coined a lot of new terms—agtech, precision agriculture, digital ag, geo ag—and it brought more investment and investors to the sector. The sentiment was that Climate would be the first of many agtech startups to be founded and bought that would bring food and agriculture into the modern digital age. Has that happened and does digitization equal more tech and more value? I have some thoughts.
Since that acquisition, we’ve seen a flood of agtech and to categorize it loosely, and incompletely, as the following:
Applications (software, hardware, etc.)
Products (physical and non-physical)
Operations (facilities, businesses, infrastructure)
Each of these categories can have a digital component to it. But does digitization create new value? I’ll start with a straightforward example: data collection. Data collection has been the most immediate issue that agtech has tackled, from weather, to soil, planting, breeding, crop protection and many more variables a farmer/producer has to manage. Whether it is an application that collects spray data, or a piece of hardware that measures soil matter, or a data collection application, these digitized solutions answered the following questions positively:
Does it streamline (e.g. speed up or make more efficient) an existing process/task?
Does it save the user money?
Does it save the user time?
Does it help the user make better decisions?
If any of those questions are answered with a yes, then someone in the value chain used that digital solution. The Climate acquisition was done to bring on a technology that could aggregate weather, geospatial and broad datasets to better inform Monsanto on it’s product offerings (agrochemicals, services, etc.) to its customers (farmers, producers, vendors, distributors, and so on). Did that create new value? Monsanto paid $1B for Climate’s tech so they clearly thought it would.
When you evaluate agtech, especially digital solutions, you have to ask yourself the above questions. And if you don’t arrive at resounding ‘yes’ answers, then is that digitization for the sake of digitization?
Have a great weekend.
BD
Brandon Day is the Chief Operating Officer of The Yield Lab Institute, the global agtech think-tank, ecosystem builder, non-profit arm of The Yield Lab global network of venture capital funds. The views, opinions and commentary expressed are solely those of Brandon Day.