Advertise on podcast: Our Week in Agri-Tech

Thank you Claire Donkin and team for having us at your brilliant Peat Free Pathway event at Fountain Plants Ltd. The learnings from the discussions have been shared by Kate Brunswick and Laura Bouvet with the Agri-TechE team – clearly the transition to peat-free is neither rapid nor straightforward but your event got the industry talking together. 🚜 From fixed fee to future rights, discounted access to royalties, we had a talk by polymath plant scientist/ farmer / patent agent Andrew Tindall of HGF, who helped us navigate how farmers can be rewarded and incentivised for their input into collaborative projects and trial work such as through the ADOPT programme. 📣 Calling all innovators and farmers! Our next on-farm Demo Day will be on December 8th on the SALLE FARMS estate, focusing on AI and data interrogation. Come and bring your tech to tackle the challenges, as outlined by our host farmer Andrew Peal. Exhibition, pitching and sponsorship opportunities available. 🌱 🔬 🛜 Land use change, AI on-farm, food safety from field to fork, a farm walk, post-harvest innovations and more! Many of next week's #AgriTechWeek2026 events are sold out, but some still have availability – from Newcastle to Norwich, we have curated a suite of online and in-person agritech events for you, designed and hosted by a range of our members, including AMFRESH Group, YAGRO, University of Essex, Norwich Research Park, ADAS, University of Lincoln, British On-Farm Innovation Network (BOFIN), Newcastle University, Rothamsted Enterprises. 🚩 Have you booked your REAP ticket yet? Prices go up slightly after next week, so to get the cheaper rate, grab yours ASAP – and bursaries are available for students and farmers. Finally, some exciting news for UK agritech – featuring a ministerial visit to Lincoln Institute for Agri-Food Technology this week… and Agri-TechE is part of it too! News, trends, and breakthroughs shaping the future of farming, brought to you by Agri-TechE. We are a not-for-profit, independent organisation for our members. We bring together forward-thinking farmers, researchers, technologists, and agri-businesses to foster collaboration and drive impactful solutions. https://www.agri-tech-e.co.uk/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Our Stakeholder Group is so important to us to help shape our thinking and our future activities. Thanks to Richardson Milling UK for hosting our latest meeting, which saw really helpful input from farming, academia, agri-tech entrepreneurship and commercial innovation. The latest in our “micro-learning” series about intellectual property in agri-tech rolled off the press, courtesy of Carsten Reinhard from J A Kemp. Who knew edible fungi are also subject to Plant Variety Rights? (ICYMI catch-up via the recording in your Member Stash). Farmer-focused knowledge exchange – our Farmer First Innovation Group this month talked about crop disease management and diagnostics, featuring talks from Niab, Vivent Biosignals and Outbreak Labs. Data-driven Life Cycle Analysis – you’ve gotta measure it to manage – and report it…..also available on your Member Stash to hear from Gavin Milligan, and case studies from Ponda and Recycled Crop Nutrients A warm welcome to Soleni Systems Ltd – helping with project management of complex agri-tech innovations Also joining us this week is the STFC (Science and Technology Facilities Council – bringing physics, space, computational science into agri-tech (for example tracking the movements of nutrients and water through soil and even living plants). And some STOP PRESS news about funding available to help Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and the Food Standards Agency use engineering biology more effective – from vet vaccines to eDNA and water quality - £200k contracts up for grabs. What a week – we need a weekend now to recover from all that! News, trends, and breakthroughs shaping the future of farming, brought to you by Agri-TechE. We are a not-for-profit, independent organisation for our members. We bring together forward-thinking farmers, researchers, technologists, and agri-businesses to foster collaboration and drive impactful solutions. https://www.agri-tech-e.co.uk/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

🪟 🫣 The Sustainable Farming Incentive window opened – and shut – on Tuesday….it felt a bit of a manic panic way to allocate funding to land-owners to deliver environmental land management, but let’s hope for some major impact on the ground. 🎠 The World Agri-Tech Summit was interspersed with an evening Reception we hosted with the Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Trade. The Agri-Tech Carousel format enabled companies to showcase their tech, ranging from biostimulants (SugaROx), to herd improvement (AgriSense, crop disease diagnostics (Optigene), restoring disease resistance to plant varieties (Resurrect Bio) and measuring microscale movement for fertility and particles in agrifood and labs (Dyneval). 💸 Bramble Partners had some exciting news for our industry with a retailer partnership to bring fresh, supply-chain-focused investment into the sector. The Tesco Agri-tech Challenge final saw a line-up of awesome early and later stage businesses all aiming to positively impact the supply chain. Check out the winner of the early stage category at #REAP2026. 📣 Finally, a shout-out to the amazing things I sadly had to miss this week – the Precision Breeding Conference at the John Innes Centre, the Poster Showcase hosted by the Norwich Research Park and a huge congrats 🥂 to Harper Adams University on your 125th birthday. Genuinely gutted not to have been able to be at all of the above... News, trends, and breakthroughs shaping the future of farming, brought to you by Agri-TechE. We are a not-for-profit, independent organisation for our members. We bring together forward-thinking farmers, researchers, technologists, and agri-businesses to foster collaboration and drive impactful solutions. https://www.agri-tech-e.co.uk/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week: 👏 A big thanks to everyone who focused on finance with us - whether you were an investor, an early stage venture, or just came to listen and network. With fabulous keynotes which stretched our brains about the investable future of the food system, we discovered big opportunities for the new “biological intelligence” layer…. Plus 10 early stage ventures in agrifood, showcasing their solutions from frost protection to improved nutrition in peas, innovation to control cabbage stem flea beetle and water retaining soil additions. 📣 A warm welcome to new member Concept to Commercial who officially launched yesterday at the event - helping agri-food innovation businesses win funding and build commercial engines 🙌 Also to new member Cytotrait, taking a new approach to precision-breeding. Plants and animals don’t just have one #genome, they have loads more DNA in tiny compartments in cells (chloroplasts and mitochondria if you’re interested). So huge potential to apply new genomic techniques in these other genomes. 🪳 🍎 Thinking all things stinking – namely the Brown Marmorated Stink Bug, an invasive crop pest – hitching a ride into the UK via an unexpected source. Niab is leading the UK’s effort in locating and mapping their spread through its work at East Malling. Plus we headed out into the orchards to hear collaboration with tech companies – not least FOTENIX, OptiGene, SOIL MOISTURE SENSE LTD and Delta-T Devices. 🚜 A sense of the mood music around technology and investment among farmers with the McKinsey & Company's biennial Global Farmer Outlook report - a new blog about this landed this week on the Agri-TechE website. 🔔 And REAP registrations are ramping up.....have you bought your ticket yet? News, trends, and breakthroughs shaping the future of farming, brought to you by Agri-TechE. We are a not-for-profit, independent organisation for our members. We bring together forward-thinking farmers, researchers, technologists, and agri-businesses to foster collaboration and drive impactful solutions. https://www.agri-tech-e.co.uk/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

👉 We’re growing the Agri-TechE team…..are you – or someone you know – our next new recruit? https://www.agri-tech-e.co.uk/opportunity/team-support-administrator/ 📣 Final call to “Focus on Finance” with us next week to learn more about different financing options to start and scale your #agritech company and hear from the latest batch of entrepreneurs. Plus SyndetAI will be helping all our start-ups identify the hot (and not-so-hot) spots in their businesses using their proprietary platform. 🔔 Prepping for the new Sustainable Farming Incentive window opening……at some point…..after Sept 22nd……? Discussing this with the land agents, ecologists and ag business consultants from Brown&Co LLP at their drinks reception at Queens College. 🤝 Claim your member discount to attend the World Agri-Tech Summit in London. 🙌 New members featured this week are all about herd and plant health: 🐄 💻 farmdrive's livestock management platform helps manage the beef supply chain, logging performance, health treatments, compliance records and profit margins 🌱 CEON is all about plant nutrition and soil improvement with their range of fertilisers, soil care products, and biostimulants. A warm welcome to you both….and more new members to welcome next week! News, trends, and breakthroughs shaping the future of farming, brought to you by Agri-TechE. We are a not-for-profit, independent organisation for our members. We bring together forward-thinking farmers, researchers, technologists, and agri-businesses to foster collaboration and drive impactful solutions. https://www.agri-tech-e.co.uk/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

More money, making the most of membership and maize…. Agri-TechE’s weekly vlog is recorded alongside (an ever-dwindling) hay store. This week: 🤝 Meet the right people, increase your visibility, and grow your network and impact – we walk through how to max out your Agri-TechE membership on Tuesday 8th September at noon. Prospective members also very welcome….come and be part of the community! 💷 Two new grant funds landed – the Farmer Collaboration Fund and the Small R&D Partnership competition. Together they total £43m….sitting alongside the #ADOPT grant programme as well, there is a lot of money around for innovation and collaboration. New members welcome to the ecosystem: 💡 📉 If you’re a farmer looking to pay less for your energy, the digital platform developed by Multitude Advisors Ltd is worth a look. 📈 And for all those wanting to advance the commercial maturity of their agri-tech innovation, check out Juster AgriConsult. Our latest episode of the #Agri-Chat podcast landed – I talked to Peter Palmer of Prodata Weather Systems about #evapotranspiration and weather sensors.  Big congrats to the #BrashAg podcast on reaching your milestone, and thanks for inviting me as a guest on your 100th ep. 🌦️ 🌽 And finally, deploying AI to reveal the “golden window” during the summer which causes up to half a tonne of crop to be lost for every 10mm shortfall of water.     News, trends, and breakthroughs shaping the future of farming, brought to you by Agri-TechE. We are a not-for-profit, independent organisation for our members. We bring together forward-thinking farmers, researchers, technologists, and agri-businesses to foster collaboration and drive impactful solutions. https://www.agri-tech-e.co.uk/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week we’re about birds, biologicals, the future of farm machinery and the importance of language when talking about nature and the environment.   Read on…. 🪶 🍂 The berry bounty currently bursting forth in UK hedgerows awaits the winter bird visitors – but will it hold long enough to feed them in this “false autumn?” And the trade-off between the Government’s Drought Support Package for farmers and the impact on food and cover for over-wintering birds and insects. 🙂 🥱 From visions of bucolic scenes of local wildlife, to institutional policies and targets - words matter, according to some of the latest research. 🚜 Rabobank releases its latest update on the European farm machinery sector and we take a deeper dive into the findings in this month’s blog from Agri-TechE. 🗣️ 📆 Member catch-ups and event planning for 2027……stand by with your diaries! News, trends, and breakthroughs shaping the future of farming, brought to you by Agri-TechE. We are a not-for-profit, independent organisation for our members. We bring together forward-thinking farmers, researchers, technologists, and agri-businesses to foster collaboration and drive impactful solutions. https://www.agri-tech-e.co.uk/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In a week where the Government announced a Drought Support Package for farmers, we're calling anyone who wants to meet agritech start-ups….. Read on! ☔ With just 1mm of rain falling in some parts of the Fens this week, we dive into the details of the new Support Package. Is it a drop in the ocean of what’s really needed? 💷 Come and Focus on Finance with us on the 17th Sept, featuring start-up pitches plus a chance to learn about money available to grow your business and a state of the nation about the agri-tech funding landscape. We have two exhibition slots left for business support organisations – and all the start-ups we feature will receive a free investment-readiness analysis from headline event sponsor SyndetAI . 🙌 The Agri-TechE network is officially “Fantastic” – or at least the list of our UK members applying to attend the Agromek trade show in Denmark is! 🤝 Collect 5 @BASIS points for the REAP2026 conference (and farmers – bag yourself a bursary to attend). Plus we have one spot for sponsorship remaining if you'd like to put your brand to one of the UK's key agri-tech conferences. And check out the Agri-Tech Week programme (19th – 23rd October)….which events will you be attending? News, trends, and breakthroughs shaping the future of farming, brought to you by Agri-TechE. We are a not-for-profit, independent organisation for our members. We bring together forward-thinking farmers, researchers, technologists, and agri-businesses to foster collaboration and drive impactful solutions. https://www.agri-tech-e.co.uk/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

☀️ 🌔 🌠 🌊 🥵 🪱 Today’s vlog standing in front a compost pile ready for incorporation – helping build soil resilience for future extreme weather. Three different members deploying three different member benefits 📣 Raising the profile of their technology 🤝 Bring introduced to the right people for their business needs ❓ Specific tech “asks” from a fruit farmer….watch the vid to find out if you can help! Also, catching up with Bitwise Agronomy and how their AI-enabled platform (“Barbara!”) has provided forecasting services for 12,000km of strawberries as well as work out where yield is being lost in strawbs and other berries. (Spoiler alert, it’s not always where the grower thinks it is). 🖥️ Taking the summer to sort out the database and do some crucial updates – making everyone’s life easier (we hope!) ☎️ And finally, an exciting call from BBC Panorama… News, trends, and breakthroughs shaping the future of farming, brought to you by Agri-TechE. We are a not-for-profit, independent organisation for our members. We bring together forward-thinking farmers, researchers, technologists, and agri-businesses to foster collaboration and drive impactful solutions. https://www.agri-tech-e.co.uk/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

It’s all about the not-so-humble (and thirsty) spud, where we’ve been considering the science behind growing better potatoes and in a week where the UK’s first gene-edited crop gained regulatory approval. Plus money, the robotics revolution and a great opportunity for our Early Career Innovators. This week: 🥔 🍟 Lamb Weston processes 200,000 tonnes of potatoes a year, a great example of supply chain partners supporting their growers to produce an even better crop. We've also been talking soil moisture sensors and drip irrigation as possible mitigations in these dry, hot growing conditions. 🤖 💷 Calling all revolutionary robots as £20m funding is available as part of the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Farming Futures R&D programme. (This week we sent our members a big funding summary of everything available right now). 🍓 🏎️ When F1 meets agriculture….getting the robots to do the heavy lifting on fruit farms, with our latest new member Dynium. 🎓 🚜 We have 2 FREE places up for grabs on the Farm Management Skills Programme at Harper Adams University, thanks to our partnership with the Society of Agriculture – get in touch to start your application! News, trends, and breakthroughs shaping the future of farming, brought to you by Agri-TechE. We are a not-for-profit, independent organisation for our members. We bring together forward-thinking farmers, researchers, technologists, and agri-businesses to foster collaboration and drive impactful solutions. https://www.agri-tech-e.co.uk/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Going all ornamental in this week’s vlog – about a sector that is worth £1.6bn to the UK economy. This week’s round-up from Agri-TechE is from Bury Lane Farm Shop, one of the UK’s leading growers of house plants and flowers – with an awesome PYO experience. Just what we needed for our team away day and teeing us up for the second of our Strategy Days. A huge thank you to Will and your team for the tour of the huge glasshouses full of luscious houseplants - and then letting us loose among the dahlias, agapanthus, delphiniums and more... armed with a bucket and a pair of secateurs…🌸 💮 🪷 🏵️ 🌹 🌻 🌼 🌷 🪻 💐 🪴 🌱 😍 And a serious conversation about the challenges associated with production of ornamentals at scale and discovering the most environmentally-friendly growth medium we have ever seen. All very topical as the Food and Farming Partnership Board is developing the first of its Sector Growth Plans (as recommended in the Farming Profitability Review), focussing on Horticulture. 🪲 Plus important discussions with the Animal and Plant Health Agency at Sandringham Flower Show – the Agency works tirelessly to keep the UK’s plants and animals free from invasive pests and diseases. Colorado Beetle and Yellow Legged hornets were our topic of discussion, but we also touched on Xylella. There is no room for complacency, particularly with a changing climate.  News, trends, and breakthroughs shaping the future of farming, brought to you by Agri-TechE. We are a not-for-profit, independent organisation for our members. We bring together forward-thinking farmers, researchers, technologists, and agri-businesses to foster collaboration and drive impactful solutions. https://www.agri-tech-e.co.uk/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

➡️ All change in the UK Government - including the Department now responsible (again) for funding science, innovation and technology. 👀 Check out our video that landed this week where I talk to Sarah Evered about farmer readiness for dynamic alignment with the EU within Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. 💭 Big thoughts with Niall Mottram of Cambridge Consultants about a potential new funding mechanism for innovation in agri-food, inspired by the energy sector - watch this space! (and thank you Mary Nicholls for wise counsel). 💡 Having input into a new report being undertaken by The Royal Society about the future of food - between now and 2100. 🙏 Massive thanks to Louise Border and James FRY for offering the gorgeous Mills & Reeve office in #Cambridge to host our Strategy Day. And you gave us food for thought in your into about quantum computing and the alignment of regulation between life sciences and agri-food..... News, trends, and breakthroughs shaping the future of farming, brought to you by Agri-TechE. We are a not-for-profit, independent organisation for our members. We bring together forward-thinking farmers, researchers, technologists, and agri-businesses to foster collaboration and drive impactful solutions. https://www.agri-tech-e.co.uk/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Bag yourself a smart grad trainee, discover how it feels to be in charge of a robot, the UK's 5 year commitment to #agritech innovation, and welcome to one of our new members – this week’s round-up from Agri-TechE. 🎓 We announce a leap forward in the way we support agritech learning and development through a new partnership with MDS Ltd. Apply to host a trainee and also be part of tech-ing up the training for the next cohort! 🫵 Have your say in the planned Engine for Dual-Use Growth and Excellence, bringing together agri-tech and defence, through some work underway by Grounded Research | Market Research and Strategic Development 📣 UK Research and Innovation releases its 5 year strategic plan – a commitment to agri-tech, with an emphasis on precision technologies and engineering biology. 💷 “If you are a farmer looking to adopt new technologies…..” – the #ADOPT programme funded by Defra and delivered by Innovate UK is here to help. And for the long(ish) term. 🤖 The AgXeed robot…..as seen on Clarkson’s Farm – remarkably responsive and light on its feet (I mean, tracks). Great day with NFU Mutual looking to the tech of tomorrow. 🚀 Agri-Tech Met Space this week at our event, great discussions across sectors…..any idea how much it costs to send a can of Coke into low earth orbit? (no Mentos needed 🧨). 🙌 Welcome to a new member SKALENE LIMITED – developing real-time, non-contact monitoring of pellets, feed, grain, seeds etc as they move through tubes and pipes to keep them flowing freely.  News, trends, and breakthroughs shaping the future of farming, brought to you by Agri-TechE. We are a not-for-profit, independent organisation for our members. We bring together forward-thinking farmers, researchers, technologists, and agri-businesses to foster collaboration and drive impactful solutions. https://www.agri-tech-e.co.uk/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this week’s round-up we announce our #REAP2026 keynote speaker and give you a heads-up about the next in our “Agri-Tech Meets…” event series. And did you bump into any of the Agri-TechE team at Fruit Focus? This week: 📣 We proudly announce Anjali Goswami FRS, Defra’s Chief Scientific Advisor as our REAP 2026 keynote speaker and the wider agenda, plus some opportunities to leverage the REAP conference for your organisation 🍎 🍓 🍐 Did you go to #FruitFocus? We're eagerly awaiting the Sector Growth Plan for Horticulture, currently in development by the Farming and Food Partnership Board - will it bear fruit (pun intended) for the industry? 🚀 Go into (low earth) orbit with our Agri-Tech Meets...Space event - in partnership with Space East. https://www.agri-tech-e.co.uk/civicrm/event/info/?reset=1&id=27333 News, trends, and breakthroughs shaping the future of farming, brought to you by Agri-TechE. We are a not-for-profit, independent organisation for our members. We bring together forward-thinking farmers, researchers, technologists, and agri-businesses to foster collaboration and drive impactful solutions. https://www.agri-tech-e.co.uk/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week's round-up from the Groundswell Agriculture festival. I share my reflections, pick out one of my fave talks of the show and welcome a new member in this week's vlog from Agri-TechE. ⛺ 😎 A more considered set of conversations at Groundswell this year - and Happy 10th Birthday to the Festival. Even the Secretary of State Emma Reynolds loved it! 🫶 Inspired by the session by Pasture for Life about data capture and hard metrics not always collecting and quantifying what farmers instinctively see, sense and feel. "A lack of data doesn't necessarily mean that something isn't true." A nice segue into the theme for our own #REAP2026 conference in November! 🫵 Lots of talk about the ADOPT programme (FYI Chris Lyons is your Go-To Person at Innovate UK about all things ADOPT) - this really is the way for farmers to de-risk their decisions to embrace new innovation. Great session chaired by Tom MacMillan with Lindsay Roome, Simon Pearson MBE and Bryony Gittins. 🪟 Window 1 opened of the new Sustainable Farming Incentive round. Brace yourself for the mad scramble! 📣 Welcome to a new member BionemaUk  Group Limited - Groundswell was a perfect setting for the discussions about the technologies they develop and manufacture for biocontrol in agriculture..... Plus we recorded some podcasts and did some filming which we'll be dropping over the next few weeks, but special thanks to: David Linton | Cristóbal Uauy | Sarah Evered | Russell Batten | Louise Penn Also a shout out to the amazing little Agri-TechE team - Kate Brunswick | Becky Dodds | Kristina Kalinina | Deryn Gant | Sophie Butler | Laura Bouvet News, trends, and breakthroughs shaping the future of farming, brought to you by Agri-TechE. We are a not-for-profit, independent organisation for our members. We bring together forward-thinking farmers, researchers, technologists, and agri-businesses to foster collaboration and drive impactful solutions. https://www.agri-tech-e.co.uk/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.