Upstream Ag Professional - August 27th 2023
Essential research and analysis for agribusiness leaders
Welcome to the 6th edition of Upstream Ag Professional!
Index for the week:
Illustrative AgTech Insights: AgTech Investment on the Decline and What That Means
The Fertilizer Institute Introduces Certified Biostimulants Program - Will it help the biological space?
Eiwa Announces Integration With Spacesense and Infrastructure Wars in Agriculture
Trace Genomics and Taurus Agricultural Marketing Partner - Soil-as-a-starting point and the technology to enable
The People v. Tech: Forecasting the Future of Farming through The Lumps of Labor Fallacy and the Jobs to Tasks Frameworks to Navigate the Impact of Automation in Ag
Solinftec and the Solix Autonomous Platform: Reimagining Farming from First Principles Follow up As Solinftec Onboards more Retails and Announces Factory in USA
Cibus Reports Second Quarter 2023 Financial Results and Provides Business Update
Bushel® Secures $26 million to Accelerate Digitization in Agriculture
The Ultimate Guide to the Jobs-to-be-done Framework
1. Illustrative AgTech Insights: AgTech Investment on the Decline and What That Means - Upstream Ag Professional
Key Takeaways
Images illustrating the trends in agtech investment are declining.
The easy suggestion is that this means M&A activity. But it might actually means zombie companies and IP sales.
The need for consilience in agriculture.
One of my biases has been writing to convey a point.
I have long known that people, on average, learn better through a well-constructed image—after all, the saying is, “A picture is worth a thousand words.”; however, I have poorly acknowledged this with action.
Moving forward, I will be doing a regular series (no set cadence, though) where I will be highlighting images, graphics, and charts that I think convey a useful insight and story surrounding the world of agribusiness and agtech.
This week, I am pulling on the thread of AgTech Investment on the Decline: What does it mean? brought to life through a series of images and data sets.
The next three Illustrative AgTech Insights will include the following:
AgTech Knowledge Gaps in Farmer-Trusted Advisors
Bigger is Faster when it comes to AgTech Adoption— Age is Irrelevant
Spend of Agribusinesses on IT Infrastructure and Systems
For all of the images and analysis, check out the Upstream Ag Professional member-only link above!
2. The Fertilizer Institute Introduces Certified Biostimulants Program - Crop Life
Key Takeaways
The Fertilizer Institute is releasing a Certified Biostimulants Program that is intended to illustrate when products meet efficacy, safety and composition standards.
I believe the certification will have a small benefit, at best, towards the biostimulant industry due to the voluntary nature, the need to get the channel on board and through looking at other similar industry initiatives like Ag Data Transparent.
TFI officially announced that it was introducing the Certified Biostimulants Program. This is a voluntary evidence-based program that will award biostimulant companies a label indicating that their products meet industry recognized standards for efficacy, safety, and composition. The program is based on the U.S. Biostimulant Industry Guidelines.
This effort from The Fertilizer Institute is a good thing and I commend them for putting the effort in place. However, I think it is a minor contributor to improving the biological marketplace.
Here’s why: