Our Week in Agri-Tech

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 co...

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 L...

Lots of Defra news to share, plus we talk about trade-offs around global food security, and consider if high-input agriculture still make sense. Plus we welcome some of our latest new members.   This week in the Agri-TechE round-up:   📣 Defra’s been busy this week. The Farming Roadmap has landed, and we discover what the Government thinks about the 2025 Farming Profitability Review as i...

Rounding up the Agri-TechE week on farm, courtesy of Home Farm Nacton – the 43rd Demonstrator Farm for LEAF (Linking Environment And Farming) .   Also this week: -         Applications open for early stage #agritech ventures to present at our Focus on Finance event (Sept 17th – all welcome). -         Al...

Hazel Alpaca (newly-shorn) and I are here to tell you about Cereals, the Festival of Fresh, the next in our “Agri-Tech Meets…” series, plus the Big Announcement that UK farmers have been awaiting. This week from Agri-TechE: 🕳️ My learnings from the Niab soil hole at Cereals Event (and thank you David Clarke for a great explanation about "plate-y" limestone and following the wormholes). 💭 A mantra...

Forecasting the weather, crop performance and pest and disease outbreaks has been peppered with rhyming slogans and old wives’ tales (DM me to discover the one about the right time to drill sugar beet - too rude for the vlog!). This week the Agri-TechE round-up is from a sugar beet field, talking about the top tech being used by British Beet Research Organisation (BBRO) to bring some science to th...

We’ve all wilted and dried out in the UK heatwave this week… imagine the impact on those growing high value, short-season crops such as #peonies? How much of their marketable crop was a peony grower left with this week? Answer in the video….. 👏 Big thanks to the team at Niab for a great event, where we talked precision breeding, and learning how crop #genetics might influence the microbial commun...

Opening this week’s round-up with apologies to Gerry Rafferty (and to anyone too young to appreciate the appalling pastiche of a 1970s pop sone). This week: ❓ Are we a "Well-Adapted UK" when it comes to climate risk? The 4th independent review landed this week with some stern recommendations as to how Government should support farmers as their farming models evolve. #citrus and #chickpea, anyone?...

The Agri-TechE round-up features our discussions on crop health solutions, a new UK offering for on-farm R&D and we’ve entered the world of podcasts. And you’ll learn what the Medici Effect is and why it’s important for #agritech . 🚜 Our first on-farm “Demo-Day” – showcasing technology solutions for soils and water management at Elveden Farms Ltd 📣 We launched Season 2 of our #AgriChat podca...

Friday round up from Agri-TechE next to the lions in Trafalgar Square – not quite #agritech This week we’ve been out an about a lot…. -           You can take the woman out of the lab, (and wait X0 years!) but you can’t take the lab out of the woman! Grace O Gorman and I did a double act on all things #agritech at the London Lab Live event at...

We’re buzzzzzing after a great week where the Agri-TechE round up is from among the apple blossom, as we’re thinking #pollination. A line-up of tech companies walked us through not just pollination monitoring  @agrisound5776  but also bird ID – and, hot news – moth ID WilderSensing, soil organic carbon monitoring  @DownforceTechnologies  and a new high-tech approach to mapping...

In a lovely peas-ful field for this week’s Agri-TechE round up – but with the added jeopardy of a gas banger poised to go off behind me any moment…..   This week: 🫛 Excited about the new Pulse Performance Network being developed by Processors and Growers Research Organisation - find out more Cereals Event in June. 🗣️ What does the move to #RegenerativeAgriculture mean for R&D, future col...

Inspired by a field of oil seed rape to talk brassica breeding in this week's Agri-TechE Friday round-up, and marvelling at the diversity of plant species with from a common ancestor. This week: 📣 Announcement from Elsoms Seeds about their new innovation centre 🚜 A public consultation around modernising fertiliser regulations - time to have your say if you import, manufacture, develop, sell, use...

Ending our week at Agri-TechE with a spot of pond-dipping – and reflecting on why we need technology to monitor and manage Nature at scale. Measuring pollination, soil health, water quality, species diversity…..and how to make the return on investment, we’ll be discussing all this and more at our event on 28th April hosted by Rothamsted. No wellies or test tubes needed – and certainly no magnifyin...

Friday round up is from Agri-TechE Towers (too cold and windy to be outside today!). This week: - Introducing some of our latest new members: Livefarmer UK - farm management software to help manage crops and assets, and supporting your audit needs. GIS-Point ltd. - harnessing spatial data for analytics, monitoring and precision application. Pennine Analytical Laboratories Ltd. - measuring the comp...

Some tractor action and a cameo appearance by some roe deer in this week's Agri-TechE round-up. This week: 💡 Being inspired by the University of Reading AgriFood Futures strategy - a multi-disciplinary systems approach to agri-food, from land management to consumer and health, via crop and livestock research, teaching and real-world farming. 💻 Bringing Artificial Intelligence into #agritech - Ma...

Friday round up from Agri-TechE - in a week that has seen the launch of the UK’s Land Use Framework and our hosting of the big ARISE programme delegates from North and South America.   This week: - The Farming Minister was at the University of Reading to talk about the report around land use for food production, nature recovery, housing, energy production, communities and amenities. Good to s...

In this week’s round-up from Agri-TechE , I reveal what I am (according to Belbin) and what we've learnt about teamwork. Also: 📣The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs announces dynamic alignment of UK rules with the EU – a single “rule book” on agreed areas of law. I talked with CropLife UK ’s Feodora Rayner about the critical importance of good regulatory practice, scie...

A farming-focussed round-up from Agri-TechE this week, coming from the gorgeous GORGATE LIMITED Farm, an exemplar of production plus nature recovery. In this week’s round-up: 🙏 Reinforcing the important of farmer input into the innovation process through the #Geocrop project – using historical weather and crop data to identify potential fail points for the supply chain. Thank you to our farmer me...

It feels like the UK Spring has sprung – and with it we’re putting out shoots for some new and exciting activities for the month ahead. In this week’s Agri-TechE round-up: 👉 Come and partner with agri-tech innovators from north and south America as the final, UK-based leg of the "ARISE" project comes together at Niab . Plus hear from Dyson Farming Research , BBSRC and Cambridge Econometrics about...

This week's Agri-TechE round-up come from high above the Yarra river, hot (literally) from the AgriFutures evokeAG conference in Melbourne, Australia.   🫶 Aligning mindsets with some utter legends in global #agritech , in particular the awesome Brendan O'Connell ; Peter Wren-Hilton ; Meg Lovegrove and Rob Hulme .   💡 Being inspired by the keynote address by Andrew Bate , farmer and fou...

A presenting duo for this week's Agri-TechE round-up (but one of us had to do all the talking).   This week:   🗓️ Lots of named "days" and weeks, including the UNESCO Day of Women and Girls in Science, also National Nestbox Week and - crucially - Mind Your Head Week, raising awareness and support for mental health in our industry and farm safety. #MindYourHead Farm Safety Foundation (Yel...

The Agri-TechE round up from our week in St Louis, Missouri on the second stage of the ARISE programme with AgriTIERRA , Earthbase , Embrapa and the The Yield Lab Institute . This week's vlog featuring: 💭 Some takeaways from the week's discussions and those who inspired our thinking. ❗ Discover my new favourite mantra - is this the key to developing effective #agritech innovations.....and explai...

Talking water and some important bedtime reading in this week's vlog from Agri-TechE .   🌱 Always a joy to visit Elsoms Seeds - we were channelling the aura of John Craven (he filmed a recent BBC Countryfile segment in this very glasshouse!).   📖 A thoughtful report from CropLife UK about the potential implications of "dynamic alignment" with the EU on UK crop production.   📕 The...

A mega week at Agri-TechE , but any week that ends with horses has to be a good one. This week's round-up (also available as a podcast in Our Week in Agri-Tech) features: 🏇 When agritech meets horse-racing 🚜 Sustainable production of crops for renewable energy, with Future Biogas 🙏 Our Stakeholder Group meeting, kindly hosted at CPI and overseen by our new Chair Helen Ferrier . 🔎 A deep dive i...