‘Caffeine’ for Microbes to Cut Nitrogen Use in China by 30%

Sound Agriculture partners with Syngenta in China.

Sound Agriculture has partnered with Syngenta on the nutrient use efficiency foliar product SOURCE.

Sound Agriculture and Syngenta have unveiled a partnership aiming to decrease nitrogen fertilizer use in China by up to 30% while maintaining crop yields.

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Sound Agriculture’s flagship product SOURCE stimulates microbes in the soil to provide access to more nitrogen and phosphorus at the root zone, reducing the need for synthetic nitrogen fertilizer.

“It’s caffeine for microbes,” says Adam Litle, CEO, who spoke with AgriBusiness Global™ magazine from Sound Agriculture’s Bay Area headquarters in December.

He explains that while nitrogen is still needed to achieve high yields, “SOURCE can potentially cut nitrogen application by 7.5 million metric tons annually in China alone. This is the equivalent of removing 220 million tons of carbon dioxide, or 50 million cars from the road each year,” Litle says.

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We first met Sound Agriculture at the Commodity Classic event in Texas, in late February — just days before the pandemic was declared. Since that time, the startup has made rapid progress despite the odds, doubling its retail partners to 30 in the U.S. and selling out its products by March.

“Companies like Pivot Bio, Indigo Ag, and a couple of others who have come before us increased attention on the space and made it easier for us. We can come in and say, look, we have a chemistry that’s easy to apply and complementary to biologicals — you just throw it in the tank, and you don’t need special equipment,” Litle explains.

Syngenta will trial SOURCE in corn and wheat for about two years and take the product through China’s regulatory process, and it is also looking at use in other crops. As one of the company’s early investors through Syngenta Ventures, Chinese state-owned Syngenta has had the inside track on witnessing the science and development of the product over the past four years, Litle says.

“That’s important because there’s been some snake oil in the past and skepticism around what really works,” he acknowledges. “They also have strong interest in moving more into the nutrient efficiency space,” noting Syngenta’s acquisition of leading plant health company Valagro in October.

In the pipeline is a similar product for soybeans due to launch next, as well as for wheat, cotton, rice, and canola. Yet another compound it is testing improves the process of photosynthesis in order to boost plant efficiency and yields.

More broadly, the company’s mission centers around moving the needle on sustainability, climate, and water quality impact in the world’s largest greenhouse gas emitters.

“It is generally known that we apply 30% more nitrogen than we need for row crops, and that nitrogen either volatilizes into the air and becomes nitrous oxide, which is 300 times more potent as a greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide. Or, it leaches into the waterways and causes problems, and increasingly there’s going to be action on it,” Litle explains. “Farmers don’t want to do that to the communities. Through doing what’s right for your soil, your farm, family, and community, growers are now coming together with government and business to say, let’s solve this,” he says.

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