Ask The Experts
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James Maude
Senior Vice President, Acadian Plant Health
ABG: What kind of growth are biostimulants experiencing right now? What do you project for the next five years?
James Maude: The issue of sustainability is gaining widespread attention as more people recognize the importance of environmental health. This growing awareness is leading to increased emphasis on sustainable practices in various aspects of life, which has manifested in the regenerative agriculture movement.
The sustainable agriculture shift is creating a biostimulant market size that is anticipated to grow at over 12% compound annual growth rate (CAGR) over the next several years. This increase in market value has many companies engaging extensively to develop innovative products — including Acadian Plant Health.
We need to produce 70% more food by 2050. The ag chem market is projected to grow to $280 billion by 2028. Regenerative and sustainable ag technologies need to support these macro trends. We are investing to support the demand by ensuring we have flexible raw material supply and manufacturing capacity. We are driven and planned by demand.
European Team
Eurofins Agroscience
Services (EAS)
ABG: What challenges arise when balancing the demands of R&D innovation with the need for sustainable outcomes, and how can these challenges be overcome to deliver effective solutions?
EAS European Team: One major challenge is the potential trade-off between product efficacy and environmental safety. For example, developing a biopesticide that is both highly effective and environmentally benign can be difficult because the mechanisms that kill pests might also pose risks to non-target species or ecosystems. CROs can address this challenge by employing a multi-disciplinary approach that combines traditional toxicology with ecological risk assessment and environmental modeling. By thoroughly understanding the environmental impact of new products, CROs can help clients refine their formulations to achieve an optimal balance between efficacy and safety.
Another challenge is the long and complex regulatory approval process for new sustainable products. Regulatory bodies often require extensive data on the safety and efficacy of new agricultural inputs, which can delay market entry and increase development costs. To overcome this, CROs can streamline the R&D process by utilizing advanced data analytics and modeling techniques to predict product performance and potential risks early in the development cycle. Additionally, CROs can provide clients with strategic advice on regulatory submission processes, helping to reduce time-to-market while ensuring compliance with all necessary regulations.
The integration of new technologies into sustainable product development also presents a challenge. Innovations such as precision agriculture, biotechnology, and digital farming tools require significant R&D investment and expertise, which can be a barrier for some companies. CROs can help mitigate this challenge by offering specialized R&D services that leverage these technologies, such as genomics for crop improvement or AI-driven analytics for optimizing resource use. By providing access to cutting-edge tools and expertise, CROs enable clients to incorporate these innovations into their products, enhancing both sustainability and competitiveness.
Lastly, there is the challenge of market acceptance and consumer perception. Even if a product is sustainable and effective, it may face resistance from consumers or farmers who are wary of new technologies or unfamiliar practices. CROs can help clients overcome this barrier by conducting field trials, demonstrations, and education campaigns that build trust and showcase the benefits of sustainable products. By engaging with stakeholders throughout the development process, CROs can ensure that new products not only meet sustainability criteria but are also well-received in the market.
Sustainability outcomes are, in the end, all about standards being used for reporting and certification. At the moment, we see various approaches and technologies contributing toward beneficial sustainable outcomes. A full acceptance will be seen, once there is clarity on how sustainable outcomes will be measured and being used for certification and reporting. This will then further fuel innovation and gives clearer direction.
Brennan Duty
Senior Director of Business Development, Ginkgo Bioworks
ABG: What trends and challenges are you seeing specifically for R&D?
Brennan Duty: A trend we’re seeing is that governments are starting to respond more to consumers’ demands for wholesome, nutritious, and sustainable food systems. There is concern about how we grow our food, and specifically what are the inputs that are being used to grow food sustainably in the context of climate change and resource scarcity.
What we see in terms of trends is a moving away from synthetic chemistry when possible and moving toward biologicals. Biologicals are essentially anything that can come from nature including live microbes, molecules, proteins, and peptides. Biochemicals that these live cells produce can be applied in agriculture to provide the plants with benefits.
Those benefits can include attacking a disease or enduring stress. They can also fix nitrogen from the atmosphere in a form that’s beneficial to the plant instead of relying on chemical fertilizer. This is the kind of sustainability consumers are looking for.
In many instances, biological products have not had the consistency that farmers expect. Which causes a huge push within research and development to use a lot of science, big data as well as different field trials and platforms, to develop products that are going to consistently deliver for farmers. Anything that can be done to further optimize or boost the efficacy of a biological product. •
Photo Credits
James
Brennan Duty – Ginkgo Bioworks