CropLife Retail Week: Why Education Is Still Key for Advancing the Biologicals Market
July 5, 2024 Dr. Pam Marrone, Co-founder & Executive Chair, Invasive Species Corporation and Invasive Species Research Institute, said producers need to better evaluate the market need for biological products and users need more education to advance the sector during her presentation at the Salinas Biological Summit in June 2024.
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*This a partial and edited transcript:
Lara Sowinski: Hello everyone, this is Lara Sowinski, Group Editor for CropLife Media Group. Flying solo this week as my colleague Eric Sfiligoj is out and about in the United States, checking stuff out to report back. So you have me. I ran across a great article this past week and I wanted to highlight some parts of the article.
Jennifer Marston, journalist at AgFunder, recapped a session offered by Pam Dr. Marrone at the Salina Biologicals Summit. This was a presentation that Pam gave on June 25th, and the topic was biologicals, which, as you well know, is something that is not only of interest industry wide, but we have a dedicated session on biologicals following Tech Hub Live on Wednesday, the 31st of July.
And, some of what Pam was talking about during her presentation just really hit home with what we’re hearing as well. For those of you that don’t know, Pam, certainly an industry icon, she’s founder and chair of the Invasive Species Corporation. So, according to Pam, as it relates to ag biological companies, they’re kind of missing the boat a little bit with regards to market need and differentiation, which she said are most critical, followed by the need to educate growers on what biologicals are, why they exist and how to use them.
So, according to Pam, there are a lot of startups that have a new idea that results in the same kind of biological product. If theirs produces the same yield or the same ROI to the grower as what’s out there, you’re not going to get anywhere. So she kind of gave it a grade of a B, and she said the challenge as it relates to the biological sectors is dispelling a number of myths that are prevalent out there.
And, we kind of found that ourselves. Late in ’23, we did some industry research, made some, calls and so forth to folks out there and, I think it’s fair to say that initial experience with biologicals from a lot of ag retailers and their farmer customers may be not some of the best results and understandably, a little bit unsure or frankly, not convinced of the efficacy of biologicals, she noted.
That is one of the biggest challenges in the market, she said. I see a lot of investors and companies focus on the technology, and she’s talking about AI, and if it will change the market, she says it’s not quite there yet. At least how it’s being applied. Another mistake is going after the technically easiest products, said Pam.
She called it an extremely crowded products space. There are opportunities, she says, but often the ones that come in first are the easiest technically and don’t necessarily target the growers’ needs. Finally, one thing worth noting, she said, the last 12 months have seen continued good progress, according to Pam, on two major new categories, those being peptides and RNA interference-based solutions.
She called them two very important parts of the sector. In fact, she mentioned, for peptides, it’s now possible to find a peptide and improve upon it using AI and machine learning tools. The big elephant in the room, according to Pam, as she wrapped up the presentation, was the lack of knowledge.
Frankly, growers need more education in order for them to get over the hump and start using biologicals and better learn how to use them. So, Tech Hub Live, we are, days away. The end of the month will be meeting again in Des Moines. So as mentioned, we’ll have a Biologicals 101 for Row Crops that will be on Wednesday, July 31st, following the Tech Hub Live program from 2 to 4:30.
We will also have Drones 101 workshop. Our friend and supporter Jeff Wessels, precision ag manager at Frenchman Valley Co-op, will be leading the Biologicals workshop. Jeff will have as a guest Jacob Parnell, head agronomist at Biome Makers, and Dr. Andrea Arias, VP of data science and crop testing over at Jord Bioscience.
In Drones 101, we have a section of a parking lot next to the Iowa Event Center where we’re holding Tech Hub Live, and Matt Maus from HTS Ag will have his trailer that’s tricked out that you can learn about drones.
And we’ll have drones there demo. So, joining Matt Maus will be Dustin Polasek at Nutrien AG Solutions, and Kevin Butt, professor of agriculture at Ellsworth Community College. So we hope you’ll stay for that.
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