News

A Paradigm Shift in Agriculture

The underlying fundamentals for agribusiness remain unchanged – an expanding global population, a drastic shift towards protein-intensive diets in emerging economies and the increasing popularity of healthy food produced in a resource-efficient way.

After almost a decade of impressive growth, with soaring prices and rising demand for food-based commodities around the world, agribusiness and farmland retains its incredible potential for profitable growth even during times of volatility and uncertainty in global financial markets. Why? Agriculture faces a significant global challenge that requires constant attention – feeding the 10 billion people expected on Earth by 2050 with steadying crop yields and very limited reserves of arable farmland.…

The Truth about Bees and Neonics

Neonicotinoids, or neonics for short, are neuro-active insecticides that have been suspected of playing a key role in the deaths and disappearance of millions of bees, bumblebees and other pollinators, but controversy and misinformation had obscured the facts and confused farmers and consumers around the world. Now, peer reviewed scientific research is once again clearing the air about pesticides and bees leading to transformational policy that will benefit our environment. Introduced in the early 1990s, Neonics have become the most widely used pesticides in the world since 2009 and by 2011 the market had soared past USD $3.6 billion.

Colony Collapse Disorder is a multi factor condition that has affected honeybees since the beginning of the millennium.…

Success During Times of Uncertainty

We are entering a new age in human history where risk is increasingly imminent, holds a wider range of consequences and has the capacity to last for generations. Unsolved crises worldwide have catalyzed a massive era of migration, boosted the frequency and severity of terrorist attacks and maintained artificial support and complacency in our global financial markets. The resulting tension between countries and governments as they search for solutions are now having a greater impact on our lives, businesses and investment opportunities.

Global financial markets are currently bracing themselves as the United Kingdom hold a referendum to determine their membership to the European Union.…

Pests are Getting Stronger

Pests are one of the greatest and oldest challenges agriculture has faced in feeding our growing population expected to reach 9.7 billion over the next three decades. With the warming of certain areas due to climate change, new geographies now present favorable conditions to insects and pests and encourage greater outbreaks. Furthermore, pests have demonstrated a considerable ability resisting the different chemicals we have used against them. New programs in pest management and new natural alternatives are needed to be able to control the pests and the billion dollar damages they cause every season throughout the world.

Pest resistance happens due to basic Darwinian natural selection.…

A New Age for Precision Agriculture

The agricultural sector is facing a significant challenge; a 70% increase in global food production is needed in order to sustain the nearly 10 billion people expected to be on the planet by 2050. One in 10 people out of the 7.4 billion alive today are already malnourished and the crop yields that soared as a result of the Green Revolution of the 1960s are beginning to flatline. The future of agriculture therefore depends on how countries, organizations and investors revive agricultural yields in a safe and sustainable manner.

Agriculture today is responsible for keeping our global populations fed without causing further damage to our planet.…

Saving Millions from Antibiotic Resistance

“This may be the most important year for Antimicrobial Resistance that we’ve had in our lifetime.”

Keiji Fukada – Assistant Director General of the World Health Organization, May 2016

One of the most significant threats to mankind now and in the coming decades, infectious microbes around the world continue to develop resistance to many of our most effective antibiotics. As we continue to proliferate the use of these drugs across agriculture and healthcare we incur a greater risk of reverting to the dark ages of medicine where the most common treatments and infections become potentially deadly.

700,000 people are killed every year due to drug-resistant infections, a death toll that, if left unabated, is expected to increase dramatically to 10 million by 2050.…

Brazil’s Dream Team

“We need to reconstruct the pillar of the Brazilian economy and strengthen our business environment.”

Brazilian President Michel Temer, May 12^th 2016 

Little more than two weeks has passed in Brazil since Dilma Rousseff was suspended from office and Acting President Michel Temer has already gathered chief experts across business and finance to lead the country’s political institutions. This new team of industry heavyweights, while signalling a promising departure from the frivolous policies of the leftist Worker’s Party (PT), has the necessary experience to boost confidence and restore growth in Latin America’s largest economy.

In his first move as President, Temer elected Henrique Meirelles as Finance Minister to face some of Brazil’s more pressing economic challenges.…

The Dawn of New Leadership in Brazil

In a marathon voting session, a clear majority of Senators (55-22) voted to progress with impeachment proceedings in Brazil. In a move that is widely seen as the first step towards ending the 13-year-rule held by her Leftist Workers’ Party, Dilma Rousseff has been suspended from Office for a minimum of 180 days while she stands trial. At a time of great social and political significance for the country, with an economy in recession and the 2016 Summer Olympics on the horizon, new and reformative leadership is finally within reach.

55 out of 77 Senators voted to try Rousseff on charges that she illegally manipulated fiscal accounts during her re-election campaign.…

The New Frontier for Crop Protection

We have discovered that the synthetic agrochemicals responsible for boosting agricultural yields and saving over one billion people from starvation in the 20^th Century are now causing long-term damage to our health and the global food system. Rather than synthesizing new chemicals for crop protection, which would further proliferate arable land degradation, the world’s agricultural institutions are adopting a new approach – looking to nature for inspiration.

Where can these alternatives be found in nature? Just about anywhere – whether in plant extracts or soil microbes, our environment has provided us with many resources that can be utilized for crop protection and crop management.…

The Tide is Turning for Synthetics

Agricultural chemicals for crop care, including fertilizers and pesticides, are one of the most widely used chemicals on the planet today. Designed to kill destructive organisms and synthetically increase yields, they are deliberately released into the environment in a broad-scale approach that results in significant runoff. In fact, over 98% of sprayed pesticides, 95% of herbicides and 65% of fertilizers reach a destination other than their target species, causing chronic impacts on human health, livestock, wildlife, pollinators and beneficial insects – all of which are essential to a stable, healthy and productive ecosystem.

We need innovation and technology in crop care to supply food for our rising population.…