This episode featured as part of the Agritech segment in partnership with Sensehub Dairy by MSD.

New Zealand farmers will get first access to a handful of UK livestock technologies through a new partnership between Agnition, the UK Agri-EPI Centre and AgriTechNZ, with the technologies selected in May and shown at Fieldays in June.

Jasper van Halder, CEO of Agnition Ventures, the investment arm of Ravensdown, says the UK government’s decision to designate agritech a priority growth sector opened the door.

“We wanted to be one of the first to benefit from that new direction that the government is taking, and to make sure that we have a direct pipeline from the UK innovation centers to the New Zealand farmers,” he says.

The partnership builds on the farm innovation network Agnition set up about three years ago.

“This is real and this is happening, it’s not a project.”

The network has about 350 farmers, more than 100 industry players and 90 completed pilots.

New Zealand’s pasture-based systems set it apart from overseas markets.

“It’s this unfair advantage of our pasture-based systems, but also not a lot of other countries are looking at optimizing our systems.”

He says the sector’s real hurdle is not the technology itself.

“In agritech, if you look at what our biggest challenge is, it’s not so much invention, it’s more adoption.”

Simplicity matters as much as performance.

“You have to be able to explain it in three minutes, otherwise it’s not going to fly.”

He says for technologies to last, subsidies are not enough.

“In the end, for the longevity of the technology, it has to stand on its own two feet.”

This episode featured as part of the Agritech segment in partnership with Sensehub Dairy by MSD. Leading agritech innovation with SenseHub® Dairy — the modular, end‑to‑end dairy system combining animal behaviour monitoring, milk intelligence and automation in one connected platform, backed by MSD Animal Health. For more information visit www.sensehub.co.nz

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