OTB Is to welcome Interagro (UK) Ltd to the membership. The organisation is a leading manufacturer of in-can spray adjuvants and organic biostimulants for use in a wide range of agricultural and horticultural crops. The company was founded in 1994 by owner Mike Roche and operates in 19 countries across the globe from its UK head office in Bishops Stortford. It also has a second office in Utrecht in The Netherlands and a third entity in Hungary called IA Agriculture Kft.
Spray Adjuvants
Adjuvants are designed to optimise the performance and efficiency of plant protection products either by enhancing biological efficacy or by modifying the physical characteristics of the spray solution.
Biostimulants
A biostimulant is a product, other than a pesticide or fertiliser, which helps to improve growth and development and relieve stress, in order to maximise yield and quality in suboptimal growing conditions.
Protecting crop yield and quality is becoming more and more challenging with plant health during the growing season under increasing threat. Abiotic and biotic stresses are increasingly prevalent and crops need to be able to adapt. Our weather is more volatile than it used to be and every year we seem to be breaking new records – hottest / driest / wettest / coldest – abiotic stress factors that impact the growth and development of the plant and put it under considerable stress. With increasing disease and pest resistance biotic stress is also becoming increasingly challenging for farmers.
Biostimulants for organic farmers
Interagro’s biostimulant portfolio is approved for use in organic systems by Organic Farmers & Growers and include Bridgeway and Zonda for foliar application and Newton for seed treatment.
Bridgeway/Zonda
Bridgeway helps build healthy resilient plants. It has been proven to reduce both abiotic and biotic stress and help protect yield and quality potential.
Bridgeway is a non-microbial biostimulant based on amino acids sourced exclusively from plants. Made entirely of natural ingredients, Bridgeway can be used on crops whose end market is vegan, vegetarian, organic and GM free.
It contains all 18 essential amino acids needed by plants for healthy growth and development. Under ideal growing conditions the crop can produce the amino acids it requires to combat stress and for healthy growth and development. However, under periods of stress, the crop stops production and breaks down the proteins it has made, to access the amino acids needed to fight stress. Amino acids are the building blocks of protein that play a vital role in every process in the plant.
Feeding a plant Bridgeway is like giving the plant a natural vitamin drink. It guarantees the supply of all amino acids critical to plant health.
Bridgeway and Zonda are approved for use in all agricultural and horticultural crops without restrictions.
2020 field benefits recorded
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Helped frosted potatoes recover yield
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Increased cabbage yields by 27 t/ha leading to a MOIC of over £10,000 per ha
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Increased onion yields by 5.4 t/ha – MOIC £2,120/ha
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Increased WOSR yield by 0.3 t/ha – MOIC £57/ha
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Yield benefit in NIAB field trials of up to 1.7 t/ha worth £185 extra margin per ha.
Organic testimonials
You can read a testimonial from Neil Carnes a farmer at Barfoots of Botley about how Bridgeway has helped with his crops here and there is another testimonial here from Keith Challen, Director at Belvoir Farms which is a mixed farm, and says “Next year, Bridgeway will be used on every acre of the farm. There aren’t many products you can say that about, but I have always seen either an increased margin over cost or benefit in terms of crop health. If there is an opportunity to save money – in terms of minimising crop losses – without disturbing crop performance, it is worth doing.”
Newton
Newton is a new phytohormone seed treatment biostimulant to help cereal crops get off to the best possible start.
It helps awaken dormant seed, kick-starts growth and provides resilience in suboptimal growing conditions. For any seed planted in the ground, the best start is essential to maximise seed potential. Treating seed with Newton results in uniform and efficient seedling growth, enables greater access to moisture and nutrition, and improves crop establishment under suboptimal growing conditions – all valuable advantages for organic farmers.
Benefits summary
Improves seedling VIGOUR
Accelerates germination
Improves emergence
Improves crop ESTABLISHMENT
Stimulates root (+43%) and shoot (+22%) growth (-averages from research conducted at the University of Nottingham)
Increases TOLERANCE to stress
Resilience to abiotic stress
How are Interagro helping with climate change
Our weather is becoming more volatile. Agriculture has a key role to play in achieving Net Zero, and the NFU has set out its ambitious target of achieving Net Zero by 2040. One of the key pillars to achieving this is “productivity push” and this where we feel we have a credible offering to help farmers, and as such sponsored a recent initiative to find the UK’s Climate Change Champions.
Our offering: We see our role in finding solutions that will help growers capitalise on the opportunities they have to capture carbon as well as to help cut the carbon cost of current practices. Our biostimulants are valuable tools for both enhancing crop performance to capture carbon, and in increasing crop resilience. Adjuvants play a crucial role in improving productivity and optimising the performance of plant protection products.
These are the innovations that will help enable farmers to continue to produce the high quality food that’s required for a growing population, alongside the backdrop of increasing regulatory challenges.
On joining the OTB
Interagro are delighted to be joining the OTB and look forward to working closely with members to further understand the needs of organic farmers and provide credible solutions that help to secure profitable high quality produce in the most natural way.
Please do get in touch with us here if you are interested in exploring the benefits of biostimulants further and follow on Twitter, here.
