The Yield Lab has announced the eight startups selected to participate in its Global Aquaculture Challenge (GAC) 2021 – a non-profit accelerator programme and competition.
After a rigorous selection process involving 180 applications from all continents and sub-sectors of aquaculture, the GAC 2021 cohort includes: Feedvax (Argentina), Genufeed (Israel), Jala (Indonesia), Salmokine (Chile), Seawater Solutions (UK), TeOra (Singapore), Wittaya Aqua (Canada) and Xylome (USA).
These companies bring innovations in the fields of health and disease management, water quality management, nutrition and farming technology. They span species including tilapia, barramundi, trout, shrimp, halophytes and others.
The Yield Lab Asia Pacific, in conjunction with industry sponsors, are providing access to prizes in excess of $1.6 million. The lead sponsor is the US Soybean Export Council (USSEC), while others are IBM, Aqua Bridge, Salmon Sustentable of Chile, Enterprise Singapore, StartupSG, the Global Seafood Alliance and the Animal AgTech Innovation Summit. The Yield Lab says that it has “orchestrated this challenge in order to advance and scale sustainable aquaculture globally while actively addressing the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals”.
“In order to sustainably meet the nutritional needs of 10 billion people by 2050, an increase in diverse innovation in the area of agrifood and aqua technologies is required. Fish and shellfish convert feed more efficiently than land-based animals, aquaculture desperately needs technology and data-driven solutions to improve farming systems, animal health and their impact on the environment, while improving production and supply chain efficiency, and thus accelerate the availability of this important protein,” it said in a press release.
The Yield bills the GAC as “the first of a kind, non-equity aquaculture accelerator programme designed to have a global impact”. It is already underway, and will culminate in an event on 7 October where all eight startups will pitch to a global audience of aquaculture experts and investors for cash and in-kind prizes.
The challenge pairs viable, sustainable, and high impact innovations with experienced subject matter experts during the six-month programme. The bespoke technical, business and go-to-market mentoring aims to create added value for the innovations as well as providing access to investment opportunities.
This challenge is a collaboration between The Yield Lab Institute – a non-profit entity which drives sustainable agrifood and aquatech innovation globally – and The Yield Lab Asia Pacific. The latter is part of the Yield Lab, a global federation of funds that provides early-stage investments in sustainable AgTech companies and has been a leader in the explosion of investment in the agriculture and food industries globally.
Read more about the Global Aquaculture Challenge 2021: https://www.globalaquachallenge.com/