URUS Group, EIB, BNP Paribas, Resurrect Bio, Corteva, Infinite Acres, FAO

Anna: 00:00

Welcome to another episode of AgTech Digest, your go-to source for the latest in agricultural technology. In today's episode, we're diving into the latest developments shaping the future of agriculture. We'll explore how Oman is emerging as the MENA region's most active agricultural market and what the Strait of Hormuz closure means for global food systems, examine how controlled environment agriculture is moving beyond leafy greens into berries, pharmaceuticals, and industrial materials, and look at the largest horizontal agricultural expansion in modern history with Egypt's $15 billion New Delta. We'll also cover a major livestock data acquisition, a food crisis warning from the FAO, European agricultural SME finance, an oversubscribed biotech Series A, an agentic farm management platform launch, a botanical nematicide breakthrough, a regenerative canola expansion in Saskatchewan, natural rubber from dandelions, and a mixed but revealing earnings season. There's a lot to cover, so let's get started.

Anna: 01:05

Let's take a look at what this week brings us. A livestock data acquisition, a fifteen billion dollar desert reclamation, and a food security warning from the FAO — it was a week that cut across every layer of the global food system. We tracked forty-two developments in total, from funding rounds and product launches to earnings and policy moves. The common thread is geography: the ground is shifting, quite literally, in the Middle East, East Africa, and controlled environment agriculture everywhere.

Anna: 01:37

This week could be said to have two analysis that occurred. One covering Omnai Advantage and the other the CEA's reset.

Anna: 01:45

The analysis on Omani Advantage — AgTech, infrastructure, and food security in a post-crisis GCC. While other Gulf nations have traditionally relied on capital-intensive technology to cultivate the desert, Oman is leveraging its unique geographical and climatic advantages to emerge as the MENA region's most active agricultural market in twenty twenty-six. The closure of the Strait of Hormuz has accelerated this shift, bypassing the chokepoint to position Oman's Indian Ocean ports as critical hubs for rerouted global food corridors and domestic fertilizer supply lines. Backed by aggressive sovereign incentives, a two hundred and forty million dollar wave of fresh infrastructure projects, and a five-year roadmap with the FAO, the Sultanate is rapidly scaling its commercial production — offering concrete opportunities for institutional investors and AgTech vendors looking to deploy capital and hardware into this expanding ecosystem.

Anna: 02:44

The second analysis is focused on CEA's reset and how it is rewriting what gets grown. While leafy greens remain the historical and operational foundation of controlled environment agriculture — comprising thirty-nine percent of crop-tagged industry database entries — the sector is undergoing a strategic renegotiation about what comes next. Following the market consolidations of recent years, new capital and strategic pivots are shifting toward two distinct frontiers: berries and non-food applications. Led by high-profile investments like Oishii's one hundred and fifty million dollar Series C in May twenty twenty-six, berries are transitioning from luxury novelties to genuine retail volume due to their high profit margins, compact canopy needs, and resilience against field-grown supply disruptions. Simultaneously, an emerging segment of European operators is repurposing indoor farming infrastructure for cosmetic botanicals, pharmaceutical crops, and industrial materials like natural rubber and cotton — escaping challenging commodity food economics entirely. This positions CEA less as a food-production method and more as a versatile platform technology, with the investment frontier increasingly defined by crop diversification and margin stability rather than pure volume.

Anna: 04:03

What's in the news for us? Well, URUS Group signed a definitive agreement to acquire AgriWebb, a global livestock management and supply chain data platform for beef producers. The combined entity will span twenty-five million animals across the VAS and AgriWebb platforms, extending URUS's existing dairy intelligence infrastructure into the global beef sector. Rabobank advised on the deal and Freshfields LLP provided legal counsel, with closing expected in Q three twenty twenty-six. In what may be the week's most striking story, Egypt officially inaugurated the New Delta project — the largest horizontal agricultural expansion in modern history — targeting two point two million feddans of desert in northwestern Egypt, anchored by the world's largest wastewater treatment plant at seven point five million cubic metres per day. Primary crops include wheat, corn, and sugar beet, aimed at reducing import dependence. The project is projected to create nearly two million jobs and expand Egypt's cultivated land by approximately fifteen percent. Total project cost: fifteen billion dollars. In European agricultural finance, the European Investment Bank signed a two hundred million euro agreement with BNP Paribas Leasing Solutions, earmarking at least thirty percent for climate action and seventy percent for SMEs across Italy, Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Spain — part of the EIB's broader three billion euro pan-European agriculture programme launched in twenty twenty-four. ◆In biotech funding, Resurrect Bio closed an oversubscribed ten point three million dollar Series A led by Corteva Catalyst, with participation from Calculus Capital, Pymwymic, UKI2S, SynBioVen, and AgFunder. The round exceeded its eight point one million dollar initial close, bringing total funding since founding to approximately twelve point four million dollars, targeting AI discovery and high-throughput validation of cryptic disease-resistance mechanisms in crops.

Anna: 06:09

On the food security front, the FAO warned that the Strait of Hormuz closure could trigger a global food crisis within six to twelve months. Chief Economist Maximo Torero called for urgent action before the preventive window closes, flagging cascading risks across energy, fertilizer, and food inflation, and recommending alternative trade corridors, digital social protection registries, and long-term investment in green ammonia and biostimulants. The FAO Food Price Index has now risen for a third consecutive month. Shifting to product launches, Infinite Acres commercially launched GroLoop, an agentic farm management platform unifying software, environmental controls, and robotics for controlled environment agriculture. GroLoop is already managing approximately one million square feet at 80 Acres Farms across six US states, serving more than eighteen thousand retail locations. Hardware-agnostic with no vendor lock-in, it will demo at Greentech Expo Amsterdam in June. In energy, Anaergia secured a fifty-eight million Canadian dollar contract with Neogenyx Fuels — a new joint venture between Ameresco and HASI — to deploy anaerobic digestion technology at a large US agricultural facility, producing more than four thousand four hundred standard cubic feet per minute of biogas converted to pipeline-quality renewable natural gas.

Anna: 07:36

In crop protection, BioWorks launched TotalNema Ax, a botanical nematicide targeting potatoes, onions, strawberries, and leafy greens. Field trials showed eighty-three percent control against root-knot nematodes versus forty-four percent for a competitive product, and a twenty-two point five percent yield increase in potato trials, with zero-hour re-entry interval and no pre-harvest interval restrictions. In regenerative agriculture, Louis Dreyfus Company and PepsiCo expanded their regenerative agriculture programme in Saskatchewan, targeting forty-five thousand acres of canola under regenerative practices in twenty twenty-six, up from twenty-five thousand acres in twenty twenty-five, with outcomes tracked via the Cool Farm Tool. In materials innovation, QuberTech raised three point four million pounds to develop natural rubber from engineered dandelions, backed by DEFRA's Farming Innovation Programme and UKI2S equity. The platform uses high-yield dandelions grown in controlled environments as a locally scalable alternative to imported tropical rubber, with secondary bio-compounds for food, cosmetics, and packaging. Also this week: Gowan Milling is investing eight point seven million dollars to expand its Blytheville, Arkansas facility, creating thirty-four new jobs. MSU opened a renovated thirty-five million dollar Plant Science Greenhouse Complex. The European Commission approved a one hundred million euro Lithuanian state aid scheme for agricultural investment. Canada awarded ten point two five million dollars to Zone Agtech and Bioenterprise Canada through the ACT Accelerator stream. And PARUS opened a vertical strawberry farm in Sri Lanka with fifty-ton annual capacity.

Anna: 09:22

In earnings, Deere and Company posted Q two twenty twenty-six net income of one point seven seven three billion dollars on revenues of thirteen point four billion dollars — up five percent year-on-year — with Production and Precision Agriculture sales down fourteen percent but Small Ag and Turf and Construction and Forestry posting operating profit gains of twenty-five percent and forty-eight percent respectively. FY twenty twenty-six guidance was reaffirmed at four point five to five billion dollars. Hydrofarm Holdings posted Q one net sales of twenty-eight point five million dollars, down twenty-nine point six percent, and is operating under a Forbearance Agreement while exploring strategic alternatives. Edible Garden posted Q one revenue of three point three million dollars, up twenty-two point nine percent year-on-year, with cut herb sales up forty-six percent and new accounts at Kroger and Weis Markets, though net loss widened to three point seven million dollars on accelerated depreciation from its RTD manufacturing pivot. Finally to close our news, the OECD's twenty twenty-six report found that agricultural production in OECD countries grew more than thirty percent since nineteen ninety while farmland area decreased — but farmland biodiversity has deteriorated in most reporting countries, linked to intensification and habitat loss. It's a reminder that productivity gains and ecological health are not the same thing, and that the next phase of agricultural progress will have to reckon with both at once.

Ana: 10:57

Looking ahead to upcoming industry events, mark your calendars for Fiber Connect 20 26 and Precision Agriculture from May seventeenth to twentieth, 20 26 in Orlando. Following that, the Food Innovate Summit runs from June ninth to tenth in Amsterdam, running alongside Greentech Amsterdam from June ninth to eleventh in the Netherlands. Finally, don't miss both Amsterdam events — they overlap, so plan accordingly.

Anna: 11:25

That wraps up today's episode of AgTech Digest. We explored the latest developments in agricultural technology. From Oman's emergence as the GCC's agricultural frontrunner and Egypt's $15 billion New Delta reshaping the map of global food production, to the FAO's food crisis warning, URUS Group acquiring AgriWebb, Infinite Acres launching GroLoop for CEA, BioWorks delivering an 83% nematode control result, and QuberTech extracting natural rubber from dandelions — it's clear that the agtech sector is making strides in sustainability and innovation. The ground is shifting. In the desert, in the greenhouse, and in the data. Thanks for joining me, I'm Anna, signing off. Stay inspired and keep pushing the boundaries of what's possible!