A second fundraising round by BioGenerator garnered $2 million for Agragene, Inc., a sustainable agricultural technology firm creating cutting-edge biological crop pest control technologies. In this fundraising round, OAS, the venture arm of Ospraie Management, also took part. According to its CEO, Bryan Witherbee, the funding will hasten the sale of Agragene’s eco-friendly pesticide substitutes and field tests. BioGenerator Ventures and OAS have contributed $7.2 million to the CRISPR technology startup Agragene. The investment was announced after the company’s transfer from San Diego, where greater expenses for equipment, facilities, and employees hindered expansion. The action dramatically decreased the company’s burn rate and increased the yearly financial runway by several months. Carl Casale, the senior agricultural partner at OAS, lauded the St. Louis agtech ecosystem for helping the business by providing a friendly, accessible, collaborative, and inventive atmosphere.
“Biogenerator Ventures is thrilled to have assisted in attracting and being an investor in Agragene,” stated Matt Helms, managing director of BioGenerator Ventures. This is more proof of the region’s developing reputation as a talent-rich environment for companies with an agricultural focus.
Climate Change Contributes To Agricultural Pests To Flourish
Crop output and agricultural pests are significantly impacted by climate change and harsh weather occurrences, according to a study by Skendžić et al., 2021. Insect pests respond differently to various sources of climate change, as usually adaptive creatures. This paper discusses how changing precipitation patterns, rising temperatures, and atmospheric CO2 levels affect agricultural insect pests. Since temperature is the most significant environmental factor influencing insect population dynamics, it is anticipated that global climate change will lead to changes in how insects interact with their hosts and natural enemies as well as changes in their geographic range, overwintering survival rates, generational rates, and risk of invasive insect species and plant diseases.
An example is the rise of Septoria in the wheat culture in France. At the same time, certain types of Septoria infection were prevalent in the south of France. They are slowly but steadily expanding across the country up to the north as the climate becomes warmer. As a result, we are seeing a rise in the number of tropical insects and infections across the country.
Photo by Melissa Askew on Unsplash
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