The Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food begins the acceleration process of 15 emerging agri-food companies

The Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food and the financial entity CaixaBank have started the acceleration process of 15 emerging companies or “startups” dedicated to promoting digitalization in the agri-food sector, of which 13 are national and 2 come from Perugia (Italy) and Rishpon (Israel).

The selected companies develop projects related to agricultural electronic commerce or “e-commerce” (Abastores), precision agriculture (Agricolus), nanotechnology (Bio2Coat), artificial intelligence (Biyectiva, Bleecker Technologies, Libelium), robotics (Bumblebee AI), algorithmic technology (Digital Data Farm), the Internet of Things (Digitanimal), Big Data (Innogando, Ioland, IPM Advice), biotechnology (InnoPlant, Smallops) and Blockchain (Widhoc Smart Solutions).

This promotion process is part of the open innovation program, “AgroBank Tech Digital Innovation”, developed by CaixaBank together with the Innsomnia startup accelerator and with the support of the ministry, to incorporate technological talent and digital transformation. To this end, the ministry's policies include support for entrepreneurs who provide innovative solutions for the economic, social and environmental development of rural territories and, at the same time, improve the competitiveness of the agri-food sector.

The initiative began with a call to which 154 national and international emerging companies were presented, whose projects are aimed at achieving greater optimization of natural and energy resources, within one of the eight strategic challenges of this program: precision agriculture; alternative energies and sustainability in the countryside; automation of transformation processes; sustainability and energy efficiency; sustainable water management; circular economy, innovation in packaging, storage and logistics, new e-commerce and sales platforms; traceability and agri-food safety .

Support for this project is part of the set of actions promoted by the ministry in terms of innovative entrepreneurship, such as the Food Tech Challengers program for support and tutoring of the National Center for Food Technology and Safety (CNTA); the credits of the National Innovation Company (ENISA) for entrepreneurs and agri-food SMEs; or the Startup Engineering awards, from the Food for Life Spain Technology Platform, led by the Spanish Federation of Food and Beverage Industries (FIAB).