Six months, one cohort of agtech founders, and a lot of kilometres: Bindoon, Moora, Dowerin, Perth, Esperance, Salmon Gums, and across the country to the markets, investors and industry our founders are chasing.

HARVEST exists to put agtech businesses in the same paddock as the people they’re building for. This year that meant a grower panel at the Bindoon bootcamp, a farm tech visit at Moora, masterclasses on IP, investment and go-to-market, and one-to-one mentoring with people who’ve done it before. It meant a field walk at Salmon Gums, and a Showcase Lunch in Perth where founders sat down with growers, industry leaders and investors.

The things we’re proudest of aren’t numbers. They’re the single conversation at the showcase that became a first customer, the grower question during the field walk that changed a product for the better, the introduction over dinner that’s still going. Our job is to put founders in rooms with the people who decide whether their technology earns a place on farm. The honest feedback does the rest.

To the founders — thank you for backing yourselves and for the generosity you showed each other. The peer group was something almost every one of you named as valuable, and you built that yourselves.

Thank you to Grains Research and Development Corporation, whose long-term investment makes HARVEST possible, to the Department of Primary Industries & Regional Development for backing a program grounded in Western Australian conditions, and to the Department of Energy and Economic Diversification through the Innovation Pathways Program, funded by the New Industries and Innovation Fund. Thank you to our sponsors Radium Capital and Wrays | Intellectual Property, to EZI Group Esperance Zone Innovation for opening Esperance up to us, to Rob Hulme and AusAgritech for a keynote that set the tone for the Showcase, and to the growers, hosts and mentors who gave their time, their paddocks and their straight answers.