Blockcast.cc: Good day everyone. At the beginning of the month of July, we have a special guest from USA, Aaron Magenheim with us. Hi Aaron, can you give an introduction of yourself?
Aaron: Hi Melody, I am an entrepreneur working globally across the Agriculture and technology nexis specializing in development and implementation of innovation and growth strategies advising corporates, governments, NGO’s, investors, and farmers through successful AgTech integration and best practices across the supply chain.
Immersed in the family agricultural irrigation company in California since childhood, I pioneered one of the first stand-alone AgTechnology integration companies in 2011, Signature AgTech, bringing new solutions to farmers, with unprecedented support.
Following my vision and global economies, I founded AgTech Insight as a full service consulting and advisory firm offering expertise to ensure success and projection in today’s global economy. Our team of subject matter experts consists of experienced, top-level agriculture and technology professionals from around the world. I travel often working globally with clients concentrating on the US, Asia and South American markets. We are building an unprecedented distribution and support platform specific to AgTech to streamline the Go to Market process speeding up adoption rates.
I have been a co-founder of AgTech startups in both hardware and software development with global operation as well as have become a leader in the AgTech movement and I speak to groups around the world.
Blockcast.cc: How is blockchain being used in Ag?
Aaron: Often we are still in a data collection mode having siloed data sets within agriculture and figuring out what additional data sets we need. In produce with a short shelf life and high food safety risk, retailers are starting to use blockchain in a very basic way.
Most companies using blockchain in ag are just using it to standardize data sets in order to have the ability to track the origin of a specific head of lettuce throughout the supply chain back to the source (farmer) quicker to mitigate risk when a food safety issue comes up. In blockchain pilots, we have shown that with proper implementation the time to track the origin of a fruit can be reduced from almost a week to just a few minutes.
Many AgTech companies developing technology don’t know much about blockchain or how they can add value to the chain with their data as its not their core business and besides being a buzzword, they don’t really understand the concept or where they fit. This comes from the lack of industry leadership and education in the Ag, retail, and startup worlds alike.
As an industry we need to work together throughout the ecosystem to transfer knowledge, build relationships and support a couple of companies become leaders and standardize processes.
Blockcast.cc: What is your view on the blockchain and crypto market?
Aaron: There is tremendous value for every piece of the agri food value chain to add blockchain and often crypto currencies into their innovation roadmap as they build strategy, but we need to pick where we initially implement these technologies wisely. I see there are 3 immediate use cases we can easily integrate and need to be priority in Ag:
- Bring real time digital datasets into the chain which can be used to track activity and authenticity (date, time, location stamp) to know certain jobs and applications were actually completed as planned. These provide valuable business insights help cut costs and improve margin today but also certain blocks can be shared with others in the supply chain for forecasting or validation and eventually to the end consumer to increase product value and build brand loyalty.
- Smart contracts help validate sales and streamline the finance side to help everyone get paid quicker
- Crypto currencies can help ag & food industry in many countries who have challenging currency or political issues both on a local bases as well as allow them to export/import to the world with less risk to all parties and create a level playing field for all involved.
Blockcast.cc: What is the Asia opportunity?
Aaron: I have been to Asia over 35 times in the past 5 years and have seen firsthand that throughout Asia and many developing markets we have much less existing infrastructure which is great! This provides a unique opportunity as we centralize food supply chains and diversify our diets to build strategy and implement blockchain, innovation and best practices from around the globe so we can build the the future of food with the best technology possible.
Blockcast.cc: Can you share with our audience an inspiring quote:
Aaron:
Agriculture is the last frontier for technology and in the next 10 years we have the largest business opportunity of our lives to create success but as we do so, we also get to improve peoples lives and food systems, around the globe while making some great money along the way!
Blockcast.cc: Thank you for your time Aaron. You have given us new knowledge on Ag and how tech can help this industry. Thank you once again!
