Sustainable plant growth accelerator boosts strawberry yields by 30%
November 18th, 2015
Inocucor’s OMRI-listed Garden Solution excels in 2015 field trials
by Sustainable Food News
Agriculture biotech company Inocucor Technologies, Inc., Tuesday said multiple-season field trials conducted on strawberries and soy beans with its sustainable biological accelerators for farmers showed yield increases of 30 percent in strawberries and 8 percent in soy bean at the end of the 2015 growing season.
Montreal-based Inocucor is a manufacturer of OMRI-approved, organic soil, seed and plant growth accelerators that improve crop yields, shorten growing periods and create healthier,more resilient soils for organic farmers, greenhouse growers and mainstream production farmers.
The strawberry trial, now in its second year, was conducted on 14 acres in Ontario, Canada, by A & L Biological Agroecology Research Services Centre, based on a treatment protocol developed in concert with Inocucor scientists.
The trial involved application of Inocucor’s first commercial product, Garden Solution (formulation IN-M1), to seedlings at mechanical transplantation. See complete details of the A&L Biological strawberry trial.
Garden Solution, a fermented brew of naturally occurring beneficial yeasts and bacteria that acts as a natural growth optimizer for plants and enriches soil, is approved for use in 27 states. Garden Solution is OMRI Listed for organic production and is in use by greenhouse growers and farmers in the Carolinas, Florida, Georgia and Virginia.
“These are our first results from trials conducted by reputable industry and academic groups in Canada and the United States for the 2015 growing season,” said Inocucor CEO Donald Marvin. “They prove the ability of our sustainable biological products to help farmers dramatically increase yields and reduce season-to-season variability with crops.”
Inocucor has expanded its soybean field trials, using its proprietary “cell free” bio-stimulation formulation (IN-M2) in a tank mix with a range of cultivars, soils and climates, as well as with other micro nutrient and herbicide products. The 2015 trials add approximately 25 site-years to the three-year soybean research plot data completed at Quebec-based McGill University’s Department of Plant Sciences, Macdonald Campus.
The company is also accumulating data from approximately 30 site-years and on more than 200 acres for soybean using both its IN-M1 and IN-M2 formulations with academic and industry partners. Preliminary research plot data from the United States using this micro nutrient and herbicide-treatment package confirms an average 8 percent yield increase for a third consecutive soy bean growing season.
Marvin also reported on first-year soy bean and cotton trials with”a very large industry partner”using the IN-M2 formulation on several acres in the North and South Central regions of the United States that produced yield increases of approximately 8 and 20 percent,respectively.
“No other microbial consortia-based company can demonstrate this type of multi-year, multi-species data on row and high-value produce crops from the field,” said Marvin.
Last week, Inocucor was issued patent No.9, 175, 258 by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office to protect Inocucor consortia and unique microbial products. Its Garden Solution was licensed in California in May and is currently awaiting label approval. Last June, the company opened a 10,000-square-foot headquarters and cGMP laboratory in Montreal’s Technoparc to scale up production of Garden Solution and to further develop its burgeoning product pipeline for bio-stimulation, bio-fertility and bio-protection.
Inocucor has attracted four rounds of venture capital from Cycle Capital Management, a prominent Canadian venture capital firm focused on the clean-tech sector. In February, August and October, Inocucor closed interim rounds of financing from Cycle Capital Management with participation from Desjardins-Innovatech, the venture capital unit of one of North America’s leading financial institutions and two family offices.
The company is currently completing a Series B equity-financing round on the order of $15 million with venture capital, institutional and family office investors.
