At New Food Finance, our focus is driving a green transition in food production. We follow more than 3,200 companies, and have classified these according to more than 1,700 sectors, sub-sectors, markets and technologies that mitigate pollution, greenhouse gases or biodiversity loss.

This week, we reviewed the type of technology that founders of start-up companies are targeting, by plotting the year companies were founded by broad tech sector. The findings are striking.

Almost no-one founded a controlled environment agriculture company in 2023, at least not a “visible” one, for example that was publicly announced, or emerged from stealth via a funding round – see pink slice in chart above. And their proportion of the green transition space has declined year on year since 2018. Controlled Environment Agriculture companies include vertical farming, and indoor hydroponics and aeroponics.

By contrast, carbon & nature companies (for example offset developers, soil carbon MRV, and pollination services) have risen to more than 20% of our space, from less than 5% in 2020 – see green slice in chart. Supply chain MRV also grew strongly last year – the yellow slice.