Investment by Europe’s biggest agri-chemical companies in “green transition” start-ups outperformed the global space through 2023, but has since followed a more general crash downwards in 2024 to date.

The four big European agri-chemical companies, Bayer, BASF, Yara and Syngenta, all have venture capital arms, which invest strategically in start-ups positioning for disruptive change, including tougher environmental regulation in their home European market.

At New Food Finance, we track companies developing technologies for a more sustainable food system, to reduce emissions, pollution and biodiversity loss.

The EU this year watered down its flagship “Farm to Fork Strategy”, significantly pulling its goal to halve pesticide use by 2030. While the direction of travel is clear, the EU’s swerve risks blunting a sector transition.

The chart above shows how equity investment in green transition startups by some of Europe’s biggest agri-chemical companies held up post-Covid, but has followed global investment sharply downwards, in 2024.

Some of the biggest recent deals by these investors include:

• Both BASF Venture Capital and Yara Growth Ventures participated in a $52 million funding for Swiss AgTech company, Ecorobotix, to accelerate growth of its precision smart sprayer system (May 9 2023).
• Leaps by Bayer took part in a $45m fund-raising for U.S. ag biotech startup NewLeaf Symbiotics, to support its “new class of microbial amendments” for row crops, in December 2023.
• Syngenta Group Ventures participated in a $20 million funding for Israel-based precision agtech company Greeneye Technology, to scale up operations in the U.S., in April 2024.