Food production systems are under pressure to produce more food from less resources to feed a growing population. UK demand for high quality fruit and vegetables is high, with ~32% increase in demand vs. 2019, driven by health awareness post-lockdowns (EIT Food, 2020). New innovations are required to address existing bottlenecks to production, increase agricultural yields and food quality and reduce food imports.

Pollination is a key part of horticultural production, which triggers fruit production by the plant. Over 70% fruit crops produce rely on insect pollinators (bees, hoverflies, wasps, moths), yet pollination services to support commercial horticultural production are unsustainable -- representing a major bottleneck for UK food production. Current practices rely on importing bumblebees (from mainland Europe) or renting honeybees and has serious financial and ecological costs. Costs of renting/purchasing bees costs are growing annually (due to honeybee colony collapse and regulatory changes) and saturation of fields/orchards with non-native bees can starve indigenous pollinators, creating over-reliance on single bee type and limiting local biodiversity.

AgriSound believes monitoring the activity of pollinators can deliver increased crop yields and quality by ensuring that any pollinator deficits within an environment can be detected and addressed (sowing wildflowers, creating new bee habitat or moving hives around), resulting in a diverse mix of pollinators at the right place and at the right time. We use low-cost sensor technologies to monitor insect presence via sound analysis and help growers and beekeepers to deliver sustainable pollination and biodiversity enhancement.

Previous funding from InnovateUK has enabled AgriSound to launch monitoring technology for honeybee welfare and productivity monitoring, as well as an in-field pollinator counter (named POLY), as well as leveraging SEIS and EIS investment. Follow-on funding from Young Innovators' Award will enable further technical and commercial innovation, as well as support AgriSound to exploit earlier successes delivered at the conclusion of the previous Young Innovators' award (including presentation at COP26).

Specifically, innovation activities will focus on:

* Creation of new sound analysis tools for expanding the total number of insect types monitored by the POLY device;
* Trialling new strategies for attracting high value customers using data collected from existing customers.

Completion of the project will lead to a step-change in business profitability and environmental outcomes. The expansion of algorithms to detect new species will generate far greater insights for end-users about current biodiversity levels on farm and help to improve on-farm pollination strategies.