Sound Agriculture and Syngenta partner to reduce nitrogen use in China

Source: Brownfield

Sound Agriculture and Syngenta have announced a partnership exploring opportunities to decrease nitrogen fertilizer use in China by up to 30% while maintaining yield.

Sound CEO Adam Litle tells Brownfield their product SOURCE will be distributed by Syngenta throughout China. Based on their trials in the US, he says SOURCE can replace 25 to 50 pounds of nitrogen and still maintain yield. 

“It has shown really high efficacy to increase corn yields, while keeping your nutrition the same. It works by triggering microbes in the soil to fix more nitrogen and solubilize more phosphorus, so it is kind of like caffeine for microbes.”

He says China is the world’s largest user of synthetic fertilizers and reducing that usage by 30% would have a major positive impact on their environmental footprint.

“That is 7.5 million metric tons annually. Given the potency of nitrous oxide, which gets released and solubilizes in to the air when it is not used by the plant or leaches into the waterways, that’s the equivalent of 50 million cars on the road each year.”

Litle says partnering with Syngenta allows for the natural chemistry to be used globally, helping the agriculture industry reduce greenhouse gas emissions.