The AgriScot Product Innovation Award recognises and rewards commercial potential, creativity and innovation.
Meeting emerging or existing demand for new or developed products and pushing technological or mechanical boundaries, winners each year need to demonstrate ingenuity and uniqueness as well as business potential.
The AgriScot Innovations Award for 2022 was awarded to the smaXtec health system, a ‘smart’ bolus which can help farmers manage the herd health of their cows. The company’s bolus detects rumination, movement and, crucially, temperature fluctuations in cows when inserted into the rumen via the animal’s mouth.
“This could result in farmers being able to detect mastitis cases, for instance, four days before any clinical signs were seen. Farmers can view all the functions recorded by the bolus and it can send an alert when temperatures rise, or rumen function slows down.”
David Pool, smaXtec
The bolus costs around £20, but a smart data box which takes the signals from them costs £5500. There are now 225,000 of them in 12 countries across the world, including 125 herds with the system in the UK since launch in March of this year.
Two innovations received a ‘Highly Commended’ award;
- Brechin based company, SoilEssentials’ SKAi for their artificial intelligence platform which is based around a re-trainable smart camera set up that detects weeds, such as docks, and then spot treats them with a herbicide. Field trials had shown that a 77% saving in chemical was possible using the system.
- GEA Farm Technologies’ self-driving robot feed mixer, DairyFeed F4500, which supports dairy farms with reducing their carbon footprint and operating costs. The new feeder operates on sensor technology and can handle herds of up to 300 cows. It runs purely on electricity and can be recharged using renewable energy sources.
The judges for the AgriScot Innovation Award 2022, were Ken Fletcher, editor of The Scottish Farmer; John Elliot, a well-known Scottish cattle and sheep breeder, and Alan Laidlaw, CEO of RHASS.
