Hong Kong agri-tech projects eye US market to tackle farming challenges

Two agri-tech projects from Hong Kong are seeking to tackle some of the most pressing challenges facing agriculture, from resource scarcity and labor shortages to rising greenhouse gas emissions, while eyeing the US market for deployment.

The first is a regenerative, solar-powered air-to-fertilizer production platform developed by Amonova, a Hong Kong-based agri-tech startup with manufacturing on the Chinese mainland.

The system uses air, water and light to produce nitrogen fertilizer locally, allowing farms to reduce their dependence on large centralized production plants and long international supply chains.

"Our ambition is to change where fertilizer is made. Today, farmers around the world depend on nitrogen produced in a small number of large plants, often thousands of kilometers away," said Simson Wu, founder and CEO of Amonova.

Amonova is part of a Hong Kong delegation visiting Silicon Valley to showcase technologies and meet potential investors.

Wu said the core technology is a light-driven catalytic process that enables nitrogen fertilizer to be produced on-site, effectively "shrinking large factory systems into farm-scale units".

According to the company, a modular unit occupying about 1 to 2 square meters can produce nitrogen fertilizer for a field of around 10,000 square meters. The technology can be deployed in greenhouses, vertical farms and outdoor farming operations, with pilot projects underway in India, Japan and China.

"The strongest use case is in regions that are highly dependent on imported fertilizer or fertilizer raw materials. Japan, for example, relies on imports for most of its major fertilizer raw materials, and South Korea also relies substantially on imported urea. In these markets, the value is not only the potential to reduce emissions but also greater supply resilience," he said.

Wu pointed to recent disruptions of transportation through the Strait of Hormuz as an example of the vulnerability of global fertilizer supply chains.

Wu said the technology could also help reduce the carbon and environmental footprint of conventional agriculture, an area where he sees particular potential in the United States.

Food waste and compost can provide useful recycled nutrients, he said, but they may not always deliver nitrogen in the form, concentration or timing required by a crop. A locally controlled nitrogen production system could therefore complement them.

Over-application of nitrogen can also contribute to water pollution, greenhouse gas emissions and soil acidification, making more precise nutrient management increasingly important, he said.

California offers another potential use case because of its abundant solar resources. The state experiences periods when the grid cannot absorb all available solar generation, and surplus renewable electricity could be used to produce fertilizer, said Wu. Amonova's solar-ammonia process, meanwhile, uses sunlight more directly as an energy input.

While Amonova is addressing fertilizer supply and resource efficiency, another project is targeting labor shortages that increasingly threaten agricultural production.

The "Intelligent Blueberry Harvesting Robot", developed by the Hong Kong Centre for Logistics Robotics, combines a dual-arm mobile platform with artificial intelligence to identify ripe blueberries, analyze suitable grasping positions and harvest the fruit without damaging it.

Andrew Young, head of the Hong Kong delegation, said the technology could have strong deployment potential in the United States, where labor shortages have long been a challenge for agriculture, contributing to higher production costs and risks to crop harvesting.

"The equipment may just be a four-wheel mobile platform. But once you add different systems on top of it, it can be used to pick blueberries, strawberries and blackberries. You can also build a larger robot to pick cherries. All of these applications are possible," said Young, vice-chairman and managing partner of IPG Capital, which focuses on green technology and robotics.

Young said the two projects reflect what he sees as a direction for Hong Kong's emerging industries: focusing on high-value applications while taking advantage of the Chinese mainland's deep and highly competitive industrial supply chains.

Rather than competing directly in basic manufacturing, Young said Hong Kong could concentrate on products that are more precise, smaller-scale and higher value-added, building strengths in areas such as system integration, software and specialized applications.