CA summary
Our proposal is a feasibility study that will specifically focus on the use of blockchain for Major Agri farming businesses that want to be recognised for using carbon-negative farming methods to pull carbon from the air and putting it back into the ground.
The resultant whitepaper will set out any gaps in capability between the blockchain capability and business use cases and how they can be resolved.
This is a client backed use case – proposed by two of our clients, both of whom are major European farming groups – with revenues of over $1bn between them.
Agribusinesses such as our clients, want to prove provenance of carbon-negative farming methods as a differentiator but don’t have reliable solutions.
The whitepaper will be driven by the needs of the use case companies that are already on our client list.
The whitepaper
The first step is to understand the gap between the capability of technology and the need of ‘business’, and to then close that gap with a viable solution.
This proposal is one of four feasibility studies that will research real-world business use cases in the context of Cardano blockchain capability. Each will result in a blueprint with steps for blockchain developers to deliver the business needs towards a future, proof of concept MVP.
Our proposal is to undertake a feasibility study and produce a whitepaper that will succinctly describe how the Cardano blockchain can facilitate the proof of Soil-based Carbon Sequestration by farming businesses.
We expect the whitepaper to produce a blueprint for creating applications that will deliver on this specific use case.
The use case
The companies in the use case, that we will reference, are two large UK Agricultural businesses that operate across the spectrum of farming activities, in the UK Europe and Australia. These businesses are highly innovative in the Agri sector – both leveraging links with the Cambridge University, National Bodies, and other innovation centres. They have an understanding of Blockchain technology already and have been pivoting towards becoming Impact focussed businesses for several years now. They also recognise the value in differentiating the quality of their product, their operations and their brand, and the ability to generate revenue through proof of soil-based sequestration and the carbon credits and certificates associated with it. Such a solution will generate new and exciting B2B and B2C opportunities that will better engage their partners, consumers and employees, as they strive to become Impact focused Farming businesses.
Our proposal is for a feasibility study that will investigate how the businesses and the Agri Industry’s needs can be translated into technical process descriptions that can then be assessed by Cardano blockchain developers. Where gaps between needs and capability are identified, the resultant whitepaper will describe the technical development steps needed to provide the Cardano blockchain capability to the Agricultural sector of the economy.
The resultant whitepaper will set out any gaps in capability between the blockchain capability and business use cases and how they can be resolved.
Current Reality
There is desire in the use case companies to embrace blockchain technology aligned with a clear business case. How the Cardano blockchain can enable the proof of Carbon Soil Sequestration is understood, but it is not sufficiently articulated or described in new business processes that are truly Impact driven.
Ventures have already been built as an engine to encourage farmers to use carbon-negative farming methods to pull carbon from the air and put it back into the ground.
As an example, One such venture Nori has raised $7 million of venture capital. The company is also exploring new sources for carbon capture, further building its carbon removal marketplace, and releasing a token to facilitate it all.
Ventures such as Nori focuses on carbon removal rather than emissions reductions or avoidances. Its marketplace provides financial rewards to farmers, who use regenerative farming practices that involve soil carbon sequestration. Soil sequestration is the first of Nori’s carbon removal offerings, with additional methodologies coming to market in the future.
To date, the company has around 10 farms on its program, has distributed $1 million to its farmers and has seen around 2,200 transactions from buyers for carbon credits.
However, there is a painful irony inherent in Nori’s operations for removing carbon as they are run on Ethereum - one of the most wasteful blockchains in the world, although they are moving to Polygon.
Agribusinesses want to prove provenance of carbon-negative farming methods as a differentiator but don’t have reliable solutions that are Impact driven – i.e. with a low carbon footprint themselves, and that can be grown into a coherent integrated solution set that covers auditability of carbon capture – down to nutrient growth measurement evident from such soil carbon capture.
Our proposal will investigate the needs of the business and articulate these in the form of a set of requirements for Cardano developers.
The solution that we propose will present a pathway that describes a meaningful real-world business use case that has a clear impact.
It will achieve this by:
· Understanding the gaps between real-world business needs and the technical capability of Cardano blockchain to prove Soil Carbon Sequestration, and how to close those gaps.
· Presenting the solution described as a configurable product that can be employed by companies operating in a value chain with clear opportunities to be gained from product and brand differentiation.
The solution will:
· Describe a product that supports a business solution
· Increase the number of companies proposing and being exposed to Cardano solutions
· Provide the platform to facilitate the proof of Soil Carbon Sequestration and integration with carbon credit and certification schemes
Challenge – identify key technical partners to assist in describing the gap between capability and delivery of the blockchain-based solution/s
o Mitigation – Engage with the Catalyst co-ordination team to identify appropriate partners
Challenge – Describing the solution that delivers the outcomes required by the business use case in terms that will lead to a coherent scope of work for the development phase of the project in the future
o We will partner with developers to learn what technical development needs to occur to technically deliver the solution, and how to describe it in a scope of work