The purpose of Catalyst Agri-Innovation Society is to build bridges, linking silos of innovation and opportunity.

We have selected Agriculture as the foundation as food is the common denominator of life. Producing food is part

of the biological and cultural, as well as economic fabric of a civilization. It has been said that “What happens

out in the countryside in one century invariably affects the cities in the next century”. Today that time delay,

between cause and effect, has been reduced to the speed of thought. The massive advancement of global

integration means we can no longer rely on the foundations we stand on, or the defences that have kept us

“safe”. We believe that for the good of all, perhaps the very survival of all, we must return to the thinking of

centuries ago, in that there was an understanding that we are “in this together”. We believe that we must bring

together think tanks that roll up their sleeves, and get their hands dirty. We envision a world where the

microbiologist and the chemical engineer have lunch with the botanist and the entomologist talking about how

the bug protecting the plant excretes a fluid that enhances the bacteria processing the fertilizers. Over the next

days each of those lunch friends have coffee with the sociologist, the economist, and the psychologist.