Making plantations more productive without harming the environment is the goal of Effatha Agro, a startup based in Santo André, in the metropolitan region of São Paulo. Founded by Rodrigo Lovato and Luzo Dantas, the company uses low frequencies emitted by satellites that are able to ward off nutrient atoms contained in soils. With the smaller-sized fertilizer, the plant absorbs more easily.

"The plant can metabolize this element by spending less energy," Lovato explains. "That is, with the same energy that it captures from sunlight, it can produce more. And that's what matters to the farmer and to all of us who eat food." According to the company, the rate of improvement in crop efficiency varies according to the type of crop and the time of year, but is around 30%.

An important point for the business is that this is done without generating waste and without owning the soil. "Because we work frequently via satellite, we don't put any chemicals or biologicals on the plantation. It's a totally clean technique that makes a very big difference to production, which will also have more added value," lovato says.

According to Dantas, it took seven years of research to understand how frequency could move atoms. "We got the first result with salt and from that we saw that it was possible to work with any chemical element," says the entrepreneur. The technology began testing at the end of 2017, initially in sugarcane plantations. In 2019, the startup began marketing the solution.

For the 2021 harvest, the company started to use the technology in other crops, such as soybeans, corn, cotton, beans, etc. Currently, the tool is available for 14 types of plantation.

The startup says it cannot open the name of customers by clauses of contracts, but that it meets different profiles. "There are no size restrictions. We serve small farmers and large farms," says Marcelo Leonessa, CEO of Effatha Agro. And the startup ensures that the solution is very precise with respect to location, being possible to direct the frequencies so that they reach only the plantations of their customers.

At the moment, the technology is being used on about 60,000 hectares —of which 10,000 are from paying customers. In the rest, it is used as a free demonstration during a harvest so that farmers have the chance to prove the results before paying for the technology.

The company was born with a focus on Brazil, but the goal is to reach customers from other countries. since the satellite used by the company can reach any part of the world. For now, the technology is in the testing phase in 10 countries besides Brazil, including Argentina, Uruguay, Belgium, the United States, Portugal and Israel.

Source: Um só Planeta