Conversation with Lawrence Pratt of ClearLeaf

Chemical pesticides as well as fungicides have played a significant role in modern agriculture, helping to cut crop losses, increase productivity, and improve food security. But they’ve also brought many challenges negatively impacting human and environmental health that innovators are trying to solve for. To learn more, I spoke with Lawrence Pratt of ClearLeaf.

Lawrence grew up in Washington D.C, went to Yale School of Management, and worked at a think tank in D.C. on business policy and sustainability. He came to Costa Rica in the late 90s to be a graduate business school professor at INCAE, teaching corporate sustainability.

“I started working with startups and companies to try to help them understand how sustainability-oriented approaches such as organic agriculture could support them. About 12-13 years ago I met some entrepreneurs doing very interesting things in the health space. I joined that company and helped on strategy and raising capital. It turned out our impact was limited so we started looking at different uses of the technology. We realized that instead of healing wounds and protecting human skin, we could apply this technology on plant tissue. That was the genesis of what ClearLeaf is doing.”

FTW: “What problem are you solving?”

LP: “The primary problem is the overuse of very, very toxic chemicals that poison farmers, their kids, farm workers, the soils, and ultimately consumers. Fungicides are neurotoxicologic and carcinogenic. They’re the most problematic substances on Earth, and are used in insane quantities, far more than recommended. There are thousands of deaths annually through direct exposure.”

FTW: “And yet people are using these fungicides.”

LP: “Fungicides are effective, they are off-patent so they are cheap, and are easy to use. You buy a container, mix it, and spray it. We needed to do something which was just as easy to use. Fungicides however are very toxic. So one of our drivers is that countries are banning — or as they’d like to say, deregistering — toxic substances. The innovation process has slowed down. Agrochemicals companies have found it hard and expensive to produce new substances.”

FTW: “If these substances are so toxic, why are they still used?”

LP: “Pesticides, herbicides, insecticides, and fungicides are increasingly being banned. The health effects of Roundup appear after 20-30 years. So there’s a worldwide movement away from these chemicals. At the same time, the EU has extended the use of fungicides several times, because they’re no good alternatives — apart from us.”

FTW: “So what is your innovation?”

LP: “Our solution, GotaBlanca, uses one of the oldest bacterial fungicides — antimicrobial silver. We wanted to do something which is broad spectrum and easy to apply. The plant doesn’t know the solution is there. There are no detrimental effects. It doesn’t impact the roots, respiration, or anything.”

FTW: “It sounds expensive to use a material like silver though.”

LP: “Silver is expensive. We use pure elemental silver. It’s broken down to micron sized quantities. So we use very small quantities — extremely low levels. It would take 100,000 years to get to a problematic level of silver in the soil.”

FTW: “So the silver doesn’t make it cost inhibitive?”

LP: “Our product actually competes head to head on price with brand name legacy products from major manufacturers.”

FTW: “Tell us more about how this technology works.”

LP: “Silver is an extremely potent antimicrobial. But you have to make sure it’s dispersed. Our technological advance is to get the product to coat and protect the plants. And our solutions works both pre- and post harvest.”

FTW: “What’s your business model?”

LP: “We produce the active ingredient in-house. Then we use contract manufacturers to mix in the other ingredients, and use distribution partners in the countries where we’re in. We have our own dedicated sales force in Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Panama, Honduras.”

FTW: “Does your product require regulatory approval?”

LP: “The regulatory processes look very different from country to country, depending on the use you claim for the product. For the U.S., we’re optimistic we can be on the market within 2-3 years. Same thing with Japan and South Korea. Australia will take perhaps 3-4 years. In general, it takes us 2-4 years to enter a market.”

FTW: “When and where did you first launch?”

LP: “Our first market was in Costa Rica. We have over a thousand farmers using our solution across many crops — pre-harvest and post-harvest — pineapples, bananas, papaya, coconut, onions, tomatoes, probably 20 different crops.”

FTW: “How do you convince farmers to use your solution?”

LP: “Farmers want to know it’s as effective as conventional chemicals, that the plants are happy, and that their customers are happy. And yeah, they do care about protecting biodiversity. They notice the presence or absence of insects and pollinators.

Farmers can see the plants are healthier when they use our solutions. We’ve quantified that in coffee for example. We’ve also had some endorsements by e.g. Wal-Mart in Central America that recommended our product for tomatoes and onions.

We’re not cheaper than off patent stuff, but we’re cheaper than the branded, patented products.”

FTW: “How big is the market you’re going after?”

LP: “We compete head to head with all fungicides and bactericides. So it’s tens of billions of dollars in terms of market size. Biologicals are typically tricky to manufacture and to use, and they’re limited in scope. You need one bug to kill another bug. And the biologicals need temperature control etc. From an impact point of view, we believe our product is ideal for smallholder farmers across the world.”

FTW: “What are your plans for the next few years?”

LP: “We’re 20 people in the team. We aim to be in 12 markets four years from now, likely including the U.S., Japan, South Korea. So a couple of big markets, and we’ll need to build distributor/partner relationships there. We’re currently getting patents all over the world. Our IP is strong, which gives more confidence.”

FTW: “Have you raised any external funding?”

LP: “We’re closing out a Seed round now”.

FTW: “What are your asks for anyone reading this?”

LP: “We’re looking for partners with existing distribution networks that believe alternative solutions are a viable market opportunity. It could be larger international companies looking to bring new products into their portfolios, or national level companies that have a great ability in bringing novel solutions to their farmer communities.”

FTW: “How can people get in touch with you?”

LP: “LinkedIn or email is fine!”