São Paulo startup bets on regenerative agriculture

By Roseli Andrion  |  FAPESP Innovative R&D – Amidst the grayness of the city of São Paulo, capital of the Brazilian state of the same name and the country’s largest metropolis, an initiative is seeking to change the way food is produced, distributed and consumed. Santa Food Tech, a startup supported by FAPESP’s Innovative Research in Small Businesses program (PIPE), has developed a model for transforming urban areas into laboratories of sustainability.

The main difference of the project is its integrated approach that combines environmental education, social networking and data analysis to create a “circular green microeconomy.” “We’ve developed our own methodology, a social technology that uses information technology to promote an innovative non-linear chain model and the positive impacts that result from it,” explains Evelyn Dias, partner and founder of the startup and responsible for its operation.

And the results are already visible: in the driest region of São Paulo, the company implemented the first urban laboratory, proving that it is possible to create a synergistic and economically self-sufficient chain. “We were able to demonstrate that the model can achieve local results from an environmental, social and economic point of view.”

The initiative is currently being implemented in four micro-regions of the state capital and in Guarulhos, the second most populous city in the state. And why is this revolution necessary? “The current chain is exhausted, no longer works and could lead to the collapse of the planet,” Dias points out. “In the big cities, where more than 85% of the population lives, solutions are needed that don’t depend on migration to the countryside or a radical change in lifestyle.”

Accelerated transition

The project was designed to accelerate the transition to more conscious habits. This requires a method that combines environmental and social education with technology. “Our methodology has six stages to implement the circular green microeconomy,” summarizes Dias.

Santa Food Tech is not limited to the production and distribution of organic, agroecological and agroforestry food: the concept of the project is the transformation of urban lifestyles. “Initially, the goal was to democratize access to organic food, which is everyone’s right by law. In the course of the research, we realized that simply connecting producers and consumers wasn’t enough to make the system synergistic and self-sufficient,” she explains. This evolution has led the company to pivot (change strategic direction) twice since its inception.

In its strategy, the startup focuses on a very specific audience: just 0.31% of the population. “We discovered during our innovation journey that trying to talk to the masses didn’t work. So in our last pivot, in 2022, we defined that we’d focus on a specific profile so that it becomes a multiplier of the model,” she says.

This target audience, made up of individuals and companies, has “instant buy-in” to the proposal. “They’re looking for sustainable solutions, but find it difficult to implement them on a daily basis. Despite already adopting a more conscious lifestyle, those in the city encounter many barriers.”

To engage the multiplier audience, Santa Food Tech has created pathways in which participants gradually evolve and are encouraged to invite people with a similar profile who might be interested in the project. “Our indicators show that each person involved in one stage increases the chance of being activated in another stage by 20% within 35 days.”

This data demonstrates the effectiveness of the method in continuously engaging participants. “As the person activates in other stages, it shows that this is the movement they were waiting for to make this transition. In other words, it becomes clearer that this is the lifestyle they want.”

From personal to collective

The story of Santa Food Tech began for Evelyn Dias in 2010. “It was a personal awakening. I underwent a nutritional re-education, and as I researched, I saw that there was a market opportunity – especially after the Organic Law was passed in 2011,” she says. As the growth of the organic market in Brazil has not kept pace with expectations, it was not until 2022 that the project adopted a model based on science and technology.

One of the pillars of the project is the adoption of regenerative agriculture. “This concept goes far beyond producing food without pesticides: it’s the best form of production there is, as it seeks to reconcile nature with human consumption,” says Dias. “Among other benefits, this practice protects the soil, preserves water sources and removes more CO₂ from the atmosphere than conventional methods. It also respects regional socio-environmental aspects, such as local culture and income generation.”

In practice, the system works with three types of transactions: exchange, donation and commercialization. The startup classifies the participants in the chain as beneficiaries (producers, cooks and organizations), customers (individuals and companies that pay) and users (those interested in exchanges and donations). “In the chain, there are exchanges, donations and sales. There are users who are interested in making exchanges and donations: in other words, they can both offer and receive,” she explains.

Women’s team

The startup’s entire strategic team is made up of women. “Our goal is to make an impact, and it’s tied to seven Sustainable Development Goals [SDGs, set by the United Nations] — one of which is gender equality,” Dias describes. “We focus our efforts on training and providing opportunities for women.”

The group is multidisciplinary and includes experts in food, electrical and production engineering, quality, sustainability, marketing and sales. “The next step is to bring in a data science expert, which is a strategic area for the business. Our big technological challenge is data science – and it’s also our biggest value delivery,” she says. “The project is able to map food deserts and all the indicators related to this segment.”

This data-driven intelligence has piqued the interest of municipalities and large corporations in the markets for carbon credits and payments for environmental services. “With data science, we have access to these two markets.” The next phase of the project includes a partnership with the Brazilian Company for Industrial Research and Innovation (EMBRAPII) and the Luiz de Queiroz College of Agriculture (ESALQ) at the University of São Paulo (USP), focusing on data science for regenerative agriculture.

Expansion and internationalization

The startup’s projections for the coming years are ambitious: by 2025 alone, it plans to expand from its current five micro-regions to 33 locations. “In four years, we can grow ninefold and serve more than 65,000 families.”

Santa Food Tech proposes a revolution in the concept of economic value. “We believe we’re going to develop a new economic model. Our focus is on optimizing the natural resource, which is on an equal footing with the monetary one,” explains Dias. She says that there are no similar solutions in the country or abroad. “We’ve found initiatives that are part of what we do, but they don’t integrate the chain as completely as we do. They’re potential partners, not competitors.”

The company’s internationalization is currently underway with pre-pilots in the Dominican Republic, supported by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the World Food Programme (WFP). “There, we’re working both in a very poor farming community and in an ecovillage with a more affluent population. The goal is to validate the model in both.”

The startup was one of those selected to take part in FAPESP Week Germany, in a session on the circular economy, inequalities and social injustices. The event took place on March 25th and 26th at the Free University of Berlin.

For the researcher, this is just the first stage of a global transformation that will take place over the next few decades. “When we look at the innovation curve, it’s going up. We believe that in 2050 we’ll look back and say: ‘I don’t know how we lived before that.’”