Technology investment will help scale regenerative cotton, BCI says
Cotton sustainability body Better Cotton Initiative (BCI) has announced an investment in technology that it says will help it scale regenerative agriculture across its programme.
This news comes immediately after BCI’s announcement that its programme now aligns with regenerative agriculture standards.
It has now announced the acquisition of an AI-powered technology platform called Co:Farm. This platform was developed by Materra, a London-based agricultural technology provider.
Speaking at an event in Vancouver on October 13, BCI chief executive, Nick Weatherill, said the technology would equip clothing brands and retailers with “new levels of impact data”. He said this data would be valuable in these companies’ sourcing decisions.
He also said acquisition by BCI would lead to Co:Farm scaling quickly. Materra has engaged 10,000 farmers as users of the platform; BCI will seek to extend it now to more than 1.3 million farmers.
“Co:Farm will manage BCI’s field intelligence,” Mr Weatherill said, “enabling efficient digital data collection at farm level and delivering high-quality validated impact data.”
He said access to this data would lead to “actionable insights, greater integrity controls and feedback loops to drive continuous improvement”.
Through AI-driven guidance and tutorials, he said Co:Farm will help farmers optimise their work, streamline data collection, and accelerate their adoption of regenerative practices.
BCI said it will now aim to implement Co:Farm for the 2027-28 cotton season and will share a roadmap for the platform at its conference in Marrakech in January.
