2024 Product Performance Report
+9.9%
82%
14
Trial Summary
In January 2024, growers and independent researchers in the UK and EU began trialling Overture® A and Overture® B in their own systems. Over the following twelve months, 14 trials in four countries put the two candidate products through commercial deep water culture, NFT, aeroponic, ebb-and-flow and drip-irrigated systems, on peat, coir, rockwool and other inert substrates.
Overture® was applied onto the seed before germination, typically with a spray or drip bar, and many growers chose to apply it again as a foliar spray after germination. No trial required any change to standard practice, and no grower reported changes in germination. The impact was assessed by comparing harvested fresh yield with untreated plants grown alongside.
“High-tech greenhouses … have emerged as the most promising new generation of agriculture technologies, and optimising the microbiome will allow us to unlock even more of a plant’s natural potential”
Conclusions
Across the 2024 programme, Overture® delivered a +9.9% average yield increase in commercial systems, with an 82% success rate. In lettuce, the largest gains were +20.9% with Overture® A and +20.0% with Overture® B. Results varied between sites, and a small number of trials showed no improvement (Figure 1).
The products also worked beyond lettuce. In a cucumber trial run to standard commercial practice on rockwool slabs, Overture® A produced +10.7% more cucumbers and Overture® B +5.7%, with all fruit harvested at a set size. Pak choi harvested yield rose by +11.4% with Overture® A and +13.7% with Overture® B, and beetroot by +6.9% with Overture® A (Figure 2).
Overture® A and B were trialled across the systems soilless growers use, from deep water culture and NFT to aeroponics and drip irrigation, and showed activity with all of the common sterilisation methods, including UV, ozone and peroxide, and in high-care vertical farms. Overture® B did not improve yield in some systems with very high levels of sterilisation.
The full report covers every trial, the compatibility results by system and substrate, and the data behind Overture®.
