Elbow Beach is pleased to announce that its portfolio company UPP, a pioneering UK food-tech company creating sustainable, hypoallergenic vegetarian protein products from previously wasted broccoli crops, has entered a landmark harvest and supply partnership with East of Scotland Growers (ESG). The collaboration will leverage UPP’s Harvesta, UPPs self-propelled automated selective harvesting system, and creates a proprietary source of feedstock of up to 100,000 tonnes of broccoli biomass annually for UPP’s ingredient production.

Under the initial 5-year agreement, ESG will deploy UPP’s Harvesta across its farms, automating broccoli harvest operations and targeted to save 30% of harvest costs. Harvested material from ESG farms will be supplied to UPP as a proprietary side-stream feedstock, enabling both organisations to unlock a new revenue stream from biomass that would otherwise have gone to waste.

The partnership builds on UPP’s recent £3.5 million funding round, which includes a £1.5 million follow-on investment from Elbow Beach. The investment is now being realised with the acceleration of Harvesta deployment and scaling UPP’s dual revenue partnership model. Together, UPP and ESG are demonstrating how automation, upcycling and grower partnerships can reshape harvest economics, reduce food waste, and deliver planet-positive protein at scale.

“At Elbow Beach, our mission is to back innovative UK technologies that drive efficiency, resilience and sustainability across the real economy,” said Andy Summerfield, Investment Director at Elbow Beach.“UPP’s partnership with East of Scotland Growers exemplifies this -transforming under-utilised agricultural biomass into high-value, nutritious ingredients while generating meaningful incremental income for farmers.  We’re proud to continue supporting UPP as they scale a technology that strengthens both farmer livelihoods and the commercial resilience of our food system.”

Benefits for Farmers

UPP’s Harvesta solution delivers multiple advantages for growers:

·       Reduces reliance on casual harvest labour, a major production constraint

·       Mitigates labour cost inflation to maintain market competitiveness

·       Minimises crop losses and reduces farm waste caused by labour shortages

·       Reduces harvest costs to improve margins on high-value crops

·       Creates an additional revenue stream for farmers, improving farm financial sustainability

“We’re proud to partner with UPP to deliver real economic and environmental value back to growers and to the broader food ecosystem,” said Andy Laing, East of Scotland Growers. “This collaboration not only improves farm profitability but also contributes to a food system that is more sustainable, resilient and impactful.  We are working with supermarket partners to address Scope 3 emission reduction, and working with UPP is supporting us to meet our goals.”

“This partnership exemplifies a shared vision: empowering growers, reducing waste, and creating nutritious, planet-positive food ingredients,”said Mark Evans CEO, UPP. “By combining ESG’s agricultural scale and expertise with UPP’s proprietary processing and ingredient technology, we are turning materials with little commercial value into nutritious proteins and fibre for food producers.”

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