Food & Agribusiness Innovation Lab

People & Workforce

People are at the heart of any great business. With this in mind, the Maryland Innovation Lab identified startups with innovative solutions that can help us better understand our people and use this information to ensure they have the best work experience possible.

Sustainability

Maryland is committed to sustainability throughout our food sector. For this program, we specifically looked at technology to help us lead the way in sustainability standards in agriculture and in the carbon offset market.

• Tracking carbon offset and commercializing carbon credits: The world of carbon commercialization is booming and the Maryland Innovation Lab wants to be a part of it. We are looking for solutions that can help us accurately track carbon across all parts of the agricultural supply chain and can be scaled across many regions with rigorous standardization. We are also looking for solutions that can enable our farmers to take a more active role in the carbon offset market.
• Setting sustainability standards for agriculture: We’re looking for disruptive solutions and technologies that can help provide a standardized and consistent approach to sustainable, social, and agricultural practices that can be communicated and enforced across different regions and organizations in the supply chain.
• Sustainability education: While setting standards and carbon offsetting are our main focus, we are keen to look at all innovative sustainable solutions. More specifically this might be, the cost-effective recycling of plastic, sustainable packaging materials, disruptive solutions that track and validate sustainability claims, or educate consumers on the importance of sustainability, or consumer insights on the adoption of sustainable practices.

Retail and Product Optimization

In order to be at the forefront of developing the next generation of retail, we discovered solutions that can help us optimize and enhance every aspect of the retail experience. We also were interested in technologies to help tell the story of our brands through the retail journey.  I

Optimizing Supply Chain & Distribution Processes

Maryland’s food sector is supported by a large number of complex supply chains. These incorporate everything from processing and manufacturing, distribution and logistics, through to ERP, and everything in between. All parts of this process are critical and we explored new and innovative ways in which we can ensure it is running as efficiently and transparently as possible.

Wildcard

Our wildcard category is an opportunity for innovative start-ups to surprise us. We are always on the lookout for what we might not know we are looking for! Within the Wildcard, we recevied applications of companies with solutions from outside of the four main categories that could help us transform the Maryland food sector.

We are always interested in how Maryland can transform how food is produced, distributed, and consumed in the region. Innovative solutions around sustainable practices, sustainable packaging & bottling, and enhanced strategies to support local agriculture are areas of interest as well as educating consumers on the importance of sustainability.

In the pursuit of sustainable practices, as stated in other categories, Maryland is also interested in solutions to address greenwashing within their operations. They are committed to transparent and authentic environmental efforts and welcome innovative strategies to ensure their commitment to sustainability is genuine and impactful.

Our goal is to create a dynamic and resilient food ecosystem that benefits local communities, supports farmers, and aligns with modern consumer demands for sustainable, nutritious, and ethically sourced food products.