Variable Rate done RIGHT with SWAT MAPS: https://swatmaps.com/
ProducePay: https://producepay.com/
Today's episode features ProducePay founder Pablo Borquez Schwarzbeck. Born and raised in a 4th generation farming family from Mexico, Pablo brings over 20 years of experience in the fresh produce industry. After growing up on the family farm – Campos Borquez, a premier supplier of fresh asparagus and grapes to the United States and Canada – Pablo went on to work for The Giumarra Companies, managing grower relations in Argentina, Chile, Uruguay, and the United States. Pablo returned to the family farm as Chief Financial Officer, then went on to complete his MBA at Cornell University, where the idea of ProducePay was started, founded and launched.
Last year the company announced that longtime board member and advisor Patrick McCullough would take over as CEO, and Pablo moved at that time into the role of Executive Director of the board. But as you’ll hear in this interview he is just as energized as ever about their mission and their future.
We talk about the challenges of the produce trade and why there is so much waste and so many intermediaries involved, why he thinks there in a position to create a better model, what role financial technology has in their ability to pull it off, how interest rates and investor sentiment impact companies like ProducePay, and how his transition has been from founder to CEO to board director.
There’s a lot to this story but a good place to start is acknowledging that we all want quality produce to be at the store every time we show up, whether its in season locally or not. For that to happen, there’s a lot of people involved around the world, and a lot of waste along the way. ProducePay may have started as a way to better capitalize farmers, but now they have their focus on how they can help those farmers manage price risk.
And the guy who started it all is today’s guest, Pablo Borquez.
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FoA 321: Vertical Farming in a Skyscraper with Dan Houston of AgriPlay
FoA 320: Farmland Investment and Management with Skye Root of Root Agricultural Advisory
FoA 319: Cell-Based Milk with Fengru Lin of TurtleTree
FoA 318: The Budding American (Hard) Cider Industry with Greg Peck, Ph.D.
FoA 317: Modern Dairy Management with Greg Bethard of High Plains Ponderosa Dairy
FoA 316: Poultry Tech with Alan Beynon of Poultry Sense and Arjun Ganesan of Ancera
FoA 315: Building Local and Regional Food Systems with Philip Giampietro of Walden Local Meat Co
FoA 314: The Value of Farm Data with Jason Tatge of AGI Digital (Farmobile)
FoA 313: Farming Seaweed to Reduce Cattle Emissions with Joan Salwen of Blue Ocean Barns
FoA 312: Digital Supply Chains with Scott Sexton of EverAg and Dairy.com
FoA 311: The Role of Earthworms in Agricultural Soils with Jan Willem van Groenigen
FoA 310: Investment Models with Hannah Senior of Innovating Agtech
FoA 309: Farm Business Analytics with Patrick Smith and Dan Maycock of Loftus Labs
FoA 308: The World's First Floating Farm with Peter and Vincent van Wingerden
FoA 307: Vertical Farming Beyond the Hype with John Purcell of Unfold
FoA 306: Reintegrating Livestock and Row Crops with Zack Smith of StockCropper
FoA 305: Strategic Investing in the Future of Animal Agtech with Stephen Murray of Merck Animal Health Ventures
FoA 304: Digital Playbooks for Specialty Crops with Ros Harvey of The Yield
FoA 303: Implementing a Farm Operating System with Kristjan Hebert
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