Agritech in New Zealand is thriving. From early-stage startups to export-ready innovators, the sector is proving its ability to solve real-world challenges and drive meaningful economic value.
Take Halter, for example – the smart-farming company behind GPS-enabled cow collars and real-time pasture management tools. In 2024, it was named the fastest-growing company in the country, achieving 1,539% growth. 2025 has seen them soar to even greater heights, raising $165m at a valuation of NZD 1.65 billion. Halter’s trajectory has not only captivated global investors – it’s also helped shine a spotlight on agritech as one of New Zealand’s most exciting innovation sectors.
And it’s not just a one-off. Across the country, agritech businesses are transforming how we grow, harvest, measure, and manage our natural resources – contributing to climate resilience, export growth, and productivity gains. Still, agritech often sits in the background of conversations about New Zealand’s primary industries. When we talk about food and fibre, the focus often falls on the more traditional sectors – dairy, red meat, forestry, and fisheries.
But agritech is the connective tissue. It enables these industries to evolve, compete, and thrive. In many ways, it carries forward our legacy of primary sector innovation – one that’s made New Zealand globally respected for its ingenuity on land and sea.
Today, that reputation can go even further. With the right funding behind them, agritech businesses can accelerate their growth, expand their impact, and lead Aotearoa’s next wave of smart, sustainable innovation.
In this article, we’ll explore two of the most powerful funding tools available to agritech businesses: the Primary Sector Growth Fund and the R&D Tax Incentive – and how they can be used to fuel what comes next.
The Agritech Opportunity
New Zealand’s reputation as a food and fibre-producing nation is well established – but the technology that underpins it is becoming just as important. Agritech businesses are no longer just enabling our traditional sectors – they’re now emerging as a thriving export sector in their own right.
Globally, the push for more sustainable, efficient, and resilient food systems is accelerating. Kiwi agritech companies are meeting the moment – creating tools that boost productivity, reduce environmental impact, and solve challenges faced by producers worldwide.
According to AgriTech NZ, agritech businesses in New Zealand are generating $2.5billion a year in export value. The government has set an ambitious goal: grow that to NZD 8 billion by 2030. What we’re seeing now are the green shoots of a high-potential sector – but meeting this potential will require sustained investment and support.
That’s where smart funding comes in – and where many agritech businesses are still missing out.
The Funding Is There – But Many Are Missing Out
The good news? Agritech is a sector where meaningful government funding is available. Right now, there are two standout opportunities: the Primary Sector Growth Fund and the R&D Tax Incentive.
They’re very different in how they work. The Primary Sector Growth Fund supports forward-looking projects – offering co-investment to help businesses test, develop, and scale new ideas. The R&D Tax Incentive, on the other hand, rewards innovation that’s already happening – offering a financial return for eligible research and development work. Together, they give agritech businesses a unique chance to access capital, reduce risk, and go further, faster.
And yet, from Swell’s experience working closely with agritech companies across the country, these opportunities are still being significantly underutilised.
Often, it’s simply a case of not knowing the support exists. Other times, businesses assume they won’t qualify – or they’ve had a tough experience applying for funding in the past and decided not to try again.
But here’s the thing: this funding can be a game-changer. It can help you move faster, invest in growth earlier, and create the headroom you need to stay ahead. In a fast-moving sector like agritech, that kind of boost can be the difference between surviving vs. thriving.
In the next sections, we’ll break down how both the Primary Sector Growth Fund and the R&D Tax Incentive work – and how agritech businesses can make the most of them.
The Primary Sector Growth Fund (PSGF)
The Primary Sector Growth Fund (PSGF) was launched by MPI in 2025, replacing the previous Sustainable Food & Fibre Futures (SFFF) programme. While SFFF focused more broadly on innovation and sustainability, the PSGF introduces a sharper commercial lens – targeting projects that deliver measurable value to New Zealand’s primary industries and the wider economy.
It represents a significant opportunity for ambitious agritech businesses. With a focus on impact, scale, and sector-wide benefit, the PSGF is designed to turn high-potential ideas into reality.
What the PSGF Will Fund
The PSGF supports projects that contribute to five core outcomes:
- Boosting productivity and efficiency – Initiatives that help producers lower costs, improve yields, or use resources more effectively across the food and fibre value chain.
- Driving export growth – Projects that open up new international markets or significantly grow New Zealand’s export potential.
- Creating higher-value products – Moving beyond commodities by developing new ways to process, refine, or transform raw materials into premium offerings.
- Scaling proven innovation – Helping validated technologies or approaches reach wider adoption across the industry.
- Delivering sector-wide benefits – Ensuring outcomes don’t just benefit one business, but create uplift across the value chain.
Many of these goals are perfectly aligned with the kinds of innovation agritech companies are already working on. Whether it’s a digital platform improving on-farm decision-making, an autonomous tool increasing labour efficiency, or a biotech solution reducing emissions – PSGF is built to support these ideas at the point they need it most.
How the PSGF Works
- Co-investment model – MPI typically funds up to 40% of total project costs; the applicant funds the rest
- Minimum project size – NZD 625,000 total, with a minimum MPI contribution of NZD 250,000. For example, on a $5 million project, MPI will contribute $2 million, with the business bringing the remaining $3 million.
- Funding scope – Focuses on operating costs (Opex); generally excludes capital purchases, branding, and IP registration
- Commercial orientation – Projects must be beyond the exploratory stage, with a clear plan for delivery and adoption
- Accountability & structure – Milestone-based funding, regular reporting, and oversight are all part of the deal
If you’ve got a project in the works that could deliver meaningful value to New Zealand’s primary sector – and, in turn, the country as a whole – the PSGF might be the impetus you need to move from idea to implementation. It’s a chance to take something ambitious and make it real.
The R&D Tax Incentive (RDTI)
Unlike the Primary Sector Growth Fund – which is competitive and selective – the R&D Tax Incentive (RDTI) is an entitlement. If your business meets the criteria, you qualify.
The RDTI provides a 15% tax credit (often paid in cash) on eligible R&D expenditure. For many agritech companies, that could mean tens to hundreds of thousands of dollars flowing back into the business each year. That cash can be reinvested into innovation – hiring developers or engineers, accelerating product development, funding on‑farm trials, or scaling operations faster.
Eligibility: What You Need to Meet
To qualify, your R&D activities must satisfy three core eligibility principles:
- The Objective: You’re aiming to create a new or improved product, process,service, or knowledge.
- The Uncertainty: The work must tackle a scientific or technological uncertainty – meaning even a competent professional in the field couldn’t resolve it using standard methods or existing public knowledge.
- The Approach: You must use a systematic, structured method to investigate and test solutions. This means planning, experimenting, analysing, iterating, and documenting your process.
For example, an agritech company improving soil‑sensor algorithms to better predict moisture dynamics might qualify: the algorithm adjustments tackle uncertainty, it moves beyond off-the-shelf approaches, and the work is tracked methodically.
In addition to these, you must be a business entity eligible to claim, and the R&D work must occur (or be principally managed) in New Zealand.
RDTI Underutilisation & Why Agritech Is No Exception
When compared to other similar schemes in OECD nations that have existed for decades, the RDTI in New Zealand – introduced in 2019 – is relatively young. This means that awareness and uptake is still low.
We estimate that only around 20% of eligible New Zealand businesses are claiming. Agritech may do slightly better, but the majority are still not leveraging this resource. The common barriers we see include lack of awareness, uncertainty about eligibility, and limited internal bandwidth to prepare claims.
Key Considerations for Agritech Claims
When preparing an RDTI claim in agritech or tech‑adjacent fields, these three considerations are especially important:
- Focus on the scientific or technological challenge
Don’t just describe the end product. Clearly articulate which technical problem is being solved, why it’s uncertain, and why it’s non-trivial. The IRD wants to see the depth of the challenge, not just the outcome. For example, if you're improving soil‑sensor algorithms to better predict moisture dynamics – as mentioned earlier – your uncertainty might relate to integrating different environmental variables into one predictive model, or resolving interference from highly variable terrain. These are the kinds of scientific or technological unknowns that make R&D eligible.
- Separate routine development from genuine R&D
Not all improvements qualify. Work that’s simply repetitive, maintenance, or incremental tweaks may not meet the threshold. You’ll need to draw a clear line between “normal business improvements” and experimental R&D activity.
- Claiming contractor & overseas developer costs
You can include amounts paid to contractors, but with limitations (e.g. foreign contractor costs are capped to 10% of total eligible R&D if they support a core NZ-based activity). Also, you need to carefully separate any ineligible contractor costs (e.g. capital purchases) from the claimable work.
For Early-Stage & Loss-Making Businesses: The R&D Tax Loss Credit
If your business is pre-revenue or loss-making, there’s another powerful option: the R&D Tax Loss Credit.
This allows eligible businesses to cash out their tax losses from R&D activity – effectively unlocking 28% of eligible R&D costs, even if you’re not paying income tax yet. It turns what would otherwise be carried-forward losses on a balance sheet into immediate, usable capital.
For early-stage agritech companies working through product development, trials, or technical validation, this can provide vital breathing room – enabling you to keep innovating, retain talent, and extend your runway.
There are limits on how much you can claim based on your total R&D spend and labour cost structure, but for businesses building genuinely novel solutions, it can be a valuable tool to bridge the funding gap in those critical early years.
Swell Helps You Access Funding – So You Can Go Further, Faster
Between the Primary Sector Growth Fund and the R&D Tax Incentive, agritech businesses have access to meaningful government support. But the challenge isn’t just knowing these opportunities exist – it’s knowing how to access them, how to frame your project, and how to navigate the process with confidence. That’s exactly where Swell comes in.
At Swell, we specialise in helping innovative businesses unlock the funding they need to grow. We're not just experts in grant funding and R&D tax incentives – we bring deep, practical knowledge of agritech and the primary industries that power Aotearoa’s economy.
We understand the realities agritech businesses face – balancing product development, on-farm testing, compliance, and commercial growth. That’s why we work alongside you to make the funding process clearer, faster, and more achievable.
We help you identify the right funding opportunities, frame your project to align with funding objectives, and take the complexity of applications off your plate – so you can stay focused on building solutions that continue New Zealand’s legacy of agri-innovation.
If you’ve got a project in motion – or even just want to talk through your eligibility – we’d love to hear from you. Get in touch with one of our funding specialists.