Cirencester's Farm491 is launching a competition to encourage and support companies fostering innovation in the natural world.

Farm491 is the Royal Agricultural University's (RAU) innovation hub, focused on the future of farming and food systems.

Supported by Esmée Fairbairn Foundation, the three-year series of the Farm491 Challenge Prize will enable companies, which are developing innovative ways to solve challenges in the natural world, to invest in their business and develop their product.

Organiser Verity Payne, operations and events manager at Farm491, said: "The aim of this exciting new series is to inspire innovators to develop ground-breaking solutions to pressing global challenges that we all face today.

"Entrepreneurs will have the opportunity to pitch their businesses as possible solutions to each year's challenge, with the winner receiving £50k and the runner-up £25k, to advance their business."

This is the first year of the Farm491 Challenge Prize series and the 2024 challenge is Mixed Land Use. Entries for this year's competition are open now and will close on September 27.

Verity continued: "Land is under unprecedented pressure in the UK and globally, to make space for carbon sequestration, biodiversity, food and energy production, and housing. One of the possible solutions is to stack land uses, finding synergies that mitigate this resource competition.

"We are looking for companies that are developing innovative products and services to support nature friendly, multifunctional land use. These could include enabling agroforestry, regenerative and productive housing development, intercropping food and non-food crops, or co-producing food and renewables.''

Will Steadman, funding manager at Esmée Fairbairn Foundation, said: "Farm491 has supported more than 200 food and farming start-ups and SMEs over the last six years with its flexible incubation model.

"The Farm491 Challenge Prize has the potential to really amplify impact, and we're thrilled to be working with Farm491 on it. It pushes the boundaries of what's possible with grant funding and focuses our support on where it can be catalytic."

Companies which have been shortlisted will be notified by October 9. An online pitching workshop for shortlisted companies will take place in November.

The event will culminate in a pitching day at Farm491 HQ on December 5, where the winner and runner-up of the 2024 Farm491 Challenge Prize will be selected by a panel of academics and industry experts.

Professor Peter McCaffery, vice-chancellor of the RAU, said: "The RAU has been a university of purpose ever since its inception - as the Royal Agricultural College in 1845 - working with farmers, entrepreneurs and innovators to make a practical difference on the ground.

"Cultivating care for the land is at the very heart of what we do, and we are delighted to be teaming up with Esmée Fairbairn Foundation, which has an exceptional record of supporting changemakers, in establishing this new challenge prize."