The Country 23/07/25: Marion Cantillon talks to Jamie Mackay

We continue Innovation Week here on The Country with Herd-i. Today, we catch up with the founder of Pit-Seal - an edible biofilm made of seaweed and nutrients used to cover silage pits instead of plastics.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
From Grassroots to Greatness.

Speaker 2 (00:03):
Innovation Week on the Country with herd Eye. The future
is right here, right now, Searge herd I. It is
Innovation Week here on the Country, brought to you by Herdeye,
and this is the interview I'm probably most looking forward
to now. Doctor John Roach, the Prime Minister's new or
relatively new Chief Science Advisor, talked about this particular product

(00:27):
at the PINS Primary Industry New Zealand conference that we
were recently at. It's a product called pit sel. It's
a biofilm made from unique strains of seaweed and nutrients,
which forms an airtight and waterproof layer on top of
silage pits, fully replacing traditional plastic coverings and weights. The

(00:48):
biofilm is later consumed by the ruminant animals as part
of their winter feed, creating a zero waste cycle. The
inventor or the founder of this wonderful product is Mary
and Kentalon and she's joining us all the way from
Ireland and Marian there was a great backstory about how

(01:08):
you came about this product. Good afternoon, New Zealand time.

Speaker 1 (01:12):
Good afternoon everybody in a big hello from Ireland. Yeah,
there was a fantastic backstory about how I came about.
I guess I have to preface this and tell you
I'm not a farmer by trade. I help out on
a lot of farms, but me myself, I don't have
any land or I don't farmland. But what I did
have was during my masters, I was studying nutritional science

(01:34):
and we were passed with pisis or your master's project
as part of the university was to replace plastic covering
on your fresh fruit produce. So you know, anything like
a strawberry, do you have the packs of strawberries at
the film on top of it, or lrasberries or any
fresh fruit berries come with a little plastic filma, And

(01:54):
our task for the masters was to replace that for
retail space, so in super in big supermarkets, like any
big grocer. And I was writing up my THEISS and
COVID hits. I got sent back home and I'm from
a very rural part of Ireland where farming is very common.
So I got put to work doing farm work instead

(02:16):
of doing my thesis work. And one of the jobs
that I got put to and was silent, and it's
quite tedious and time consuming, and I remember covering the
first couple of pits, and I was like, oh my god,
this is this is the way too time consuming, a
way too cumbersome for the amount of work, the amount
of work they were putting out and energy that's going
into it. And I remember going back in to write

(02:38):
off my thesis and I was like, I guess that
was my light bulber. My eureka moment was if I
can do we can talk about writing and having theories
of covering fresh root projects in the retail space, why
can't me bring it to agriculture. And I guess that
was the way.

Speaker 2 (02:52):
It's all kind of stemmed from Mary and Kentslon with
us from Ireland. Tell me about your uncle because he
played a role in this product slipping over on the
top of the slid pit.

Speaker 1 (03:04):
Yeah, so he did. I actually ended up taking a
lot of the farmwork over my uncle's ron dairy farm
in the West Coast of Ireland, and one of them
ended up slipping and falling off the silent pits. So
I ended up taking his position in the farm for
the humans that he was in hospital trying to recrupiate.
He had a broken knee, but he was all good

(03:26):
and well. I took over the reins and I think
after that, I remember considering how dangerous and cumbersome this
is for farmers and how time consuming it is, so
it was a massive safety feature. I know New Zealand
you're a bit different. You have bunkers, but in Ireland
we of pits, so they're on top of the ground,
so trying to fall off one of those is not
a pretty size. So yeah, he did play a massive

(03:46):
role in the development of an actually me kind of
putting my head behind it and then trying to actually
get it to fruition.

Speaker 2 (03:52):
Did you know that the Prime Minister's chief science advisor
was touting your product at a major one of the
major farming conferences on the other side of the world.

Speaker 1 (04:02):
No, I didn't, but I'm quite flattered. I know he
has some Irish connections, so I think maybe that my
Irish chair might have worked a bit of a truth there.
But I'm really pleased that he did, and I'm sure
he's doing fatherless work. He's a great scientist. I know
some of his work, but I'm delighted to even see
that I've really been taught about in that part of
the world.

Speaker 2 (04:20):
So is this product available in New Zealand at the moment.

Speaker 1 (04:24):
No, we're currently in testing phases, so we haven't launched
market yet.

Speaker 2 (04:29):
Now it's one thing replacing plastic salads covers, and we'd
all agree that's a good thing, creating a zero waste cycle.
But cost comes into all this. Have you any idea.
I know that this is early on in the development
of the product, but how's it going to compare cost wise?

Speaker 1 (04:47):
Yeah, of course, like plastic is very, very cheap, I'm
not going to be price competitive with plastic. That was
never ever going to be the goal. I guess our
offering what we're trying to do is we're savoring on
the labor force too, because it's the one man job,
and of course we don't have the waste from us.
I guess our mindset of it. Yes, I'm going to
be expensive. I think I'll know that going to the market,

(05:09):
but I don't see plastic being in the market in
ten years time, so I want to be the leader
in that field and with the replacement of that for Syloge.
So albeit I will be expensive for the first two
three years, maybe for when we launch into the market,
I do see a pathway to reducing that, but it's
more about being the alternative to plastic.

Speaker 2 (05:30):
Look, I think your product has a wonderful potential. Pet
seal is a biofilm. How do you apply it once
you've got all the solo john and squashed it down.

Speaker 1 (05:40):
That's a great question. We actually built the applicator ourselves,
so we've actually a machine that does that for you,
and it comes with it attaches on the back of
a tractor and to a trailer and you just drive
up on top of the pit and roll it out.
It has eight spray nozzles as the breath of the
trailer and it comes with a lance as well to

(06:01):
do any awkward corners or awkward connections to especially around
the ends of the pit. Now apologies, I'm using an
Irish silentce pitter's reference because this is on top of
the ground, if that makes sense.

Speaker 2 (06:15):
It's Mary and we have a few of those in
New Zealand as well, so we get where you're coming from.
And one more final question, he said for the final time.
So it's got unique strands of seaweed and nutrients in
the biofilm. So I presume that in itself helps methane
reduction of course.

Speaker 1 (06:32):
Yeah, So I guess that's one of my big interests,
and that's what my doctorates in doctors is in at
the moment, So I'm focusing mainly on mitigating emissions from
the livestock. What we have at the moment is kind
of like a blank canvas, and we can add in
additives and of course, you know, and I think anyone
in the science fields have knowed, there's a lot of
nice technology and nice science coming out about methane reducers

(06:57):
and specific ingredients, extraine of ingredients. But being able to
adapt that and add that into a base film will
be a game changer when we're going to fortify the film.
If that makes sense. I guess no, that's a kind
of a world wind answer to your question. But of
course we're looking into that, and since my area is
in science, it's really one of my peak interests at

(07:19):
the moment.

Speaker 2 (07:19):
What a brilliant innovation for innovation work here on the country. Doctor.
I was going to call you doctor Mary and Cantalon.
You're about two months away from being a doctor. Look,
I have really enjoyed chatting to you. We're going to
keep in touch. This is a wonderful product.

Speaker 1 (07:33):
Go well, thank you so much.