Why Gather all of this Farm Data?

Why Gather all of this Farm Data?

Tim Hammerich
Tim Hammerich
News Reporter
It’s time for your Farm of the Future Report. I’m Tim Hammerich.

For years, farmers have been encouraged to collect as much data as possible because it is valuable. But are we really seeing the value from all of this farm data? Consultant Allan Fetters says we are still in the very early days of leveraging farm data to make farmers more profitable.

Fetters… “We are in the hunter-gatherer timeframe. We're putting sensors out there, we're gathering data, but most of this data is still very siloed on different platforms. So the actual use of that data in many cases is not being utilized.”

Fetters says part of the challenge is enough data must be collected to start to see the patterns that exist among various layers.

Fetters… “Synergies really become very, very important, you know, when you're able to combine and look at the correlations between different data layers and how is that going to be able to, to help tease out some insights that I can then turn into something actionable.”

Progress has been made, but Fetters says we are still a long ways from those actionable or even predictive insights that will benefit farmers.

Fetters… “We're understanding what might be happening on certain elements, but not a broad cross section of what might be happening on a day-to-day basis where I can truly make some preemptive moves from the insights that I've garnered from this data.”

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