Technology Adapting to Farmer Needs

This is Tim Hammerich of the Ag Information Network with your Farm of the Future Report.

Farming is not a one-size-fit-all situation, though using data and biology can help tailor products and services to each individual farmer’s needs. Brian Lutz of Corteva Agriscience says agriculture is already doing this with seed selection and genetic data.

Lutz… “For a century now have been selling seed that really, we develop through selection. So we cross a bunch of seed and we make new seedlings and then from those we select the few that do better than the parent generation. With gene editing we can be much more intentional so we can move from selection to design. While we now have the tools to start to design these new products, it really hinges in the information that we have; in other words, what are we trying to design for? And this is why it’s ever more important that we understand how our products are performing under a broad range of conditions because that’s going to inform what we’re designing to. Another example is, we have so much genetic data that what we really need next is the performance data because again when you look at performance data across just our ability to run internal trials or plots, it's just a limited subset of the world. So the more real-world performance data that we get, that helps us then design the next generation of products.”

That’s Corteva Agriscience’s vice president of agricultural solutions, Brian Lutz.