This quarter of the Future of Agriculture podcast is made possible by Case IH: https://www.caseih.com/en-us/unitedstates

Janette Barnard's Prime Future Newsletter: https://primefuture.substack.com/

Future of Agriculture YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@FutureOfAg

Dr. G. Kee Jim is the founding partner of Feedlot Health Management Services Ltd. (FHMS). Dr. Jim’s cattle feeding companies (G.K. Jim Farms, Cattlinc Inc, Silverado Cattle Inc, Taweel Cattle Company Ltd, Korova Feeders Ltd, Diamond Feeders, Quality Beef Producers LP, CanTex Feeders LP, Tierra Blanca Cattle Feeders LP, and Ordway Cattle Feeders LP) are major players in the Canadian and United States cattle industries through ownership of cows, backgrounding cattle, grass cattle, feedlot cattle, and feedlots. In addition, Kee has served on the board of directors of several beef industry groups and as an Adjunct Professor in the Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences and VERO at Texas A&M University.

Brought to you by Case IH:

Case IH designs,engineers and produces cutting-edge farm equipment based on a comprehensive understanding of farmers’ needs, wants and challenges, integrating these insights into their development and manufacturing.

For example, take their Model Year 25 Magnum tractor. The new Magnum is purposefully designed to answer farmers’ needs in every design and engineering choice. Improved horsepower for pulling heavier loads, faster.

Bundled, integrated and ready-to-go precision tech for greater accuracy in the field. And a transmission farmers can tweak for improved control and performance in different tasks.

That kind of design thinking is exactly where the future of ag is headed, and that’s why you’ll be hearing me talk to the folks at Case IH at different points throughout this quarter about what they do and how they’re working to push the ag forward.

This quarter of the Future of Agriculture podcast is made possible by Case IH: https://www.caseih.com/en-us/unitedstates

So much of what we talk about on this show comes together in the cab of a tractor to leverage technology and make the best possible decisions for the farm. And I really haven’t spent enough time exploring the innovations surrounding the tractor itself. We take it for granted a little bit, but it really is the hub of a modern farming operation. The Magnum Tractor has been a flagship of the Case IH brand since it debuted in 1987, and Joe does a great job of talking about the work that goes into making this essential piece of equipment the best it can be. 

Some background on Joe Miller:

He grew up on a farm in Rochester, Indiana and has always enjoyed working with equipment from a young age. This led to his current career with CNH which has included  business management, new equipment sales, and parts and service sales. Joe has an MBA from the Indiana Kelley School of Business and a masters in ag economics from Purdue. 

Brought to you by Case IH:

Case IH designs,engineers and produces cutting-edge farm equipment based on a comprehensive understanding of farmers’ needs, wants and challenges, integrating these insights into their development and manufacturing.

For example, take their Model Year 25 Magnum tractor. The new Magnum is purposefully designed to answer farmers’ needs in every design and engineering choice. Improved horsepower for pulling heavier loads, faster.

Bundled, integrated and ready-to-go precision tech for greater accuracy in the field. And a transmission farmers can tweak for improved control and performance in different tasks.

That kind of design thinking is exactly where the future of ag is headed, and that’s why you’ll be hearing me talk to the folks at Case IH at different points throughout this quarter about what they do and how they’re working to push the ag forward.

Sponsored by Case IH: https://www.caseih.com/

The VINE: https://thevine.io/

Farmhand Ventures: https://www.farmhandventures.com/

The Reservoir: https://www.reservoir.co/

F3 Innovate: https://www.f3innovate.org/

Today you’ll hear from three people: Hannah Johnson, Connie Bowen, and Danny Bernstein. Hannah is the Industry Lead for The VINE at  UC Ag and Natural Resources. Connie is the founding general partner at Farmhand Ventures who works with The VINE. Danny is CEO and managing partner at Reservoir, which includes Reservoir Ventures, and nonprofit incubators, Reservoir Farms & Labs, which is what he’ll be talking about today. 

I attended FIRA-USA this past October to try to better understand what’s happening in ag robotics and automation. What I didn’t expect was to see some really fascinating public-private partnership efforts that I think fill some real needs in agriculture innovation. But as luck would have it, that’s what happened, and so I wanted to put together this episode to highlight it. I think this type of work is critical. Running a farm, doing industry-leading research, growing a startup, all of these things are all-consuming tasks. It really is important to build the connective tissue to empower and fully enable new and lasting innovations in agtech. 

Brought to you by Case IH:

Case IH designs,engineers and produces cutting-edge farm equipment based on a comprehensive understanding of farmers’ needs, wants and challenges, integrating these insights into their development and manufacturing.

For example, take their Model Year 25 Magnum tractor. The new Magnum is purposefully designed to answer farmers’ needs in every design and engineering choice. Improved horsepower for pulling heavier loads, faster.

Bundled, integrated and ready-to-go precision tech for greater accuracy in the field. And a transmission farmers can tweak for improved control and performance in different tasks.

That kind of design thinking is exactly where the future of ag is headed, and that’s why you’ll be hearing me talk to the folks at Case IH at different points throughout this quarter about what they do and how they’re working to push the ag forward.

Featured Podcast Episodes:

1. David Friedberg on Joining Ohalo Genetics as CEO, Gene Editing Technology, and AgTech Trends by The Modern Acre
2. How Syngenta is Thinking About AI with Feroz Sheikh by Agtech - So What?
3. The Agriculture Economy: How Bad Is It and Where Is It Going? by The Business of Agriculture
4. Coaching Farmers for Profit: Athletes Have Coaches Why Shouldn't You? by Farm4Profit
5. Navigating the De-Commoditization of Ag with Daniel Oh of AgCertain by The Pacesetter Pod
6. A New Direction in Florida Citrus with Benny McLean by Regenerative Agriculture Podcast
7. Emerging Trends in Sustainable Packaging with Max Teplitski and Andrew Stephens by Fresh Takes on Tech

Links to other resources mentioned:

• FoA 395: Where is Agriculture Headed? Insights From Six Different Ag Podcasts
• 'Biological' Is Not A Category (it's the future of agriculture)
• The Changing Farm Economy with David Widmar of Agricultural Economic Insights
• Ask The Ag Economist With Trey Malone, Ph.D.
• Farm Business Strategy with Kristjan Hebert
• Implementing a Farm Operating System with Kristjan Hebert
• The Farm Entrepreneur Mindset with Evan Shout of Maverick Ag
• Understanding Status Quo Risk in Ag with Jim Schweigert of Gro Alliance
• Challenging Assumptions About Regenerative Agriculture With John Kempf
• Why Syngenta Is Investing In Soil Health With Matt Wallenstein

Conservation Technology Information Center: https://www.ctic.org/

Regrow Ag: https://www.regrow.ag/

The Nature Conservancy: https://www.nature.org/en-us/

FoA 248: Regrow Merges Agronomic Insights with Sustainability Metrics

Today’s episode is made possible thanks to the support of the Conservation Technology Information Center (CTIC). Formed in 1982 to support the widespread use of economically and environmentally beneficial agricultural systems, CTIC’s mission is to champion, promote and provide information on climate-smart technologies and sustainable agricultural systems that conserve and enhance soil, water, air and wildlife resources and are productive and profitable.

Members of this non-profit organization include farmers, policy makers, regulators, academic researchers, agribusiness leaders, conservation group personnel, farm media, and others. It is supported by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service, and other public entities. 

Thank you very much to the Conservation Technology Information Center for supporting agricultural innovation and the Future of Agriculture podcast. 

All right, now let’s dive into today’s episode. I’m excited for this, because while the content of today’s show are right in our wheelhouse at the data-driven intersection of technology and sustainability, I don’t think I’ve ever had an episode quite like this. We’re not featuring an individual or company, but a collaboration. A group of people who saw a problem in the lack of important information, and came together to make that happen. 

To tell this story, I’m very pleased to have on the show three guests: Bill Salas who is the chief strategy officer at Regrow, Dave Gustafson, project director at the Conservation Technology Information Center, and Kris Johnson, director of agriculture at The Nature Conservancy. 

Some brief context here: 

CTIC, Regrow, and The Nature Conservancy are all partners is bringing together the Observational Tillage Information System, or OpTIS. This is an automated system to map tillage, residue cover, winter cover, and soil health practices using remote sensing data. 

And before anyone Tweets me concerned about using remote sensing to track on-farm practices, you should know: while OpTIS calculations are performed at the farm-field scale using publicly available data, the privacy of individual producers is fully protected by reporting only spatially-aggregated results at regional and watershed scales.

This collaboration has been happening for over 14 years, long before just about anyone was talking about carbon sequestration or climate smart agriculture, so in a lot of ways, this effort was ahead of its time. And it’s a good thing it was, because these data are needed now more than ever. So, I highly recommend you stick around through all of today’s episode, as we talk about the past, present and future of OpTIS, highlight some of the use cases it enables, and talk about the importance of efforts like this for the future of agriculture. 

And this isn’t just answering the simple question of are farmers doing x practice at not. This data can inform much more nuanced questions, like: 

• Why do farmers employ conservation practice in certain areas vs others?  
• Does this correlate with investments made in those areas? 
• What is the relationship between crop insurance and conservation practices? 
• What is the impact of cover crops and conservation tillage on nutrient runoff or prevent plant acres? 
• How does historic tillage influence current land values? 

The questions are endless and the more robust and reliable the data gets, the more accurately we can answer them. So I think this stuff is really cool, and extremely important. 

Bloomfield Robotics: https://bloomfield.ai/

Kubota North America Corporation Acquires US-based AgTech Startup

FOA 228: Solving the Rural Connectivity Problem with Dr. Sara Spangelo of Swarm

Quick note: I am still looking for a couple of brands to partner with in 2025. If your company might be interested in positioning yourself as an innovator in the ag industry, I would love to talk with you about my quarterly presenting sponsorship package. This is an exclusive, I only work with a maximum of four companies per year, and I’m hoping to have all of them locked in by the end of the first quarter of 2025. So if your company is doing innovative work and you’d like to share that with thousands of leaders in the ag industry, please reach out to me at [email protected] or via LinkedIn or Twitter. I’m happy to share details. 

Ok, now back to today’s conversation with Mark DeSantis. As I mentioned, Mark was first on the show about four years ago on episode 228 in October of 2020. Since that time, Mark and team grew Bloomfield AI, a company that helps specialty crop growers improve the health and performance of their crop on a per-plant basis using computer vision and artificial intelligence. Then this past September, it was announced that Kubota had acquired the company. 

I wanted to invite Mark back on the show to talk about the experience and his views on where autonomy, robotics and digital ag go from here.   

Mark led Bloomfield through the acquisition and is now a consultant to Kubota. Prior to joining Bloomfield in 2019, he was previously cofounder and CEO of RoadBotics (acquired by Michelin), a company that assessed roadway infrastructure using AI. So he’s been in this space of robotics for real world applications for a long time. He is also an adjunct professor of entrepreneurship at Carnegie Mellon University.

Frostbite: How Refrigeration Changed Our Food, Our Planet, and Ourselves by Nicola Twilley

Prime Future Newsletter by Janette Barnard

The Great Beef Bonanza and the Fall of the Cattle Kingdom

"Our ancestors learned to control fire before modern humans even evolved. But our ability to command cold at will dates back a little more than 150 years. Mechanical cooling refrigeration produced by human artifice as opposed to the natural chill offered by weather dependent snow and ice wasn't achieved until the mid 1700s and wasn't commercialized until the late 1800s, and it wasn't domesticated until the 1920s."

That is a quote from the book that we're gonna be talking about here today, Frostbite: How Refrigeration Changed Our Food, Our Planet, and Ourselves by Nicola Twilley. I'm very excited to dive into this book. There's so much here on the history of refrigeration and we take for granted how much refrigeration has changed our food system and our world in a number of profound ways.

But I'm also excited to not be tackling this massive project by myself. Coming back for another episode is my good friend, animal agtech venture capitalist, and creator of the Prime Future newsletter, Janette Barnard.

Also from Twilley's book: "It's impossible to make sense of our global food system until you understand the mysterious logic of the all-but-invisible network of thermal control that underpins it. We overcame not just rot, but seasonality and geography as well."

Listen as Janette and Tim unpack their takeaways from this incredible book about the history of refrigeration.

Tenacious Ventures: https://tenacious.ventures/

Farmhand Ventures: https://www.farmhandventures.com/

“Navigating a future of cross sectional forces” (AgriFutures Australia Report): https://agrifutures.com.au/product/navigating-a-future-of-cross-sectoral-forces/

Ag’s Scifi (and Non-Fiction) Future: Horizon Scanning… so what? with Shane Thomas: https://tenacious.ventures/insights/ags-scifi-and-non-fiction-future-horizon-scanning-so-what-with-shane-thomas

Citrus Moves North with Farmer and Orangepreneur Lindy Savelle: https://tenacious.ventures/insights/citrus-moves-north-with-farmer-and-orangepreneur-lindy-savelle

FoA 348: Investing in the Future of Fertilizer with Sarah Nolet of Tenacious Ventures: https://futureofagriculture.com/episode/foa-348-investing-in-the-future-of-fertilizer-with-sarah-nolet-of-tenacious-ventures-agtech-so-what-crossover

FoA 112: Accelerating AgTech with Sarah Nolet of AgThentic: https://futureofagriculture.com/episode/future-of-agriculture-112-accelerating-agtech-with-sarah-nolet-of-agthentic

FoA 127: Expanding the Global AgTech Ecosystem with Connie Bowen of The Yield Lab: https://futureofagriculture.com/episode/future-of-agriculture-127-expanding-the-global-agtech-ecosystem-with-connie-bowen-of-the-yield-lab

FOA 220: Agricultural Solutions for Hunger and Poverty with Paul Winters of IFAD: https://futureofagriculture.com/episode/foa-220-agricultural-solutions-for-hunger-and-poverty-with-paul-winters-of-ifad

FoA 260: The Lentil Underground with Dave Oien of Timeless Seeds: https://futureofagriculture.com/episode/foa-260-the-lentil-underground-with-dave-oien-of-timeless-seeds

There are few topics that seem to get people more riled up than climate change. Most of the episodes I’ve done that focus on climate as a theme receive comments from people that seem to think I’m being an alarmist and others thinking that I am drastically underestimating its impacts. I could take this as a sign to avoid the topic altogether, but that’s not really how I roll. I instead take it as a sign that we need to ask more questions and gather more data and context to understand what has everyone so fired up. 

And the concept for this episode came to my mind while I was listening to the Agtech, So what? podcast with Sarah Nolet. Specifically, their August episodes which are titled: “Citrus Moves North with Farmer and Orangepreneur Lindy Savelle” and “Ag’s Scifi (and Non-Fiction) Future: Horizon Scanning… so what?” with Shane Thomas. I’ll leave links to both episodes in the show notes. 

But both describe this concept of a climate refugee, which put simply is people leaving their home for reasons that could be the result of changes in climate. So citrus producers leaving the state of Florida as one potential example. 

In that second episode about Ag’s Scifi Future, Sarah and guests are breaking down a report commissioned by AgriFutures Australia called “Navigating a future of cross-sectoral forces” that you can download for free via a link I’ll leave in the show notes. One of the 10 forces outlined in that report is the emergence of climate refugees, which created an interesting discussion on that episode. 

I’ve heard talk about climate refugees before, in fact it’s been mentioned a couple times on this podcast. Episodes 220 and 260 come to mind. But I always thought of it as something that could happen in a worst case scenario in the future, not as something that is happening today. I also found myself wondering if we are attributing to climate change what would be explained by other forces, like regulations and economics. We have a lot of dairies that moved out of California for those reasons, but we don’t call them regulatory refugees. So is this term intentionally dramatic to fit a climate agenda? 

I consider Sarah a friend and someone who is very well researched and intellectually honest, so I wanted to invite her back on the show to address some of these questions with her. And in the meantime, I was interviewing Connie Bowen of Farmhand Ventures for an episode about labor and she made the interesting connection between labor challenges and climate change, which I thought fit well in this episode, so you’re getting a bit of a two-for-one episode today with two extremely sharp ag investors. 

Niqo Robotics: https://niqorobotics.com/

Five Questions About The Ag Robotics Revolution (FIRA USA Takeaways)

Today’s episode was recorded live at FIRA USA in Woodland, California. If you’re not familiar with FIRA it is the premier event for agricultural robotics and autonomous solutions in action. If you’d like more of my reflections and takeaways from the event go back and listen to episode 439.

But I wanted to feature this interview with Jaisimha Rao as a standalone episode for a few reasons: first, I think his story is interesting as a finance guy turned farmer turned agtech founder. He also uncovers some very real insights about agtech that he’s learned over the past 10 years or so in this industry. And they are a great example of an ag robotics company that is making real impact on farms, not just doing demos and talking about what the future might hold. Because what I’ve been most excited about lately is the commercialization of ag robotics and automation. 

Walking around FIRA last month, my first reaction was, this all looks really familiar. Most of the technology has either been around a while or it looks a lot like machines that have. So at first glance you might wonder, are we just stagnating? But then you talk to these companies about what they’re doing with the technology. How many farms their working with and how many hours they have under their belt. In Niqo's case it’s over 50 autonomous sprayers running in India that have operated on over 120,000 acres and worked with over 2000 farmers. That is what has me so excited about what’s happening; what’s new - or relatively new, and what’s changing. 

NIQO is now not only expanding in India, but also bringing their technology to the North American specialty crop market with their Niqo Robo Thinner which they had on display at FIRA. 

Geco Strategic Weed Management: https://geco-ag.com/

Today’s episode features a new tool in the toolbox for farmers fighting weed pressure. As I’ve had conversations with farmers throughout the country, there is no doubt that the costs of weed control is a major pain point. This takes a lot of different forms, from the hand labor crews in California’s vegetable crops, to herbicide-resistant kochia in the middle of US and Canada to just the sheer cost of chemistry that’s impacting the bottom line of farmers everywhere, it’s certainly an area ripe for solutions. 

For the past few years, Dr. Greg Stewart has been working on a very interesting solution to use data to predict weed pressure. This is interesting because it’s addressing a major problem in weed control, but it’s also interesting because it embodies what where we all hope this “ag data revolution” is going: towards predicting problems before we experience them. This opens the door up for more proactive weed management solutions, in some cases before the crop is even planted. 

Greg is a listener to the show and he’s heard my requests over the years to not just feature founders of new technology, but also the farmers that are trying the solutions, so he offered to connect me to Rob Stone. Rob was nice enough to join me for a short interview while in the cab of a tractor, so you’ll get his perspective as well. Rob is a customer of Geco and not compensated by them in any way. He was invited on to openly share his experiences. 

Let’s dive into things here starting with an introduction to Greg. I’ll introduce rob when we cut to him mid-episode. 

Dr. Greg Stewart is the founder and CEO of Geco Strategic Weed Management, who use AI and agronomic modeling for targeted and predictive control of weeds in farm fields. It requires no new equipment or new practices, and the turnaround time for a new farm can happen within a day. Geco is now serving over 60 farms across Western Canada.

Greg’s PhD is in the control of spatially distributed systems. He has worked with a range of industries. His data products reside on farm fields in Canada, US, and South America, in over 12 commercial greenhouses, 350 paper machines, 35,000 production diesel vehicles, and are creating more than $40M/year in value in manufacturing. He holds over 50 patents and 60 technical publications, and is a certified judge for competitive barbecue.

FIRA USA: https://fira-usa.com/

SwarmFarm Robotics: https://www.swarmfarm.com/

Robotics Plus: https://www.roboticsplus.co.nz/

Bluewhite: https://www.bluewhite.ai/

Agtonomy: https://www.agtonomy.com/

Western Growers' Financial Case Studies: https://www.wga.com/innovation/case-studies/

A couple weeks ago I had the chance to attend FIRA USA, which is the gathering for ag robotics and autonomous equipment in agriculture. And autonomy has been on my mind a lot lately. You’ve seen an uptick in autonomy related episodes this past year or so, featuring companies like Verdant Robotics, Carbon Robotics and Sabanto all on different episodes. The reason for this is I’m definitely getting the sense that many of these solutions are starting to reach a tipping point from “wouldn’t it be cool if” to “this is actually being purchased and used on farms”. 

And that’s exciting. So while I was at the event I recorded about a dozen conversations and asked some of the questions I have about what I’m choosing to call the “ag robotics revolution”. What you’ll hear today are clips from four founders who were at FIRA USA to feature their technology. 

Andrew Bate of SwarmFarm Robotics

Steve Saunders of Robotics Plus

Ben Alfi of BlueWhite Robotics

Tim Bucher of AgTonomy

I should mention that Tim’s interview didn’t actually happened at FIRA, it happened earlier this year for a series of radio reports, but it really fit the episode and he was at the event I just missed him, so I wanted to include him. That said, I chose these four to feature on this episode for a number of reasons: 

• They all have some sort of focus on fully automating the power unit of the farm - aka the tractor - although this isn’t their exclusive focus as you’ll hear - but they all are taking different approaches
• They are all originally from different countries, which I think really shows the global effort of this industry and the different perspectives that come with that. Andrew at SwarmFarm from Australia, Steve at Robotics Plus from New Zealand, Ben at BlueWhite from Israel, and Tim at Agtonomy from California. 
• They represent the type of people leading this effort in that these are not young (no offense guys) silicon valley types. These are accomplished entrepreneurs and businessmen in their own right who don’t seem to be doing it because they need the money or they want to become billionaires. They really seem to just have a passion for the technology and the change it can bring to the future of agriculture. This to me is at the core of what made the people I interviewed at this event different from other agtech events I’ve been to. That, and the field demonstrations equipped with everything from fake orchards and vineyards to vegetable beds to a field crops area just big enough to showcase John Deere’s see&spray ultimate and its 120 ft carbon fiber boom was what separates this events from other agtech events.  

I’ll tell you more about each of the guests as we go and share some of my thoughts about robotics and the event, but overall through these four interviews, we had the chance to cover seven of the big questions I have about farm robotics, and i’ll outline those questions here: 

1. Has the ag robotics revolution *really* arrived? 
2. What’s driving the push toward these solutions? 
3. Does this technology really solve much-talked-about “ag labor problem”? 
4. Will farmers actually adopt this? 
5. What’s next for ag robotics? 

Previous episodes featuring robotics and automation:

Tractor Driver is Now a Remote Opportunity With Craig Rupp of Sabanto

Laser Weeding And Growing A Robotics Company Toward An IPO With Paul Mikesell of Carbon Robotics

The Path To Superhuman Farming with Curtis Garner and Brent Shedd of Verdant Robotics

Robotic Harvesting and Beyond with Kyle Cobb of advanced.farm

Autonomous Sprayers with Gary Thompson of GUSS

Ag Robotics Roundtable