Ontario Grain Farmer November 2021

“We have younger generations embracing the change, but outcomes must be rapid, reliable, and reproducible,” he says. That’s a big ask. There are not many digital tools commercially available in the market that meet all those parameters.” More refined algorithms are critical for the development of truly fast and reliable tools. Khosla believes the ag-tech sector as a whole has come a long way in the last 20 years, but emphasizes it is an evolutionary process, not a revolutionary one as seen in other sectors. “Google has been collecting data from the airline industry for 20 years. It’s unidirectional data,” Khosla says in reference to the ability for anyone to search and select plane tickets from algorithm- generated lists. “In agriculture, it’s physics, chemistry, biology, sociology…all mixed together. If it was easy everyone would have done it, so let’s not pretend it’s easy.” Additionally, he says the disorganized nature of agricultural technology means there is no common collective data pool from which tech developers may draw. That means tools must individually go through an extensive machine learning process before the data which can be delivered to the farmer is actually valuable. Algorithms and the data they generate, in essence, are only useful if they successfully mimic how farmers accrue knowledge of the land over time. “I’m not interested in cool toys. How are you adding value? How are you avoiding [the farmer] incurring losses? Are you providing the ability to see into the future? That’s where the money is. You have to really question how many iterations of the machine learning algorithm was used.” QUESTIONS Assuming a piece of technology works as intended, the perspective of those using digital tools is another key element. While supporting a farm’s bottom line is important, Khosla believes operators should first ask, “How does it add value to my current operation?” Autosteer and GPS technology, for example, are not inherently money- making items. But they are useful at reducing operator fatigue, stress, and monotony. They also enable less skilled labour to operate at a higher level. Like autosteer, digital tools can be similarly valuable provided they are site specific (designed to account for the specific geography in which it will work), locally adaptive (workable with ONTARIO GRAIN FARMER 15 NOVEMBER 2021 If digital tools are not being adopted because they are expensive, hard to use, and bring little customer support, would a good digital tool simply do the opposite? characteristics of individual farms), economically affordable, and operationally feasible (helpful without being cost prohibitive or time consuming). “All those factors have to come together for any digital tool to be popular,” he says. As the data from AAFC, ICPC, academia, and other agricultural organizations indicate, however, the industry would still benefit from sorting out labour challenges. “We have much better data analysis tools. Unfortunately, we don’t have enough skilled people who understand agriculture and who are not scared of working on good computers.” l DON’T MISS OUT... our early order discounts are available now! MOST OUT OF YOURS SO YOU GET THE WE PUT THE WORK IN OUR FIELDS De Dell Seeds The Leaders in Non-GMO Corn De Dell Seeds • 7095 Century Drive • Melbourne, ON • N0L 1T0 P: 519-264-CORN (2676) • F: 519-264-2672 info@dedellseeds.com • www.dedellseeds.com Our breeding is done the traditional way, in the field, in an effort to bring you the best possible results on your farm. That is why we are The Leaders in Non-GMO Seed Corn .