Rethinking Technology in Agriculture
December 3, 2025 In the conversations that I’ve been having lately, all anyone wants to talk about is the economy. As I write this, cash corn is $4.12 and soybeans are $10.04. I use these as an example but have been reading and talking with friends in the other commodity markets, such as cotton, and those are just as, if not even, uglier markets.
That’s on the sales side, then we get to the supply side. High fertilizer prices, like we’ve never seen before. Even higher equipment prices. And add competition for land with industry, solar, and wind projects and, we get prices that just don’t pencil.
Kind of reminds me of the late 1970s and 1980s. Seems to me, about all that’s missing is the 18% interest rates.
I was talking with a client in preparation for the 2025 growing season, and he was getting calls to cut inputs due to budget constraints. We talked about how he was making those decisions and where he thought each of those operations could make cuts and not affect yield. However, he was deciding more by “art and feel” of the operation than by the science, data, and information. Kind of a “this is the way we’ve always done it” mentality.
Even though the economy looks and feels like 45 years ago, I believe we are in a different era, and we need to look at our budgets and how we manage through this economy in a different way.
In my experience, when growers are managing their budgets in tight economies, the first things to go are the technology tools. First off, as I’ve often been reminded, it’s the easiest thing to delete because they can, and have for decades, planted crops without that technology. And I understand that thought process.
Other than a few technologies, like autosteering, a grower probably hasn’t seen the value of the technologies payoff like they were told, expected, or seen. I can’t blame them for that. That’s been a shortfall in our industry for most of my career in ag technology.
But as I mentioned earlier, this is a different era, and maybe we should look at technology through a different lens.
Think about the 2011 movie “Moneyball.” If you haven’t seen it, the movie is about the 2002 Oakland A’s and how the manager, Billy Beane, changed how they put a team together. Beane abandoned traditional scouting and evaluation methods and puts a team together based on data, information, and metrics. Making sure that the right people were put into the right situation, at the right time.
That same mindset can apply to agriculture today. Data and analytics. Putting your people, equipment, and inputs in the best position to be successful.
We have existing tools that have been collecting data for years. We have service providers that have been giving recommendations for years. We have had soil test data for decades. What has been done with all of that data? Who processed that data and turned it into valuable, decision-making information? My guess is very little and very few.
So, as the old saying goes: “No better time than the present.”
Now is the time to dust off the old thumb drives that have been cluttering that desk drawer and process that yield data. Now is the time to process the planter data. Now is the time to process the as-applied data. Now is the time to learn how to use the analytics functionality in your software program. Now is the time to sit down with your advisors and ask the tough questions so that you can make hard business decisions for 2026.
Now is the time to get the promised return on your investment in technology.
You must be strategic in your thinking. Develop tactics to accomplish your goals — and be intentional in your actions to be successful.
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