Sustainability Is the Starting Point for a Much Bigger Conversation in Agriculture

Editor’s note: This article originally published in May 2021.

No one who works in the food supply chain would claim that the past couple of years has been easy. While images of deserted streets will be the defining images of daily life, I’m sure the footage of dairy farmers pouring away gallons of fresh milk and retail shelves devoid of flour will be used to demonstrate the Coronavirus pandemic and its impact on our industry.

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On a more positive note though, it was heartening to see just how quickly our industry was able to pivot our focus from hospitality to emerging opportunities such as the home cooking renaissance. As bad as things got, if the pandemic had hit just two decades ago the story is likely to have been dramatically different. Thanks to today’s increasingly connected supply chains, the sector has been able to adapt, even where others have struggled.

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However, now is not the time for complacency. Very few businesses in the ag sector could – honestly – put their hands up and say they are digitally future-proofed.

This was thrown into stark relief when I (finally) returned to the office only to find piles of snail mail, including a number of invoices. I’d imagine I’m not alone in this. Over and above the cash-flow issues that must be experienced by those repeatedly sending paper invoices to empty offices, it highlights the need to become digital first.

As an industry, we stand at a critical juncture. Events like Tech Hub LIVE offer an opportunity for us to come together and talk through how we can collaborate better to increase productivity through precision.

The rallying call for doing so must be sustainability though. All of us know that this has always been at the heart of our agenda. After all, our land is our core asset and as its custodians, it makes no commercial sense to deprive it of the nutrients needed to keep it productive. Equally, it is simply bad business not to use the precision agriculture tools at our disposal to ensure we are working efficiently and within the bounds of state, national and international legislation.

The challenge is to convince all consumers that’s really the case. Actually, we’re not in a bad place: three quarters (76%) of Americans agree ag is an environmentally responsible industry. But that still leaves a quarter that don’t, so there’s still work to be done.

Showing Our Cards

The key to countering any entrenched – and in the vast majority of cases, unfair – beliefs lies in greater transparency. Merely reassuring people we’re all in this together is no longer enough. We need to show them.

Demonstrating the sector’s sustainability credentials on the factors that matter most to consumers – reducing food waste, net-zero carbon, provenance, and so-on – is dependent on finding ways to work together better. There are things we should compete on, of course. But there are things that we should do together. Particularly if we’re committed to doing the right thing on sustainability. The pandemic should be seen as a wake-up call and sharing our knowledge makes us stronger.

Let’s be clear: I’m not advocating a data free-for-all. We often hear about businesses working within walled gardens in order to maintain control of their IP – and that’s perfectly understandable. So, rather than knocking down those walls, we can open the gates just a bit to share cuttings (to continue the garden analogy), and as trust grows over time, we can open them a little wider again. And the best thing is that your neighbors will be speaking the same language as you, sharing their knowledge in return.

As it stands, fewer than a third of growers use the precision tools that allow them to access the right input advice that would help them work more sustainably. But that could equally apply to increased productivity and consequently, more profitably. Perhaps more importantly, it can be the starting point for a bigger, more connected journey.

Data is the key to precision; the more data we’re willing to share from seed to fork, the smarter each stakeholder within that supply chain is able to work. Over time this cascades across each stage to form an integrated data loop – the virtuous circle towards a more sustainable future. Just as significant, it is demonstrably so to external parties given the inherent transparency.

The means to finally show the world this sector is what it claims to be – one that has always been built around sustainable principles – is finally within our grasp.

All it takes is a little trust and it could grow into something much bigger. Insight starts with data, it becomes knowledge and, in time, wisdom. In fact, mutual collaboration is already starting to happen – albeit in pockets around the world – and this makes me hopeful for what we could achieve together.

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