AgWired

This morning’s opening session of the 10th International Conference on Precision Agriculture (ICPA) was certainly a good one, as attendees heard that while the world’s farmers have increased the rate of growth of the food they produce, the current increase doesn’t match the rise in the human population and its rising incomes expected by the year 2050 when it’s expected that we’ll share this world with 9.2 billion people.

Dr. Ken Cassman with the University of Nebraska’s Center for Energy Sciences Research told the standing-room-only crowd that without negatively impacting some of the world’s most sensitive ecosystems – the rain forests, wetlands, and grassland savannahs – the current rate of production growth won’t meet the rising demand. He says a process of increasing yields and reducing agriculture’s “footprint” is necessary: a process he calls “ecological intensification (EI).” And he believes precision agriculture could play a key role in that process.

“The buffer between proper management and poor management narrows, that is, the margin for error becomes smaller in terms of what helps the crop or what hurts the crop. So your precision of management becomes the single most important factor in helping farmers achieve yields near the yield potential ceiling.”

Cassman says the goal is to achieve 80 percent of a crop’s genetic yield potential while not increasing the impact that crop has on the environment. He says while biotechnology might help get us there, there is no magic bullet. It will take a combination of new technologies and techniques to hit that potential.

And a man who shared the stage with Cassman during the opening session believes we cannot play down the importance of testing and monitoring of fields to make sure the crops are living up to their potential. Dr. William Raun with Oklahoma State University also made a pitch for funding of extension services so that testing can take place.

“Extension is obviously important to us. We cannot just do research. We’ve got to have thousands of enrich strips and ramps out there in the fields and investing in that extension so farmers can see it.” And he adds that the numbers and formulas are out there to best forecast what can happen in a field. We just need to make sure it’s measured. “Yield potential can be predicted.”

It really was a great session. Because of the length of it, I can’t post all of the audio here, but I am going to let you hear the question and answer session after Cassman’s and Raun’s presentation. You’ll also hear from Dr. Raj Khosla during this segment. You can download or listen to this session at ICPA here: Opening Session Questions and Answers

I’ve also posted the day’s pictures on the ICPA Photo Album

Coverage of the 10th International Conference on Precision Agriculture brought to you on Agwired by When it has to be RIGHT!

One of the nicest things about coming to a conference such as the 10th International Conference on Precision Agriculture (ICPA) is meeting new friends here. Among some of the folks I’ve met are the good people at Leica Geosystems, who are sponsoring coverage of this year’s event.

In the exhibitor hall, I met up with Harlan Little, Leica’s North American Business Manager. He says for a company that works so closely with precision ag systems, it’s absolutely important to have a presence here.

“The biggest part of it is to have our booth here at the trade show to be able to make sure that all the practitioners that are here at the show, along with the researchers and different people from the industry, all have a chance to see and touch what Leica is all about from an ag standpoint.” Little says Leica is fairly new into the ag market, and a show with this caliber of attendee is a must for his company.

He says they’ve been showing off their tried and true mojoRTK system, as well as the new mojo3D, a seven-inch, touch-screen control unit, that can be used for manual or automated steering.

While there are some producers here at the conference, most of the attendees are from the research and academic fields, and Little is happy to talk to them as well.

“A symposium like this really gives that academia a little bit of what’s the real world capability out there and keeping it grounded as to what the next research piece needs to be.”

Little is glad to be able to make reconnections with some old friends, as well as all the new ones they are making.

You can hear more of my conversation with Harlan, by listening to it or downloading it from the player here: Harlan Little, Leica Geosystems

Also, check out our photo album on Flickr: ICPA Photo Album

Coverage of the 10th International Conference on Precision Agriculture brought to you on Agwired by When it has to be RIGHT!