High-tech fattens the bottom line

Agricultural Research, April, 1996 by J. Kim Kaplan, Dennis Senft, Don Comis, Jill Lee

"For example, last fall, they said I didn't need to use an insecticide the first year I had corn rootworm, that the damage wouldn't be worth the cost of spraying. According to my yield monitor's data, where I had corn rootworm damage, it cost me 40 bushels per acre - a lot more than the cost of the spraying."

"We're really going to be able to check out how good the advice is, now."

Generating precise information on this small a scale actually turns every farm into a test farm. There is an accurate record of what went in and what yield came out, one of the requirements for scientific analysis.

Hart points out one year's data is not really enough to base major management changes on. It may take 3 to 5 years of data to smooth out variations that are not related to management decisions, especially the influence of rainfall and weather.

"Eventually, as we spend more time looking at years of data, we may be able to develop equations and factors that will let the farmer account for that variation on fewer years of data," Hart says.

For many, the yield monitor is the access point to the computer-generated highway. It is often the first piece of computer-run equipment that farmers purchase. Others enter the computer age through accounting and recordkeeping software and a home computer.

Research by the University of Wisconsin and Meredith Publishing shows that about 250,000 of the 1.9 million farmers and ranchers in the United States have computers, says Association of Agricultural Computing Companies Vice President Warren E. Clark. He is also president of Clark Consulting International, Inc., in West Dundee, Illinois, an agricultural public relations and marketing services consulting firm that has built a database of the 90,000 largest producers who own and use IBM-compatible computers in their operations.

"Of course, many others may have access to computers off the farm," Clark says, "primarily through farm recordkeeping service bureaus."

Clark adds that he believes there are three types of farmers.

"Some who have started using a yield monitor and crop mapping software and are discovering they need better financial recordkeeping, some who have been using computerized accounting and are adding yield monitors and crop mapping software, and the third type who hope they can retire before they have no choice but to deal with computers.

"It's not that different from using ATM's at the bank," Clark says.

It isn't necessary for all farmers to own enough computer equipment to do everything themselves, which makes it possible for even small farms to have access to computer aids. Cooperatives, extension offices, universities, and businesses are all providing computer services, both generating and analyzing data.

In many cases, farmers can just buy services from experts or share the cost among a group of people who need similar services.

"It's just like hiring an accountant to keep the books," Clark says. "A farmer has to keep more and more records - business accounts, records for environmental regulation, marketing information, and now soil data and yield data. You need either an expert to help you boil the data down or training to do it yourself."