Growing up with a family actively involved in the medical community in rural Alabama, Luke Knight, crop protection territory manager at Corteva Agriscience, says agriculture wasn’t on his radar at all. It wasn’t until high school, when he became involved in FFA and exposed to the various careers in ag that he changed his path and became 100% focused on getting into agriculture.
“Before becoming an Alabama FFA state office, I only thought you could be a farmer or an agriculture teacher,” Knight says.
It was in college at Auburn that Knight first realized what made the seed industry compelling. While working for an entomologist within the Alabama Cooperative Extension System, he realized how much he enjoyed communicating and supporting the work he did with farmers throughout the state.
“I wanted to continue to provide solutions and service to growers,” Knight says.
And in particular, he loves the variability each year provides when working in the seed industry.
“Every year is different,” he says. “Every year has brought challenges and successes. When you’re working with plants and the environment, you never know what to expect a given year will bring. New diseases, herbicide resistance and policy changes allow for innovation to be constant.”
One thing you might not realize about Knight? He loves to cook.
“I like to try new recipes and use locally grown and produced food,” he says. “I love every aspect of the ag industry from the production and growing of the seed to manufacturing of food to cooking.”
Knight even loves trying as many new bourbons as he can from the growers that provide grain to distilleries in Kentucky.
“It’s enjoyable to see how hard growers work to push a seed to its fullest potential,” Knight says. “When you see growers achieving record yields on their operations, it gives me encouragement to know that we have yet to discover and reach the true potential of the seed.”
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