68 / SEEDWORLD.COM JUNE 2017 Exploring ideas and views on all aspects of the seed industry. DIGITAL DEVICES BENEFIT FARMERS In an interview with Global Health Action, Tobias Menne, head of Digital Farming at Bayer, says farmers need to focus less on inputs and more on outcomes. In changing their business models, Menne believes producers can do just that. By using digital technology such as drones, field robots, decision-support software and smart irrigation systems, farmers can now determine where their field problems are in real time. “For the first time, growers can understand exactly where pests, weeds and diseases are, in real time, as well as the state of the soil. We’re heading to a future with less pesticide use, which really improves the environmental footprint.” Menne believes this will be of great benefit to the smallholder farmers, as they are “furthest away from an agricultural optimum.” This means in the future, companies will make the shift from selling fewer products to outcome- based services; sensor devices that will help determine what is and what is not working. And the answers will come in real time. NEW PLANT DISCOVERIES This past year, more than 1,700 new plants have been discovered, according to the second annual “State of the World’s Plants from the Royal Botanic Gardens.” The new species could not only help provide food in the future, but may also aid in disease research. According to an article in New Scientist, seven new species of Aspalathus, which provides redbush or rooibos tea, have been discovered, as has a new parsnip species in Turkey. Although these “wild relatives” of current crops might not have the yields found in today’s crops, they have sustained centuries in multiple climate conditions. While the report looks at how valuable these plants are, it notes that some of these plants are endangered. The report was compiled with the involvement of 128 scientists in 12 countries, and sites that some 340 hectares of the world’s plant-covered surfaces burn in wildfires every year. That is the equivalent to the size of India. The report also states that 28,187 of those could be used medicinally, with only 15 percent cited in medicinal regulatory programs. RABOBANK ANALYSTS SAY DIGITAL AGRICULTURE IS MOST PROMISING TO THE AG INDUSTRY RaboResearch Food & Ag Group released a report, “Bungle in the Ag Tech Jungle — Cracking the Code on Precision Farming and Digital Agriculture,” which finds the newest wave of innovation in the digital agriculture industry has great potential, but some strides still need to be made before data-intensive farming methods can add value to producers. In the past two and a half years, more than $6.5 billion have been invested in the ag technology industry. For the most part, these ventures have been funded by venture capital investors and by departments within agricultural companies. “Digital agriculture offers the promise of higher income and lower in-field variability and volatility,” says Kenneth Zuckerberg, RaboResearch Food & Ag Group farm input senior analyst. “Improved agronomic practices, coupled with more precise field decisions can create the promised value through higher crop yields and lower input costs.” According to Rabobank, one of the barriers to adoption of this technology is the lack of a universal operating platform. Dirk Jan Kennes, Rabobank farm input global sector strategist adds that it took some 20 years for electronic commerce to evolve, after Internet access became available to the general public. “We would expect creation of the necessary platforms for digital agriculture to occur much faster,” he says.