Software guides farmers to good decisions for their land, and bottom lines

While some members of the Republican-controlled Legislature lie awake nights trying to concoct ways to amend, delay or blow up altogether the state's new stream-buffer law — claiming they're acting on behalf of farmers — important and innovative players in the agriculture industry are spending equally sleepless nights figuring out ways farmers can do what they're in business to do: Make more money …

While also cleaning up the state's waters and developing additional wildlife habitat.

Previously in this space we've examined the critical work underway at the University of Minnesota, where researchers are developing new perennial crops that someday might supplement or replace altogether standard corn and soybean rotations.

Called "Forever Green," the U program intends not just to benefit farmers economically — the top priority — but to reduce the negative by-products of so much corn and soybeans on rural landscapes: topsoil, fertilizer and other chemical runoffs, water degradation and wildlife habitat losses.

Forever Green is referenced today for two reasons:

• To note that the Legislature, in its backward approach to "helping" farmers and taxpayers, has voted this session to cut by about half the $3.85 million in general fund and Clean Water fund money proposed for Forever Green by Gov. Mark Dayton.

• And to draw a comparison between the kind of retrograde reasoning that underpins such funding decisions, with the vastly more innovative and forward-looking thinking that is the hallmark of people in the agriculture and conservation industries who want farmers to make more money.

Even casual observers of modern farming know that onboard computers and software "drive" many of today's tractors and combines, essentially guiding them up and down fields on autopilot.

The same computers and software can pinpoint parts of fields where yields are low, and earmark those areas for possible installation of drain tiles or other actions that might increase production.

Enter now Dave Muth, co-founder of an Iowa company called AgSolver.

Muth holds a doctorate in mechanical engineering from Iowa State University, and before starting AgSolver he directed a research team at Idaho National Laboratory.

AgSolver's primary product is an online, cloud-based software program called Profit Zone Manager (PZM), which analyzes data input from farmers' tractor and combine computers.

Most farmers can benefit from the information because research shows that 3 percent to 15 percent of most fields are consistently unprofitable to farm.

On those acres, one alternative might be simply to reduce or eliminate inputs such as seed and fertilizer. Another might be to enroll the acres in a revenue-producing state or federal conservation program.

PZM helps farmers decide among these and many other alternatives by illustrating on sliding scales various combinations of overhead costs, per-acre yields and commodity prices to consider.

Using the information, a farmer can determine if attempting to increase the yield on the questionable acres is the best way to boost overall farm profitability — or if one of many other alternatives would best serve that purpose.

The overarching objective is to boost the farmer's return on investment.

Example: On an Iowa farm operated by Muth and his father, overall crop production declined when they replaced 17 low-yielding acres of soybeans with pollinator habitat. But their farm's profitability rose.

"There's new research that confirms a positive correlation between honeybees and pollinator habitat, and increased nearby soybean yields of between 10 and 30 percent," said Ryan Heiniger, Pheasants Forever (PF) director of agriculture and conservation innovation.

Pheasants Forever has joined with AgSolver to spread the use of PZM, realizing that conversations spawned by the software can be a game-changer for wildlife and the environment.

After all, asking a farmer to set aside land at his cost that benefits water and wildlife can be a tough sell. But showing a farmer how he can increase profitability by taking these or other actions can be a win-win.

To broaden and help coordinate deployment of PZM, Pheasants Forever has added staff, including two Minnesota-based agriculture business planning specialists. Supporting this effort, the LCCMR — Legislative-Citizen Commission on Minnesota Resources — has approved a funding request, subject to legislative approval, and the Minnesota Department of Agriculture has OK'd a $25,000 grant.

"When we do these analyses using AgSolver,'' Heiniger said, "there are two phases. The first is to assess a farmer's current path and profitability. The second is to see what changes can be made to increase profits. We might propose using a federal program like the Conservation Reserve Program, or developing a 'working lands' conservation option that is part of a farmer's overall operation.''

Similar PF efforts are underway in Ohio, Iowa, North Dakota, South Dakota and Washington, among other states.

"AgSolver and PZM provide the 'tools' to make these profit-boosting decisions,'' Heiniger said. "PF's role is to increase the technical capacity of farmers by providing funding from our member chapters to 'buy down' the cost of PZM, and by providing consultants to present to farmers a suite of options for money-losing acres.''

Conservation programs for possible inclusion in the 2018 farm bill are being developed that would give farmers still more profit-boosting options using PZM.

Such forward thinking is a must if Minnesota farms, and farms nationwide, are going to be productive and profitable, without degrading land, water and wildlife.

"Only by producing enough to supply an increasing global food demand on a smaller agricultural footprint can landowners put more land into existing conservation programs and set aside less productive lands for prairies and wetlands. What excites me is that innovations in agricultural practices and the application of data science and satellite imagery are helping to reduce environmental impacts, increase crop productivity and make available more land for conservation efforts."

Put another way:

You can think your way to a better farming future. But — a note here to Minnesota legislators — you can't cut your way there.