Single-seed planters using technologies developed by US manufacturer Precision Planting are being evaluated in Europe for the first time.

Harnage Estates in western England has been utilising precision technology within their farming operations longer than most. Two experienced farm managers share their experiences and successes.

The Global Future Farming Summit at Wageningen Campus, the Netherlands saw experts and agricultural professionals from all over the world discuss the challenges facing precision agriculture, and the opportunities it provides.

The Dutch National Experimental Ground for Precision Farming (NPPL) has selected 10 new farmers.
 
The second year of The Dutch National Experimental Ground for Precision Farming(NPPL) project started on the last day of November. 10 new participants have been selected and they will start in 2019. This brings the total to 16 farming businesses. In addition to the 6 arable farmers who started with precision farming in 2018, 3 dairy farmers, 2 bulb growers, 4 arable farmers and an open ground cropper participate in next year’s edition. 

One of the most common ways this new technology is discussed for use in agriculture is helping to make seed selection recommendations for individual fields. How does this work? How can a computer be programmed to know what seed to plant? There are a couple key aspects needed to make this new selection process work.

Data has been essential to farmers’ work for generations. Weather patterns, historical crop yield data and market information all helps to inform their planting cycle, treatment and watering plans. Farmers have also been many of the first technology “early adopters,” in many parts of the world, enabling them do their job with greater efficiency.

Agriculture has always been a ripe market for tools that take the power of the computer out to where the action is — in the middle of a 1,000-acre field of corn, at an impromptu meeting in the farmer’s driveway, or out at the remote seed storage facility.

Jacob van den Borne is one of the farmers who was nominated as one of the 10 most innovative arable farmers worldwide. He and his brother started with precision farming in 2006 and they have an eye for the best technology available.

Precision farming has been around since the '90s to help farmers monitor their yields.