Successful Farming – August 2019

ILOS ARE MORE THAN JUST A PLACE to store grain on

Paulman Farms. They also represent iso-

lated pockets of yield, moisture, machine, and

nutrient data that could help the Sutherland,

Nebraska, operation get the most out of the

nearly 10,000 acres it covers.

Roric Paulman relies on 40 different apps to

control and monitor the 14 dryland and irrigated

crops grown on the land. The software generates

one terabyte of site-specific data every month,

which equates to 75 million pages of information.

That information is key to helping him

make sound management decisions. The problem is, no one

has created a system that effortlessly connects the dots to give

Paulman better insights. Also, if he can’t access the informa-

tion from his smartphone, he’s not interested. “The apps and

the information being collected have stopped being useful,”

says Paulman, who farms with wife Deb and son Zachary.

Creating a solution

C

ompanies with a long history in agriculture have been

working to build a user-friendly system that seamlessly pro-

cesses and integrates data from myriad apps. Yet, data sharing

and interoperability are still not easy or seamless.

These companies also face a problem of their own: How do

they collaborate with others to develop a solution yet remain

PAULMAN FARMS WON’T REALIZE THE PROMISE

OF DIGITAL AGRICULTURE UNTIL A SEAMLESS,

AUTOMATED INFRASTRUCTURE IS IN PLACE.

BY LAURIE BEDORD, EXECUTIVE EDITOR, AG TECHNOLOGY

BREAKING

DOWN SILOS

Photo Illustration: Juhari Muhade/YangYin, Getty Images August 2019 | Successful Farming at Agriculture.com 41