Precision Agriculture Improves Environmental Stewardship While Increasing Yields

Apr 28, 2021

The Association of Equipment Manufacturers (AEM), in partnership with the American Soybean Association, CropLife America, and National Corn Growers Association, released a study quantifying how widely available precision agriculture technology improves environmental stewardship while providing economic return for farmers.

Precision agriculture leverages technologies to enhance sustainability through more efficient use of critical inputs, such as land, water, fuel, fertilizer, and pesticides. Farmers who use precision agriculture equipment use less to grow more.

The Environmental Benefits of Precision Agriculture study highlights how policies and technological advancements can help farmers increase these outcomes.

“We are living in a new age of agriculture, and today’s precision technology on equipment can have an enormous positive impact on farmers and the environment,” said Curt Blades, Senior Vice President of Agriculture at the Association of Equipment Manufacturers. “One of our goals at AEM is to encourage the adoption of these technologies by more farmers, so they can all reap the benefits as we continue to focus on sustainability.”

precision agriculture technologies

Precision agriculture technologies have contributed significantly to the increases in yields for the major crops grown in North America. Source: Association of Equipment Manufacturers and USDA NASS, Purdue Precision Ag Dealership Survey, Context Analysis and Expert Input.

Environmental Benefits

The study explores five key environmental stewardship benefits achieved through precision agriculture technology adoption, including:

Yield benefit through increased efficiency
Fertilizer reduction by more precise placement
Pesticide reduction by more accurate application
Fuel savings due to less overlap and better monitoring
Water savings through more accurate sensing of needs

Part of Climate Answer

“The reductions in greenhouse gases this study illustrates shows modern agriculture is part of the climate solution,” said Kellie Bray, CropLife America (CLA) Chief of Staff. “Fuel savings alone due to precision ag tools is the yearly equivalent of taking nearly 200,000 cars off the road, all while preventing an area equal to 4.5 Yellowstone National Parks from being added to production because of yield increases.”

Study Highlights

As precision agriculture equipment and technologies are more widely adopted it will lead to significant increases in yields and further input savings: Significant increases in yields and further input savings can be reached as precision agriculture technologies become more widely adopted:

Productivity has increased an estimated 4% and has the potential to further increase 6% with broader adoption.
Precision agriculture has improved fertilizer placement efficiency by an estimated 7% and has the potential to further improve an additional 14%.
Herbicide use has been reduced by an estimated 9% and has the potential to further decrease 15% at full adoption.
Fossil fuel use has decreased an estimated 6% with the potential to further decrease 16%.
Water use has decreased an estimated 4% because of current precision agriculture adoption with the potential to further decrease 21% at full adoption.

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Video: Western Canadian Agriculture: Hard Times Made the World's Best Farmers

Western Canadian agriculture produced the most advanced farmers in the world not through abundance but through adversity. The crow rate fell. The wheat price went nowhere. The brown envelopes stopped.

When the subsidies disappeared, the bad farmers left and the good ones stayed. And the ones who stayed could not just grow wheat anymore. They started growing lentils and canola and peas and flax and faba beans. They built crop rotation. They got serious about agronomy because there was no government backstop. That process produced the Western Canadian agriculture Dennis Bulani describes in this clip: the most advanced, most educated farming culture in the world.

His contrast with Iowa corn and soybean farmers is sharp. At a DeKalb farmer meeting in Okoboji, Iowa, he asked what crop rotation they ran. Beans on corn stubble, corn on bean stubble. How do you fertilize? The co-op agronomist handles it. Have you considered other crops? No need. We make so much money on corn and soybeans. Western Canadian agriculture was never allowed that comfort. And now those Iowa farmers are watching soybean markets lock up with China and corn prices slide, and they do not have the agronomy knowledge or the research base to pivot. Western Canadian farmers adapted on a dime because they had done it before.

Dennis also makes the case that Western Canadian agriculture keeps adapting in real time. Low commodity prices over the past year have pushed growers to look seriously at precision spot-spray technology. He knows a neighbor who bought a sprayer with the seeing-eye system and sprayed only 80 out of 320 acres. As a chemical retailer Dennis acknowledges that will affect his sales. He supports it anyway, because if it advances Canadian agriculture and makes farmers money, that is a good outcome.

The lesson Dennis draws from the tale of two farms: continuous improvement is the only durable strategy. When canola was $22 a bushel some growers went to Arizona instead of the Crop Production Show. When the price came down those same growers came back to the research and the discipline. Products do not go on Rack Petroleum's shelves unless they pass a replicated trial first. That is what Western Canadian agriculture built through hard times: farmers who do the work whether the times demand it or not.

Dennis Bulani is CEO of Rack Petroleum and Ultimate Yield in Biggar, Saskatchewan. Dan Aberhart hosts GTF Productions, Western Canadian Agriculture's foremost live briefing platform and its foremost AI training platform for ag operators