Fresh Minds for Fresh Challenges: Finding Your Career Path in Digital Agriculture

It’s no secret that growers are the heart of our industry, but there are a lot more opportunities for careers off the farm than people realize. According to the latest USDA survey from 2017, more than one in 10 American jobs were related to agriculture and food. Only 12% of those jobs were direct, on-farm employment. One of the fastest growing sectors in the industry is digital agriculture, and we’re going to need more and more fresh, young minds as that growth continues.

Several Paths to Success

There are a number of career paths in digital ag, ranging from what I would call more of the traditional opportunities with crop protection and seed companies, to equipment manufacturers and technology companies, as well as start-ups. With the onset of the new technology, utilizing large amounts of data, predictive analytics, and artificial intelligence to enhance decision making has become the new norm with today’s growers and advisors. This has led to employment opportunities for engineers, computer scientists, economists, mathematicians, statisticians, and robotic science graduates just to name a few.

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Diverse Backgrounds Welcome

These new career paths don’t require a history or background in agriculture. Technology driven companies such as IBM, Google, and others are working in the agricultural space to assist growers and their trusted advisors in making more informed decisions about crop management and agronomic decisions. Whether it’s new graduates or veterans looking for a career shift, this has opened the door for non-traditional ag employment opportunities. As a recent example, Syngenta has been working with Sony to bring new imagery technology to the precision ag space. This opportunity to work with a non-traditional ag company affords an individual the chance to utilize their technological education and experience to bring that knowledge to today’s agronomist and help them with growers.

Outside of partnerships, bringing technology to farms opens the door for new talent within major industry players. Syngenta was a pioneer in introducing Land.db as a farm management system to assist growers in recording their crop plans and inputs thereby allowing them to easily measure profitability at a field level. We’ve also invested in robotics for research and development; field imagery in drones, satellite and aircraft technology; as well as data analytics for advanced agronomic decision making. Syngenta is, and has been an open-minded organization when it comes to recruiting talent, both inside and outside of the traditional ag arena. Interested students should look for internship and developmental opportunities from ag companies — as it not only allows them a chance to explore possible careers, but also helps the industry understand the incoming workforce.

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Building a Brighter Future

Our goal is to provide the best technology, be it traditional crop protection and seed or our digital ag products, to today’s growers and their trusted advisors. As the industry continues to grow we’ll need more young people interested in the tech, manufacturing, engineering, mathematic, and scientific sectors to check out the ag industry so we can meet the needs of the growing global population.

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