Agronomic Plans Are Useless, But Planning Is Indispensable

By CropLife

While the current cropping season is still in full swing in Australia (winter crop), the U.S. (summer crop), and many other countries around the world, a lot of growers are already starting to plan for their next season, writes Reinder Prins at CropLife. While the reality of the current season’s challenges is still fresh in our minds, it’s a lot easier to apply this knowledge to future plans and ensure they are accurate and grounded in reality.

I’m sure it won’t take long after publishing this article until I get emails from people asking: “Reinder, have you lost it? A plan is so important for farmers and agronomists!” And, they are correct, a plan is very important indeed. But my point is very clearly made by a famous quote from WWII leader and U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower when assessing preparation for battle: “Plans are useless, but planning is indispensable.”

It’s not because of the plans generated that planning is so important, but it’s the planning process itself that is so valuable for all involved. Planning should be a collaborative process between growers and their trusted advisors. The plan should draw on all available data from previous seasons in order to anticipate the impact of important variables and different scenarios. It’s only by having “everyone that matters” involved in the planning process and working on the same dataset, that people can contribute their specific knowledge and help improve the process. It is the very act of planning that allows you to assess how you executed your previous season and look at ways where you can improve your efficiency or even your strategy.

Collaborative planning based on a large set of historical data would have been a difficult, time consuming, and logistically challenging process 10 or more years ago. Fast forward to 2020, and growers and agronomists can now simply adopt a digital platform that allows them to collaborate and work off the same set with a complete record of historical data.