Data
Data. You have it, your neighbour has it, and yep, you guessed it, your competition has it too. But what good is data if it is not being used?
Data collection, and more importantly, sharing that data in a secure environment can help improve your productivity, sustainability, and profitability.
So how do you do go about using the data you’ve collected over years to improve your operations in the future? And what technology exists now that can help you get the most out of your data?
There are several ways that data can assist you on farm, such as:
- Improved Decision-Making: Access to shared data helps farmers make informed decisions about crop management, pest control, and resource allocation.
- Enhanced Research and Innovation: Researchers can use shared data to develop new agricultural technologies and practices, leading to more efficient and sustainable farming
- Market Access: Farmers can gain insights into market trends and consumer preferences, helping them to better align their production with market demands.
Challenges in Data Sharing
- Accessing your Data: Whether that means digitising it from a paper trail to the computer or uploading it from a USB stick to a secure cloud environment, the value in data is realised when it is well managed and easy to access.
- Data Privacy and Security: Ensuring that shared data is protected from unauthorised access and misuse is a genuine concern.
- Standardisation and Interoperability: Different data formats and systems can make it difficult to aggregate and analyse data from multiple sources.
- Farmer Engagement: Farmers may be hesitant to share data due to concerns about privacy, data ownership, and the perceived value of the data.
What does effective data sharing look like?
An industry best practice Data Sharing Agreement template has been developed by Food Agility CRC in partnership with tier one legal firm Minter Ellison, to provide a fair contract template for data sharing between farm businesses and those they share data with.
The Data Sharing Agreement template is for anyone collecting, managing, or sharing farmers’ data. It is designed for contracts with only a few parties, such as: a research project contract between a farmer and a research institute, or a farm business and a processor, or a farm business and another farm business.
Data means consolidating business information from across the farm into one securely stored central location.
You can also compare different product’s data ownership and data privacy and security policies by using our free comparison tool (find out more below).
A Good Place to Start
Choosing the right solution (or a combination thereof) for your business will depend on the size and scale of your operations, your production methods, connectivity, existing infrastructure, and data integration.
It is important you consider these factors when deciding what technology to purchase. While many agtech companies can provide this support, there are also independent websites and advice that can assist. AgTech Finder is an independent resource you can trust.
If finding the time to conduct this research is difficult, then try searching the ‘Help & Advice’ section of our website. There are 36 podcast episodes to listen to that talk through the benefits of adopting agtech, with each episode focusing on a particular piece of technology.
If you already have an idea of what you need, visit our Product Directory and filter your search by focus area and solution type. Click the star on the product image to add it to the comparison tool. This will allow you to compare product features side-by-side.
If you don’t know where to begin, start by browsing our wide variety of resources in the If you can’t find the advice you’re looking for, get in touch with us and we’ll work on developing a resource that helps you, and other farmers in the same predicament.
Relevant Help & Advice:
Aug 26 2024
Ep 32: Talking Livestock Data Analytics
This episode of the AgTech Finder podcast asks: what do you do with all your livestock data once you've collected it?
Read MoreJul 22 2024
Ep 27: Data Utilisation in the Seafood Industry
This episode of the AgTech Finder podcast explores the use of agtech and data-driven decision-making within the seafood industry.
Read MoreFeb 26 2024
Ep 17: Data Codes with Pairtree Intelligence
EPISODE 17: In this episode we’re talking about building trust when it comes to sharing farm data. Data is now one of the world’s most valuable commodities and needs to be protected,…
Read MoreAug 14 2023
Ep 6: Data Sharing with Terracipher
In this episode we’re talking about data sharing – the importance of standardising data and creating data sharing ecosystems.
Read MoreList your company on AgTech Finder.
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