Earlier this year, the trusted leader in industry news and trends Greenhouse Grower published this article about how technology will help growers succeed in 2024. The article pointed to six different applications for precision farming technologies to optimize various aspects of crop production. Below I outline how each of these six is enhanced by and coincides with the Growmentum platform.
Application #1: Data-Driven Decision Making
Insight from Greenhouse Grower: Data-Driven Decision Making: Precision farming allows growers to collect and analyze vast amounts of data related to soil conditions, weather patterns, crop health, and more.
How Growmentum Helps: This process begins with the collection of this data. Growmentum’s platform allows various control points in your organization to collect and analyze data in a consistent way that creates standards throughout the growth cycle and beyond.
Application #2: Resource Optimization
Insight from Greenhouse Grower: Resource Optimization: Precision farming enables precise application of resources, including water, fertilizers, and pesticides.
How Growmentum Helps: Resource optimization related to labor costs and savings is the goal of Growmentum. Knowing the standards of time allocation per task allows for more accurate forecasts of labor needs, improves fiscal management, and lowers overall operational expenditures.
Application #3: Increased Productivity
Insight from Greenhouse Grower: Increased Productivity: By tailoring farming practices to the specific needs of each field or even individual plants, growers can maximize productivity and profitability.
How Growmentum Helps: Productivity is increased when communication is improved. Growers like Metrolina Greenhouses that implement the Growmentum platform have claimed 5-8.5% savings in labor costs. According to Dr. Charlie Hall during his Cultivate ‘23 speech, there is an anticipated 2.8% increase in the hourly rate paid to H2A workers in 2024. These rising input costs place additional constraints on profit margins in the coming season, making the use of precision labor technology even more relevant.
Application #4: Automation and Robotics
Insight from Greenhouse Grower: Automation and Robotics: The integration of automation and robotics in agriculture is part of the precision farming trend. Autonomous machinery and robotic systems can perform tasks such as planting, harvesting, and monitoring crops, reducing the need for manual labor and increasing operational efficiency.
How Growmentum Helps: The automation provided by Growmentum’s data analytics platform allows for consistency in tasks taken throughout the growth cycle and highlights the opportunities across greenhouse activities for improved efficiencies, for example where the investment of automated machinery would be most beneficial.
Application #5: Remote Monitoring
Insight from Greenhouse Grower: Remote Monitoring: With the help of sensors and IoT devices, growers can remotely monitor their fields in real-time. This capability allows for early detection of issues such as diseases, pests, or adverse weather conditions, enabling prompt intervention and mitigation.
How Growmentum Helps: The Growmentum platform has capabilities for growers to determine which areas in the greenhouse have the most consistent activity levels, how you standardize the response to a disease or pest outbreak, and a step-by-step process integration of how to deploy manual labor to promptly intervene.
Application #6: Integration with Farm Management Software
Insight from Greenhouse Grower: Integration with Farm Management Software: Precision farming technologies often integrate with farm management software, providing a centralized platform for data analysis, planning, and decision-making. This integration streamlines operations and facilitates better communication and collaboration within farming teams.
How Growmentum Helps: The Growmentum platform allows team leaders to have a line of sight into various operations across the greenhouse that could be impacting their specific division. These insights spur conversations to develop collaborative solutions. Growmentum can integrate into larger enterprise software solutions and complement your existing technology applications.
Closing Thoughts
As profit margins narrow, growers must explore how various technologies can enhance efficiencies, streamline operations, and increase cost savings. The team at Growmentum strives to be a trusted partner for growers, providing them with the unique ability to gain control over the largest and most complex operational line item in their operation today: labor.