Feeding dairy cows the nutrients they need to produce nutritious milk products requires large harvests of corn, soy, grasses and other plants. One-third of the nations’ feed supply for dairy cows is grown right on the farm itself. While many farmers currently incorporate best practices into their crop production, they lack the specific data that is relevant to their farm in terms of climate, air quality, soil, land and watershed — information that can lead to greener decisions during feed production.

Opportunity: empower farmers with actionable data 

If farmers have easy access to robust real-time, on-field data, this will allow them to assess, measure and mitigate their environmental impact on the climate, air quality, soil, land and watershed.

Solution: on-field decision support tool

Best-in-class tools already exist that provide computer simulation models to predict crop growth, soil temperature, moisture, regimes, soil carbon dynamics, nitrogen spillover and water quality levels. Integrating these models into a farmer-friendly decision tool can help mitigate the levels of carbon, nitrogen and phosphorous emissions that occur during fertilization and other aspects of crop production. This tool will allow farmers to maximize the use of manure as an alternative to commercial fertilizer, which decreases the use of fossil fuels and greenhouse gas emissions. It will also lead to less nitrogen and phosphorous runoff into the watershed.

When farmers can more precisely determine the levels of fertilizer and water required for crop reduction, this helps them identify and adopt better crop management practices to improve air and water quality, and soil conservation. By putting precision information at the farmer’s fingertips, it’s likely that a farm can improve its crop production practices to both meet and even exceed local state and federal environmental regulations.

“The dairy industry can lead the way in precision agriculture by developing world-class technology that helps assess, measure  and mitigate environmental impacts of on-farm practices.”   Bruce Knight, principal, Strategic Conservation Solutions, former chief, Natural Resources Conservation Service, USDA

Collaborators: leading academic researchers + NGOs + industry + government

The Farm Smart team is comprised of more than 50 leading institutions and organizations, including eight prominent agricultural universities, Sustainable Food Lab, Sustainable Conservation, Organic Valley, Spruce Haven Farm, Monsanto and the USDA. 

Farm Smart: project goals and milestones

The goal of the Farm Smart project is to provide farmers with a robust real-time, on-field decision tool for better crop production management.

The tool will empower farmers to make scientifically sound, economically viable choices that will reduce carbon, nitrogen and phosphorous emissions.

Moving forward: project timeline

Phase 1: Develop and Test Integrated Tool
The tool is being developed based on best-in-class existing modeling processes that assess carbon and nitrogen biochemistry, and water use and quality. When completed, the tool will integrate these modeling processes with other relevant information requested by farmers. In process: 2010 ─ 2011

Phase 2: Site Testing of Decision Support Tool
The tool will be tested on two dairy farms to determine ease of use, value in decision-making and ability to
interpret results. Evaluations from these two pilots will guide additional tool development. 2011

Phase 3: Migrate Tool to Web-based Delivery
Developing a web-based tool will allow access to more customized information, more frequent data updates and modeling choices by farmers. 2012