What’s New at the WGCIT? In the first WGCIT Lunch & Learn event of the year, Mark Mason from Huntington Farms shared his thoughts about the future of agriculture, both in terms of workforce development and how to integrate new innovation into existing systems.
these students for his ranch. The Next Gen Ag Workers program is a Western Growers effort to implement modules into the current two- and four- year college programs to educate students about technology and systems unique to a career in agriculture. The modules are set to be utilized in the upcoming Spring 2023 semester. Once a student completes five of the 10 modules available, they will be able to have access to internship opportunities
with Western Growers members. For the representatives from 18 startups that were in attendance, Mason talked about “farming by committee” and how the integration of new technology has to marry itself with the systems that already exist on a farm for implementation to happen. For more information about WGCIT’s monthly Lunch & Learn events, visit: www.wginnovation.com/
Mason, who manages Huntington Farms’ location in the Salinas Valley, spoke about the potential for the Next Gen Ag Workers program, coining the term “two-year tech,” and his hope to hire
Catch up on new episodes of the WGCIT’s podcast, Voices of the Valley! Voices of the Valley just passed a major milestone—we reached 10,000 listens in less than a year. Be sure to tune in and listen to the latest developments with the major innovators and thinkers in the area of agricultural technology. Voices of the Valley can be found on all major podcast distribution platforms, including Apple Podcasts, Anchor.fm and Spotify.
In a February episode of Voices of the Valley, Stuart Woolf, President and CEO of Woolf Farming Company, shares his interest, knowledge and utilization of agtech, which started in 1982 with his first Apple computer computations. Woolf is the second generation of growers who stays grounded in the present while looking to the future: “One thing my Dad did—which I thought in retrospect was really kind of genius—he looked at the crops that were predominantly being grown out there in the mid-‘70s and it was a lot of cotton, grain, melons, those kinds of things, and he thought ‘You know, I don’t want to be beholden to farm programs and support payments and all that.’ So he really started to focus on crops that were unique to California like almonds and pistachios where we had global competitive advantage. He narrowed it down to a handful of items that turn out to be highly mechanized, we had a global advantage, we enjoyed a better
return per acre-foot on those crops.” That inclination to see the big picture and how it relates to success over time means a focus on innovation. Of the topics that are on his radar—water, labor shortages and soil health, to name a few—Woolf says there is one area of innovation he and his team have an eye on: data processing. His take makes this episode a must listen for any grower, innovator or environmental health advocate. In a January episode, Seana Day, Partner with Culterra Capital and Venture Partner with Better Food Ventures, joins Donohue and Wilson to share her perspective about the need for digital systems to better utilize farmers’ time, information and resources. “When we think about the role of technology and optimizing our assets, our resources, it just doesn’t make sense to me why more companies aren’t thinking about integrating those technologies…it’s always surprising to me how much loss or waste operators are willing to assume as just a cost of doing business,” Day shares.
Day also speaks about the growing need for a workforce trained in the unique environment of an agricultural organization and how important it is for those working in specialized roles to integrate with one another and the software that’s available. “I’m looking at all of this information and it’s siloed,” Day says. “It’s so disconnected. It’s so analogue. It’s all done on pen and paper, and it takes forever. Making any kind of remotely real-time decision—let’s be honest, there’s a lot of risk. You leave revenue on the table. Your costs are inflated. There’s more risk than there should be because we’re not able to access information…to make those swift decisions.” As Venture Partner, Day also offers insight into the three things that stand out to her when she’s assessing startups and what sets the two-to-four that are chosen apart from the hundreds that apply.
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MARCH | APRIL 2023
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