The Soil Network

The Soil Network: Episode 3 - Chuck Baresich, Xavier Hébert-Couturier, and Dr. Lori Phillips

• Ian • Season 1 • Episode 3

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 Innovations in Agricultural Technology and Microbiology

In this enlightening episode of The Soil Network, we delve into the transformative world of agricultural technology and microbial ecology with three trailblazers in the field: Chuck Baresich, President of Haggerty Robotics; Dr. Lori Phillips, a Microbial Ecologist at Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada; and Xavier Hébert-Couturier, lead at Picketa Systems.

Join us as we unpack their discussions from the recent Innovative Farmers Association conference, where they explored the frontiers of their respective fields. Dr. Phillips shares insights into the underground world of soil microbiology and the significant changes observed when switching from conventional farming to systems utilizing perennial cover crops. Learn how new tools are allowing us to better understand and measure these subterranean dynamics.

Chuck Baresich brings his expertise in agricultural robotics, discussing the challenges and breakthroughs in integrating advanced robotics into farming operations. Discover how this technology is poised to revolutionize agricultural practices by enhancing precision and efficiency on the farm.

Xavier Hébert-Couturier rounds out the conversation with an in-depth look at his team's development of real-time leaf tissue analysis tools at Picketa Systems. These innovations are revolutionizing nutrient management by providing immediate data on crop nutrient content, allowing farmers to optimize fertilization strategies on the fly. This pivotal technology supports precision agriculture by ensuring nutrient applications are tailored specifically to plant needs, enhancing sustainability and crop health.

Learn More: Dive deeper into the innovations and projects of our guests by visiting their profiles and exploring further resources. Links to detailed information and related content are available below:

Tune in for a dynamic discussion on how technology and ecological insights are setting the stage for the next agricultural revolution, fostering a sustainable and technologically integrated approach to modern farming.


Thanks for tuning in to the Soil Network Podcast!

If you enjoyed this episode, share it with a fellow farmer or agri-curious friend. Don’t forget to subscribe so you never miss a conversation about farming smarter, growing better, and building stronger communities.

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Let’s keep growing—together. See you next time!

00:00:00:000 - 00:00:12:073
Unknown
so welcome to our another episode of the Bites and Coffee podcast. We are here today in Kitchener Waterloo with Laurie Phillips, Chuck Barr and Zavvi. Xavier or,

00:00:12:073 - 00:00:16:118
Unknown
Xavier. Either way, we're okay. Exactly. Xavier.

00:00:16:118 - 00:00:18:104
Unknown
he better. Yeah. Perfect.

00:00:18:104 - 00:00:23:081
Unknown
just finished an amazing session on New Frontiers here at the innovative Farmers Association conference.

00:00:23:081 - 00:00:26:048
Unknown
we're just going to have some nice, fun, candid conversations.

00:00:26:077 - 00:00:35:066
Unknown
Really excited to be chatting with you guys. It sounds like everyone else and equally excited to be chatting with you guys. I'd love to start. just a brief introduction,

00:00:35:066 - 00:00:44:012
Unknown
for each of you and tell me a little bit about what you guys were talking about today, especially for those who are tuning in at home and aren't entirely sure what was spoken about.

00:00:44:022 - 00:00:53:053
Unknown
Lori, we'll start with you. all right, so I work in soil microbiology, and we were talking about what happens when you transition your system from,

00:00:53:053 - 00:01:03:075
Unknown
basically a conventional system to a perennial cover cropping system. Can we actually detect what those what changes happen below ground? what are the changes?

00:01:03:075 - 00:01:05:011
Unknown
what direction are things going?

00:01:05:011 - 00:01:07:099
Unknown
Are you what what's improving? What's not improving?

00:01:07:099 - 00:01:15:101
Unknown
and how do we detect those changes more importantly as well, what are some of the new tools that we have in our pocket to actually evaluate what those changes are? Very cool.

00:01:15:101 - 00:01:17:047
Unknown
Awesome. Chuck.

00:01:17:047 - 00:01:19:041
Unknown
our agronomy company,

00:01:19:041 - 00:01:20:091
Unknown
which has been involved in,

00:01:20:091 - 00:01:26:008
Unknown
precision agriculture work for close to 20 years starting in 2020.

00:01:26:018 - 00:01:47:106
Unknown
We ventured into agricultural robotics. So what I talked about was what that transition looked like, some of the challenges that we had. And and I gave it, you know, an example of some of the pieces of tech that we're using and why we're using them. And why we we think that there's going to be a place for this technology moving into the future.

00:01:47:116 - 00:01:48:107
Unknown
Amazing. Thank you.

00:01:48:107 - 00:01:51:045
Unknown
Baker. Yeah. So we were talking about,

00:01:51:045 - 00:02:02:017
Unknown
what the system does, and we're working to make plant tissue analysis happen in real time in farms right there. So you can see your full nutrient profile to be able to dose your fertilizers.

00:02:02:017 - 00:02:03:070
Unknown
and specifically going over,

00:02:03:070 - 00:02:16:095
Unknown
an interesting project. We started with the University of Guelph expanding different crops from potatoes, corn to onions, and now adding even more so, had great conversation growers and got even more suggestions on new crops side to the platform.

00:02:16:095 - 00:02:47:108
Unknown
So it's been great. Amazing. One thing I find really interesting about the IPO conference is you have this clear difference between like big AI innovation and small AI innovation. We've had some great discussions with small AI, but not lot with big AI. And I think that's what makes you guys so unique and really cool to speak with. And considering each of your unique focuses soy biology, agriculture, robotics and nitrogen management, how do you see these disciplines intersecting to shape the future of sustainable farming practices?

00:02:47:117 - 00:02:53:062
Unknown
And whoever wants to answer, I'll just open the floor. I don't mind starting in that one. I think,

00:02:53:062 - 00:02:53:097
Unknown
it's,

00:02:53:097 - 00:03:00:065
Unknown
The technology and the ideas and look, we're at it. We're we're at a unique space and time where there is,

00:03:00:065 - 00:03:03:118
Unknown
a convergence of the technology and really,

00:03:03:118 - 00:03:08:026
Unknown
we're trying to take crops and crop production, you know, to the next level.

00:03:08:026 - 00:03:09:076
Unknown
And when you think about,

00:03:09:076 - 00:03:29:030
Unknown
you know, what stage of agriculture is in, you know, like, you know, as we moved from basic, you know, agrarian, you settle down, you start farming, you know, you move through the, you know, kind of the industrial revolution of farming. The and, you know, the invention of nitrogen fertilizer. Then we move into chemical farming.

00:03:29:030 - 00:03:41:003
Unknown
We move into big technology like big tractors, equipment and all these kinds of things. All of those stages have taken us to a certain point on the productivity curve.

00:03:41:003 - 00:03:51:072
Unknown
But I think that's leveling out to some degree. And now we're looking to what is the next piece of tech that's going to to increase that. So what we've done to date has taken us so far.

00:03:51:081 - 00:03:53:038
Unknown
Now we want to move past that.

00:03:53:038 - 00:03:53:111
Unknown
Very cool.

00:03:53:111 - 00:04:11:114
Unknown
It's interesting you say that because in some ways when we're looking at soil biology, we're going back to practices that were used to three 402,000 years ago where, you know, farmers knew that if you, you know, if you continually planted the same crop in the same spot, that you would have disease problems, you would your crops wouldn't grow as well.

00:04:11:114 - 00:04:34:053
Unknown
So if you're going to grow corn, you should probably throw a bean in there as well. You know, if it indigenous cultures you look at, you know, historically through the record. I mean those were the that was called a knowledge back then. I think the difference now is and again, we're I agree that we're plateauing. And now we're both looking to the past and looking to the future to see how can we make that next great big, you know, that next leap, the next increment.

00:04:34:062 - 00:04:56:001
Unknown
And I think we really are working. And when you're looking at biology, biological systems, we're not talking about fundamentally changing anything. We're talking about small tweaks. one of those small tweaks that we can use using, you know, deploying new tools to assess questions that are thousands of years old to understand what exactly is happening when you do this.

00:04:56:001 - 00:05:00:006
Unknown
And with that additional information, you can maybe make that additional small step.

00:05:00:006 - 00:05:15:007
Unknown
going forward. So it's it's an interesting divergence, I would say, and convergence of, of disciplines of knowledge. Very cool. Yeah. I think Chuck really had a great point on his presentation where it was, you know, two plus two equals five. How can we find that?

00:05:15:016 - 00:05:23:014
Unknown
And when you look at kind of a new sector coming in for precision, high precision navigation, new ways to measure things, supply things,

00:05:23:014 - 00:05:29:080
Unknown
that's where things are headed, right? Everyone's kind of proven their own path. But once you start thinking of how things connect together,

00:05:29:080 - 00:05:34:055
Unknown
you know, into a new system, that's pretty interesting to see, and you're starting to see little hints of it here and there.

00:05:34:055 - 00:05:41:047
Unknown
And so, yeah, yeah, you know, stuff that wasn't stuff that people did like, as you said, 3 or 400 years ago,

00:05:41:047 - 00:05:56:050
Unknown
that we excluded out of the system because we wanted to use because some other piece of shiny tech took us a certain way. But now we can bring that back in and that and then and again to get to that two plus two equals five, right?

00:05:56:054 - 00:06:01:095
Unknown
I agree, it was what was interesting to me. And it is maybe a bit of a digression, but you were talking about,

00:06:01:095 - 00:06:33:046
Unknown
how your system can be used to detect disease loads as well. So I mean, if again, you're looking at some cellular basically changes in plant structure that are indicative of that disease taking hold, but you could probably take that same information, apply it to things like does is my legume has it inoculated properly, is it fixing enough nitrogen or should I be looking at modifying the way I grow my legume crops so that I can get better nitrogen fixation happening through that biological plant symbiosis?

00:06:33:056 - 00:06:54:014
Unknown
but using a system like yours to detect where those deficiencies are happening, rather than having to go in with a shovel and dig something up and crack open a nodule and say, oh, yes, look, there's something there. So I think there's there's some interesting convergences that can happen from the biological perspective and the technological perspective on farm itself, that can be quite advantageous.

00:06:54:028 - 00:07:08:103
Unknown
And we can do that at scale. Yeah, yeah. And we can we can use a sensor like this and we can instead of just doing one shovel full and saying, well, that's representative of the field, which doesn't get us anywhere. We can now do this at scale in real time.

00:07:08:103 - 00:07:11:001
Unknown
that's the cool part of this, right?

00:07:11:001 - 00:07:15:064
Unknown
you mentioned the the virus detection is in R&D, but we're with an

00:07:15:064 - 00:07:16:088
Unknown
even with the the nutrients.

00:07:16:088 - 00:07:30:080
Unknown
Right. You can make sure that, you know, you're as resistant to disease as possible. But yeah, I fully agree. Once you're you have the access to the crop and you're already scanning it. What else can you do with that. So we've already built this the tricorder from Star Trek. All right. That's awesome

00:07:30:080 - 00:07:34:041
Unknown
Oh yeah. That upscale piece applies to, you know, soil biology as well.

00:07:34:041 - 00:07:47:112
Unknown
I mean, the only reason we can do what we do now is because we have higher throughput methods. So the prices have come down for the technology because we piggybacked on the medical world. Prices have come down for the technology, high throughput. As we get more and more,

00:07:47:112 - 00:07:54:025
Unknown
you know, we get better equipment in the labs. We can do more and more samples so we can start high throughput those assays.

00:07:54:034 - 00:08:12:046
Unknown
But right now, from my perspective, the bottleneck for me, a lot of it is still actually physically getting a sample and getting a sample that's representative of the field. So we take as many samples as we can. But we you know, there's there's a finite number of shovel fulls and soil that you can get in the lab and analyze.

00:08:12:075 - 00:08:36:038
Unknown
But if you can use the instrumentation to determine where are the where, where are the good growing areas in the bad growing areas to simplify it, and then use that instrumentation to determine a sampling strategy to go in and look and see what is deficient or or advantageous in the biological community. Then you can start to upscale what we're doing as well using these new technologies.

00:08:36:047 - 00:08:38:094
Unknown
Yeah. And like farmer said, it,

00:08:38:094 - 00:08:59:059
Unknown
in the breakout session there, if you have it, you're going to use it right. Then when it's accessible there, it makes it so that some practices that were maybe, would only make sense in vineyards or potatoes or very many managed crops are now, possible do with corn. Yeah. And just, you know, how did the metrics on hand changes what you pay attention to and then what you're managing.

00:08:59:059 - 00:09:00:012
Unknown
Right. So,

00:09:00:012 - 00:09:06:069
Unknown
yeah. And and we're not the only ones doing this. There's a lot of other layers going on. And, you know, once you have that data, how do you apply it? But,

00:09:06:069 - 00:09:09:047
Unknown
yeah, it's that's about where you're getting

00:09:09:047 - 00:09:19:112
Unknown
afterwards. Right? Yeah. Cool. Would you be able to discuss the specific challenges within modern agriculture that each of your areas of expertise are addressing?

00:09:20:001 - 00:09:21:080
Unknown
Xavier, let me start with you. Yeah.

00:09:21:080 - 00:09:24:005
Unknown
I think, like Laura mentioned, data availability and,

00:09:24:005 - 00:09:25:013
Unknown
scalability of data.

00:09:25:013 - 00:09:26:037
Unknown
a lot of the,

00:09:26:037 - 00:09:33:090
Unknown
advice there are a lot of the way agriculture has been done has been on kind of relying on human senses for, for a good while. And we're getting more and more,

00:09:33:090 - 00:09:35:105
Unknown
kind of quantitative, quantified.

00:09:35:114 - 00:09:38:051
Unknown
But this would be like another step where you can see the full nutrient,

00:09:38:051 - 00:09:49:017
Unknown
availability there. So that's the first one. And then it goes into other things like flavor, labor availability with being able to cover more ground, things like that. Very cool. But the first one is data knowing what the crop needs. So

00:09:49:017 - 00:09:53:037
Unknown
and labor availability, it's come up a few times and I think it's that keep coming up.

00:09:53:046 - 00:09:53:089
Unknown
Chuck,

00:09:53:089 - 00:09:54:069
Unknown
I think the,

00:09:54:069 - 00:09:56:104
Unknown
I know labor labor is one

00:09:56:104 - 00:10:16:037
Unknown
and it's and as I mentioned in my presentation, it's not just labor cost. It's also the opportunity cost or the or was lost of not getting that labor, you know, the cost of not having the work done on time is there's when we look at weed control, and a lot of the focus of the robotics is on the removal of weeds.

00:10:16:037 - 00:10:33:049
Unknown
There's a lot of crop loss due to weed competition. That is very that just isn't being measured right now. And it's just an accepted farming practice that the weeds have gotten big. It impacts the crop. Who knows what else is impacting,

00:10:33:049 - 00:10:42:110
Unknown
on the on the crop physiology. So the use of robotics can help to alleviate those, those two pieces.

00:10:43:000 - 00:10:46:024
Unknown
The other thing the robotic systems can do is they can add

00:10:46:024 - 00:10:55:034
Unknown
a layer, but they can help to manage the complexity of the operation. There's there's so much going on in a crop or in a field.

00:10:55:034 - 00:10:59:044
Unknown
We haven't 100% figured out that space yet, but

00:10:59:044 - 00:11:11:037
Unknown
the idea of using the the, you know, the sensors and cameras and things is we can start to measure this technology at scale and hopefully turn that into something useful.

00:11:11:037 - 00:11:21:106
Unknown
And I want to I don't want to sound like that. That's not there today. Like there's lots of promises being made, but that is one of the outcomes that we hope to get.

00:11:21:106 - 00:11:32:000
Unknown
you know, 100 years ago or 200 years ago, or when a farmer farmed, they would grow a crop on a very specific part of their field because they knew would perform well.

00:11:32:000 - 00:11:53:108
Unknown
It did well there. But that's that practice has gone away. One of the promises of tech is to sort of figure out why that is, and to allow the the machinery to go back to matching the crop to the farm and try to get back more in a, in a, in a better rhythm or cycle or whatever it might for

00:11:53:108 - 00:11:54:053
Unknown
Florida.

00:11:54:062 - 00:11:57:051
Unknown
It's an interesting question when you're talking about soil biology, because I think it's,

00:11:57:051 - 00:12:08:093
Unknown
to a certain extent it's a bit of a luxury, but it's the it's that value added that once everything else is normal within the system. But on the other hand, I mean, I'm in the I'm in the business of providing knowledge. That's what I am.

00:12:08:093 - 00:12:28:034
Unknown
That's that's what I do is and that's what soil biology does is it provides knowledge about how your system is working so you can manage that system from the surface. And we do that. That's how we farm typically is we manage it from the surface. But if you don't know how the engine of that system is working, the biological processes are the engine of that system.

00:12:28:034 - 00:12:48:001
Unknown
If you don't know how the engine of the system is working, there's only so much you can do to keep to keep the system running. And I think the one thing that, you know, our advanced understanding of soil biological processes and the tools that we have to measure those processes is providing that that knowledge that allows you to make, again, we're talking small tweaks to the system,

00:12:48:001 - 00:12:54:108
Unknown
to see, you know, to, to improve those yields just a little bit more to say, why isn't this marginal area working for me?

00:12:54:108 - 00:13:20:026
Unknown
Because it might not just be a question of it needs more boron or it needs more of more nitrogen. There might be something fundamentally wrong within that system. So we do layer in and add value, I would say. But we're not a fundamental driver of increase productivity in and of itself, that the tools that we bring to the table and in some some examples that I've seen when we're bringing in cover crops, let's say into the horticulture space,

00:13:20:026 - 00:13:25:014
Unknown
that the introduction of cover crops into an area of the field that was normally bare,

00:13:25:014 - 00:13:28:114
Unknown
it can in some cases help to alleviate other stresses.

00:13:29:003 - 00:13:43:099
Unknown
You know, it can provide competition for insects, it can provide other benefits that in the past, because the farmers couldn't manage those areas any other way, they kind of ignored that. And, you know, and so

00:13:43:099 - 00:13:51:098
Unknown
there's there's a lot of this, you know, you know, farming at at the surface level can only take us so far, you know, and, and

00:13:51:098 - 00:13:53:027
Unknown
and that's, that's a great way to put that.

00:13:53:027 - 00:13:55:013
Unknown
I like that I'm going to steal that line actually

00:13:55:013 - 00:13:56:062
Unknown
just you know. Yeah.

00:13:56:062 - 00:13:58:064
Unknown
Speaking of lines actually

00:13:58:064 - 00:14:00:102
Unknown
it's something I've heard a lot today and

00:14:00:102 - 00:14:08:083
Unknown
especially over the past few months is like, the saying where we know more about, like, the stars in the sky than we do what's going on, like seven feet,

00:14:08:083 - 00:14:09:042
Unknown
below us.

00:14:09:042 - 00:14:10:111
Unknown
can you guys speak to that and tell us,

00:14:10:111 - 00:14:12:059
Unknown
is there some truth to that?

00:14:12:068 - 00:14:24:074
Unknown
probably. I mean, it's it's hard, right, to look below the ground. I mean, when we're looking at, the stars, we are we're using equipment, telescopes that are capable of scanning immense distances and,

00:14:24:074 - 00:14:32:023
Unknown
and time with, with distance. When you're looking below ground, the only way to truly understand what's happening below ground right now is to,

00:14:32:023 - 00:14:36:039
Unknown
dig a pit is to take a soil sample is to take those soil cores.

00:14:36:048 - 00:14:45:079
Unknown
So the work of looking below ground is still quite labor intensive. And because it's labor intensive, we don't do as much of those surveys as we used to.

00:14:45:079 - 00:15:00:017
Unknown
when it comes to looking at the biological communities, I mean, realistically, we've only had these tools at our disposal for for 30 years. So, you know, we there's we know more about what we don't know now than we, you know, there's even more for exactly.

00:15:00:027 - 00:15:08:034
Unknown
so some of it is access to tool, some of it is labor intensive. There's some interesting work going on that I'd like to see continued with using,

00:15:08:034 - 00:15:13:038
Unknown
radar imaging or sorry, like lidar imaging to, you know, they're using it to map cover,

00:15:13:038 - 00:15:26:018
Unknown
cover crop coverage. They're using it for soil moisture. And what we'd like to see happening is, can we actually use that to map areas that might be deficient in certain microbes, for example, Nitra fires, detector fires, or whatever?

00:15:26:028 - 00:15:27:095
Unknown
So we've done some work with,

00:15:27:095 - 00:15:41:057
Unknown
mapping in a central experimental farm in Ottawa, trying to see can we actually start predicting what we would expect to see from a biological response based on these variables that we can detect using, remote sensing. So

00:15:41:057 - 00:15:46:096
Unknown
really, when it comes to how much we don't know below ground, it's because of the tools and the labor.

00:15:46:096 - 00:15:49:064
Unknown
And we go back to tools and labor, which was mentioned earlier.

00:15:49:064 - 00:15:57:045
Unknown
and there's only so much that we can do, at any point in time that's really I don't know if that's. Yeah, I think that was great. And then you guys to look at

00:15:57:045 - 00:15:58:052
Unknown
pretty much covers it.

00:15:58:052 - 00:16:01:028
Unknown
Yeah. I think, you know, if I put my farmer hat on,

00:16:01:028 - 00:16:03:050
Unknown
we've always taken the dirt for granted.

00:16:03:060 - 00:16:15:032
Unknown
We called it dirt. Right. And and you know, so if you needed to move the dirt, you dug it and you threw it away. If you needed to bury your garbage and make a big garbage dump somewhere, you dug a big hole and you bury you know, and that's

00:16:15:032 - 00:16:20:002
Unknown
we didn't we have not put the value on the soil

00:16:20:002 - 00:16:24:013
Unknown
as we have on other commodities and other things.

00:16:24:013 - 00:16:38:109
Unknown
And we, we, you know, it's just so ubiquitous. It gets ignored. And I think that's part so the reason the other reason is that it's always treated us so well. So the fact that we have just been able to do whatever we wanted to. Yeah,

00:16:38:109 - 00:16:53:031
Unknown
it hasn't come back to and it's and it's interesting when you see the extremists, you know, there are some extremists that come out there and say we only have seven crops left, seven crops, and the soil is depleted forever.

00:16:53:041 - 00:17:04:076
Unknown
Those people don't. They don't. They're not helping us like an interstellar type. Yeah. Just go, you know. But but on the flip side, the practices that we're doing today,

00:17:04:076 - 00:17:15:041
Unknown
treating the soil as we have, as you have mentioned it, but what we can get out of that has plateaued. And I think that is that's this is why it's coming of interest now.

00:17:15:041 - 00:17:16:107
Unknown
Yeah. Yeah. Kind of,

00:17:16:107 - 00:17:23:064
Unknown
reached the limit. So now you're like looking underneath. I'm looking at the code and seeing how can you go? Yeah. Yeah. Well, I also think in,

00:17:23:064 - 00:17:27:019
Unknown
you know, I mentioned earlier that it's a luxury to be able to look at the soil biology.

00:17:27:019 - 00:17:29:056
Unknown
and I think, you know, if you look at Canada,

00:17:29:056 - 00:17:33:104
Unknown
Europe, the US, we are countries that are relatively food rich, right?

00:17:33:110 - 00:17:36:101
Unknown
Yes, yes. It's degrading and there's no, there's no and cheap.

00:17:36:101 - 00:17:37:061
Unknown
It is cheap.

00:17:37:061 - 00:17:45:011
Unknown
yeah. But you know, we haven't we haven't had to worry. We haven't been at the edge of sustainability. If you look at other countries where,

00:17:45:011 - 00:17:52:113
Unknown
you know, productivity is really, really low and where people are living at the edge of sustainability, I think there's a little bit more probably,

00:17:52:113 - 00:18:03:102
Unknown
individuals there that are paying a little bit more attention because they have they have the biology of some kind of understanding that the biology is critical to survival, whereas here we haven't had to.

00:18:03:102 - 00:18:18:002
Unknown
It's kind of like me in the Mini Cooper I drive. I mean, when I drove an old beater pickup truck, I mean, I was changing the oil every 2 to 3 months because the metal filings were adding on. But when I'm driving my Mini Cooper, I take it in once a year. I don't have to worry about the oil.

00:18:18:011 - 00:18:31:029
Unknown
so so yeah, I think our our soil here, we, like you say we've taken it for granted as more of a food waste. We haven't had to worry about it. But now we're realizing two things. Both that our soils are degrading. and we see that really, really clearly.

00:18:31:029 - 00:18:36:113
Unknown
so our souls are degrading from a biodiversity and from a nutrient perspective in general, organic matter.

00:18:37:003 - 00:18:44:073
Unknown
and we're also, again, where we know that we need to feed, you know, that many more people in the next 20 years. So we have this paradigm where,

00:18:44:073 - 00:18:47:056
Unknown
the resource that we need to feed those people is degrading.

00:18:47:056 - 00:18:56:004
Unknown
but the need for food is increasing. And the only way to bridge that gap is to start taking care of that engine that's driving that system a little bit better.

00:18:56:025 - 00:19:17:095
Unknown
And those are data driven. Yeah, those are data driven decisions. Yeah. And on that note, Xavier, I'd like to loop you in here. So your work focuses on making nitrogen management more efficient. Correct. Yeah okay. Perfect. Just want to make sure how can data from soil biology studies and robotics technology inform and refine nitrogen management strategies? Yeah, I think it's key.

00:19:17:095 - 00:19:37:008
Unknown
Like whenever you work with with any agronomists, like you're looking at the soil maps, you're looking at weather and then you're looking at live tissue, right? It's it's about having all that data in context because without that or not knowing, you know, is it a lack of a nutrient or is it just the availability of it. Right. A lot of it determines is determined by the soil,

00:19:37:008 - 00:19:38:046
Unknown
biology and what's going on there.

00:19:38:046 - 00:19:46:005
Unknown
Right. So leaf tissue is one part of it. It's one part of it that was, inaccessible largely for for a lot of farmers, for a lot of crops due to,

00:19:46:005 - 00:19:51:027
Unknown
having to go through this chemical process and having it ground up, sent out, shipped and label and all that.

00:19:51:027 - 00:19:55:076
Unknown
so, yeah, it takes, you know, it still takes the agronomist to, to know that region.

00:19:55:081 - 00:20:01:066
Unknown
Know that farmer, and take that data and do recommendations for it like they're the one who act on it,

00:20:01:066 - 00:20:03:041
Unknown
and then do the best for, for their crop.

00:20:03:041 - 00:20:03:113
Unknown
yeah. With,

00:20:03:113 - 00:20:04:105
Unknown
with the, the,

00:20:04:105 - 00:20:06:098
Unknown
automation part that's super exciting. And,

00:20:06:098 - 00:20:10:070
Unknown
something I hope to meet, we continue to work on is we're working with, well, here and with,

00:20:10:070 - 00:20:12:039
Unknown
with Chuck there as well.

00:20:12:049 - 00:20:20:092
Unknown
is how can we take this system, which right now it's still a scout going out, picking leads and scanning them. you know, what's the next evolution of that? Like,

00:20:20:092 - 00:20:28:099
Unknown
having it done as you go? That's kind of the the holy grail we're working towards. I'm sure there's lots of work to be done there to to make it possible, but,

00:20:28:099 - 00:20:31:063
Unknown
you know, it doesn't take too much imagination to see this,

00:20:31:063 - 00:20:35:043
Unknown
being done continuously as looking at every leaf, looking at every crop.

00:20:35:052 - 00:20:41:077
Unknown
as machine learning goes down the field. So and that makes it a lot more possible with autonomous vehicles. And, precision application,

00:20:41:077 - 00:20:46:116
Unknown
methods. Very cool. Is there anything you got to look at? Can I tell you what my ideal robot would

00:20:46:116 - 00:20:56:077
Unknown
love it. So. So my ideal robot would have the capacity that your, your system has for scanning leaf tissue to detect whether it's nutrient deficiency or disease symptoms.

00:20:56:087 - 00:20:58:086
Unknown
And it's being carried by a robot that,

00:20:58:086 - 00:21:02:052
Unknown
doesn't zap weeds, but that actually will be able to take a,

00:21:02:052 - 00:21:16:019
Unknown
soil sample or a plant sample, put it into a carrier, we can bring it back. That comes back in, goes into a lab system that's all coordinated as well. And we can detect if there's disease, if it looks like there's disease, pressure, what is the pathogen?

00:21:16:019 - 00:21:18:027
Unknown
What's the pathogen that's colonizing the root?

00:21:18:027 - 00:21:21:056
Unknown
and can we actually marry that up? What is the if there's,

00:21:21:056 - 00:21:38:085
Unknown
nutrient deficiency, can we target and see? Are there certain organisms that should be present there that aren't present there? Then the robot comes back in with the bio inoculum and sprays those areas where, nutrient deficiency is occurring, where microbes, biological solutions can actually play a role.

00:21:38:094 - 00:21:42:035
Unknown
and that that sounds farfetched, but it from the technology

00:21:42:035 - 00:21:48:024
Unknown
part and we know that, you know, there are people that are working with target foliar inoculum, for example.

00:21:48:024 - 00:22:03:008
Unknown
so if you could go in and rather than toward doing a foliar inoculum spray across the whole field, use this merge system and understand the biology of it well enough that you could go back in and say, all right, here's the solution for this in real time, within the space of a couple of days.

00:22:03:018 - 00:22:09:006
Unknown
I mean, that would that to me would be an ideal merging of all three kind of technologies that we're talking about.

00:22:09:006 - 00:22:18:048
Unknown
So, so, one of one of the dangers of giving farmers a little bit of data is once they have a little bit, suddenly they want everything. What is it? If

00:22:18:048 - 00:22:19:117
Unknown
you give a moose a muffin right.

00:22:19:117 - 00:22:28:060
Unknown
And and so the but the, the technology that we have now that actually we have the ability to generate that data.

00:22:28:085 - 00:22:40:040
Unknown
And what we're seeing from farmers yield maps and from soil testing and all this kind of stuff, is that our old ways of understanding what's going on in the field, just don't cut it

00:22:40:040 - 00:22:50:079
Unknown
in that the yield responses to what we've always done, because the farmers generally their default position is is what I did last year. So I'm going to do that next year, which is and you know what?

00:22:50:079 - 00:22:55:100
Unknown
And it works for them. I'm not making I'm not cutting farmer out. The reason why they do that is that it generally works.

00:22:55:100 - 00:23:00:041
Unknown
And, you know, farmers aren't dumb people. But what we're seeing is that

00:23:00:041 - 00:23:17:031
Unknown
the soil testing done the way that we have been doing it is not equating to the outcomes. And they're not matching up, which is why we're sitting there saying there's something else going on in that soil, which and what is that?

00:23:17:031 - 00:23:20:023
Unknown
And then your sensor hopefully would tell us.

00:23:20:023 - 00:23:43:013
Unknown
Is it is it nutrient related? Is a disease related? You know, this is this is where this comes from, where the technology merges together. Is in the generation of an actionable item to the producer. The producer actually doesn't care about the soil test readings. The producer doesn't care about the nutrient, really don't care about any of these things the producer cares about.

00:23:43:013 - 00:24:04:021
Unknown
What should I do? You know, and this is where it comes into generating a map. And one of the reasons why, you know, if I put my agronomy company hat back on, I get pitched close to once a week by a company who has a new product, a new and we like, we can call it voodoo juice and snake oil and all these kinds of things.

00:24:04:024 - 00:24:04:078
Unknown
Okay,

00:24:04:078 - 00:24:21:053
Unknown
for the most part, these products in the lab show promise. But in the field, they very rarely work. And the reason why they, they very rarely work is that we don't understand what is going on in the soil.

00:24:21:053 - 00:24:29:078
Unknown
And if we could apply those products to the areas that need it, we'd probably have a lot greater success rate.

00:24:29:088 - 00:24:52:059
Unknown
And this is where the convergence of a convergence of tech starts to come together, where we say, let's match the product to where it's needed to get the result. And a good a good example of that is we've been trying to do some work with, you know, fungicide trials in soybeans, targeting that fungicide to the parts of the field that actually need it.

00:24:52:068 - 00:24:56:049
Unknown
And this is where the potential of drones comes in, right? You know,

00:24:56:049 - 00:25:01:010
Unknown
the you know, the spot application that that's where this is going. You should it was in Blade Runner.

00:25:01:010 - 00:25:15:047
Unknown
A new Blade Runner had to do something similar. Well, there's a lot of like dark matter, right? I didn't know 100% interesting. Which is, you know, in astrophysics, if the equation doesn't work out, there's some dark matter, some type of dark matter working out.

00:25:15:047 - 00:25:28:104
Unknown
And. But the reason that is, is that the more you know, the more you don't know. Right? So. Right. Kind of in soil biology we call it the black box. It's like we know something's happening in that black box, but we don't know what it is. It was the previous farm owner that did it was

00:25:28:104 - 00:25:30:008
Unknown
just haunted. Yeah, yeah,

00:25:30:008 - 00:25:34:067
Unknown
I'd like to take a bit of a pivot, but I think this will have a little bit of fun here.

00:25:34:077 - 00:25:40:006
Unknown
so, Tori. Wonderful. Amazing executive director for the Assembly. If he

00:25:40:006 - 00:25:59:113
Unknown
was telling a story, about Chuck and Chuck's family, I learned that your family has this annual tradition, where one member gets to choose an activity during the week, fostering, you know, a rich environment to explore, create, be curious together, really explore that curiosity, which I think is such an important part of innovating.

00:26:00:002 - 00:26:00:100
Unknown
so this tradition has

00:26:00:100 - 00:26:04:000
Unknown
sparked an interest in engineering for your daughter. Correct.

00:26:04:000 - 00:26:17:009
Unknown
so this is highlighting the importance of exposure and support in shaping the aspirations for young women, especially in agriculture. So in this agricultural context, massively ag engineering a field where women are increasingly making their mark.

00:26:17:009 - 00:26:20:008
Unknown
as we have the amazing Lori Phillips with us.

00:26:20:018 - 00:26:30:069
Unknown
can you share how these inclusive family environment, how this inclusive family environment has influenced your view on diversity and inclusion within the agriculture sector, particularly regarding the role of women?

00:26:30:069 - 00:26:38:029
Unknown
I think I think from, from my, from my perspective, like, you know, growing up in a very traditional, you know,

00:26:38:029 - 00:26:40:022
Unknown
farming, you know, farming background,

00:26:40:022 - 00:26:46:110
Unknown
the way that things were done was that when you needed workers, you went and you found the farmer son.

00:26:47:000 - 00:26:50:065
Unknown
That's who you hired. And the

00:26:50:065 - 00:27:12:092
Unknown
the way that jobs were structured were all over, all kind of around that, you know, you hired that person because you knew that they grew up driving that tractor. And so before driving that sprayer, because that's what they did. You had confidence that if I bought a brand new $700,000 sprayer, if I hired that kid, they could they could operate it.

00:27:12:104 - 00:27:15:001
Unknown
That's a that's that's kind of how things were done.

00:27:15:001 - 00:27:20:024
Unknown
The the reality is, is that agriculture is such a small community nowadays.

00:27:20:024 - 00:27:25:080
Unknown
If you still have that mindset, you are going to have no workers. And,

00:27:25:080 - 00:27:28:077
Unknown
and you have to you have to open

00:27:28:077 - 00:27:39:078
Unknown
the, the, your world up that it's anybody who has the interest. And it's really it's the interest in the attitude you need to hire for now, not necessarily merely the background.

00:27:39:093 - 00:27:51:038
Unknown
Interesting. So this includes not just farm kids, but people who are outside of agriculture who really want to be in the space and in the,

00:27:51:038 - 00:28:13:020
Unknown
it's interesting that the technology sector somewhat helps to bridge that gap because it it provides a connection that's outside of the of the traditional rules. And when we're looking at our business, you know, we're we look at this now that

00:28:13:020 - 00:28:17:071
Unknown
are there things that we could do to alleviate some of those barriers?

00:28:17:092 - 00:28:20:096
Unknown
You know, if, and I guess one of the examples

00:28:20:096 - 00:28:33:030
Unknown
that I, that I think about in my own life, like my, you know, one of my daughters would like to join us in the family business. She's interested in this. She comes to all of our robotics conferences. She's very much part of this.

00:28:33:030 - 00:28:37:068
Unknown
but there are certain things that that physically, she's not strong enough to do.

00:28:37:078 - 00:28:51:063
Unknown
And the old way of thinking was just, you know, we used to kind of make fun of my sister, you know, I'm not strong enough and, you know, and. Right. But you don't think about at the time how that actually creates an exclusionary environment for her to be part of that.

00:28:51:063 - 00:28:55:102
Unknown
The way that we think, I think about it now that I've grown up and matured

00:28:55:102 - 00:29:02:117
Unknown
is how do I change that system so that she can participate so that she can be part of it?

00:29:02:119 - 00:29:17:023
Unknown
What jobs like? How do we structure this? And so my daughter, for example, she drives our tree eater drives, spreads all the fertilizer to does all that kind of stuff. This is something that that you know that she can do and she enjoys doing. And

00:29:17:023 - 00:29:27:046
Unknown
and then being in the space, it's actually fun to watch her interacting with, you know, potential customers and things and then coming up and asking her questions and, and stuff like that.

00:29:27:056 - 00:29:29:088
Unknown
It really is a change in mindset.

00:29:29:088 - 00:29:30:051
Unknown
the,

00:29:30:051 - 00:29:31:090
Unknown
the skills that

00:29:31:090 - 00:29:40:041
Unknown
that people can bring to the table are more than just a strong back and weak mind kind of thing. It's it's the technology skills, the,

00:29:40:041 - 00:29:49:078
Unknown
interpersonal skills, the way of thinking about things in a different way that that's what that's what we're seeing. Very cool. Lori, just some thoughts.

00:29:49:078 - 00:29:53:082
Unknown
I mean, I've seen you talk about trying to improve representation,

00:29:53:082 - 00:30:08:091
Unknown
within whatever the workforce is. And agriculture, as you, as you mentioned, has traditionally been male dominated. And I go back to my childhood and I grew up in a small farming community north of Edmonton, and we were very, you know, we it was a small town.

00:30:08:101 - 00:30:11:045
Unknown
there were a lot of farm kids. There was a lot of non farm kids,

00:30:11:045 - 00:30:13:021
Unknown
in that, in that scenario,

00:30:13:021 - 00:30:27:117
Unknown
the guys in my class who were from farming families were the ones that were doing the heavy chores, whereas the girls in those families, in those farming, you know, in those farming families were the ones that were getting up and helping their moms get the lunches ready, eat for the for the guys going out and do the chores.

00:30:27:118 - 00:30:33:009
Unknown
So I saw that division really, really clearly when I was growing up. What changes a lot,

00:30:33:009 - 00:30:53:043
Unknown
is also is, is increasing representation. So your daughter, other people will see, other women will see your daughter. They'll see her in that role. They'll they'll understand that, there are possibilities there. And if I can draw a parallel to my own career, I suppose I had no idea that a career like science was possible when I was growing up.

00:30:53:047 - 00:31:05:111
Unknown
It wasn't. It wasn't on my radar. I didn't know any scientists. I certainly didn't know any female scientist. You know, I watched David Suzuki on television and that was it. That's what a scientist was. Yeah, it was only when I started, you know,

00:31:05:111 - 00:31:10:086
Unknown
exploring and getting out of that small town and seeing those role models,

00:31:10:086 - 00:31:14:030
Unknown
who were doing science that I realized, hey, this is a career.

00:31:14:030 - 00:31:15:019
Unknown
I can do this.

00:31:15:019 - 00:31:21:086
Unknown
I am welcome in this space. So I'm welcoming this space. I'm capable of working in this space, and,

00:31:21:086 - 00:31:35:015
Unknown
it's a space that's going to be welcoming when I say my words or repeating myself there. So I think that that representation that you're talking about, removing those barriers for people to, join whatever that working environment is,

00:31:35:015 - 00:31:46:088
Unknown
and then having that person be again, they, they will influence two, three or 4 or 5, however many more people to join in in that environment because I, I guess representation really does matter.

00:31:46:097 - 00:31:48:088
Unknown
you need to be able to see yourself somewhere.

00:31:48:088 - 00:31:52:079
Unknown
in a like she still gets lots of double takes, which is going down the interest am,

00:31:52:079 - 00:31:55:060
Unknown
interrogator that will look and see who's driving this thing.

00:31:55:060 - 00:32:03:098
Unknown
But, you know, I, I look at the example of, you know, if, if, if drones ever become legal for spraying, for example.

00:32:03:098 - 00:32:09:088
Unknown
Not very many people would feel comfortable driving a half million dollar machine at

00:32:09:088 - 00:32:10:088
Unknown
30 miles an hour,

00:32:10:088 - 00:32:16:014
Unknown
hurtling down a side road full of chemicals. Not a lot of people have that skill set,

00:32:16:014 - 00:32:27:012
Unknown
but a lot of people have the skill set of operating a small drone, right? Using a small jug to fill it. It's just a regular vehicle goes down.

00:32:27:015 - 00:32:42:042
Unknown
There's still doing a farming job and it might look a little bit different, but they're still doing that same job. And it opens up the the labor pool. So much bigger than, than than our traditional old view set of what that was.

00:32:42:042 - 00:32:48:043
Unknown
and when you're going after like big challenges, like we talked about, of going deeper on the science side that attracts even more talent, right?

00:32:48:043 - 00:32:52:027
Unknown
Like if you feel like you're contributing to something and anecdotally like,

00:32:52:027 - 00:32:58:101
Unknown
going to the conference yesterday on the bus, I was sitting next to someone who saw me work on science and said, I've never worked in agriculture.

00:32:58:101 - 00:33:02:014
Unknown
I've worked as a PhD in, in psychology.

00:33:02:014 - 00:33:06:118
Unknown
I find this interesting. And I want to work with, robotics and, you know, technologies and things like this.

00:33:07:016 - 00:33:08:044
Unknown
this was, you know,

00:33:08:044 - 00:33:09:039
Unknown
there were still those,

00:33:09:039 - 00:33:15:092
Unknown
like, she even asked, like, you know, will people accept me? Like, there's still concerns, but, things like this, things like,

00:33:15:092 - 00:33:26:038
Unknown
showing the science and technology side, I feel is, you know, going in the right direction to attract people. It was good to see someone from Toronto go out and, you know, come to Kitchener, come to go after to see this,

00:33:26:038 - 00:33:30:062
Unknown
type of things going on to two of our employees are not firkins.

00:33:30:072 - 00:33:37:080
Unknown
Yeah, but they may want to be involved in ag and but they came from the tech side. Right. And it's fun to see. Yeah,

00:33:37:080 - 00:33:45:117
Unknown
I would say almost 100% of the students that we have coming through the lab have never set foot on a farm before, and they're always very excited to see their first chicken

00:33:45:117 - 00:33:48:003
Unknown
drive down the road heading towards the field site.

00:33:48:003 - 00:33:55:047
Unknown
And chickens are you know, it's it's like spotting, I don't know, moose in the wild or something. so, you know, when you're, when you're looking at,

00:33:55:047 - 00:34:06:053
Unknown
again, for me providing that access to these most of these kids are coming from the GTA. We hire from Waterloo. We hire from. Well, we get about you know, a stream of co-op students coming through the lab.

00:34:06:063 - 00:34:13:074
Unknown
One of the things that they learn is that farms aren't scary, right? I mean, I know the machinery is scary, but one of the things they learn is that,

00:34:13:074 - 00:34:26:112
Unknown
you can apply logic and reason. It's not all about brute force. You can go in and you can see the elegance of the system. You can see the elegance of the solutions that people are applying to manage different problems, regardless of what those problems are.

00:34:27:001 - 00:34:44:091
Unknown
and by bringing those kids through the lab and I'm not they're not flowing necessarily to farming systems, but they're taking that knowledge back home with them. They're they're taking they all interact with some of the farmers that that we work with. They usually get rides and combines and things like that, which is always very, very exciting.

00:34:44:091 - 00:34:46:081
Unknown
but they take that knowledge back with them.

00:34:46:081 - 00:35:14:024
Unknown
And so you expand an awareness and a knowledge of what farming means today. in a group of individuals who would otherwise not have any access to that information. And I think when you're looking at expanding the talent pool, that's equally important to consider. Sort of the peripheral activities associated with farming where you're getting people, you're giving people experiences who wouldn't normally have those experiences, and then they take those and again, they disseminate, disseminated to the wider community.

00:35:14:033 - 00:35:16:035
Unknown
And I think it brings more people in, I really do.

00:35:16:035 - 00:35:26:047
Unknown
so, I mean, we've seen a lot of the students that have come through the lab go into grad studies and students that, you know, never set foot out of Mississauga, or all of a sudden, you know, doing,

00:35:26:047 - 00:35:32:107
Unknown
a master's degree in plant biology at, you know, UBC or something like, oh, I know it's the parking lots of square one.

00:35:32:111 - 00:35:45:077
Unknown
Exactly. Yeah. So, so I think that there's different ways of bringing people in and of, of increasing that representation and, and increasing that potential labor pool. And we need it. Yeah, we do and we need it 100%. Yeah. Yeah. them

00:35:45:077 - 00:35:59:037
Unknown
everyone that's been a truly fulfilling conversation. I want to be very respectful of your time. but I also want to give you guys the opportunity to share with our audience, any final thoughts on the cool that you're working on that you think the world needs to know about?

00:35:59:046 - 00:36:04:033
Unknown
or just any personal stories? The floor is yours.

00:36:04:033 - 00:36:05:052
Unknown
who would like to go first?

00:36:05:052 - 00:36:06:063
Unknown
Can go first. Yeah.

00:36:06:063 - 00:36:08:080
Unknown
The main thing I'd mention is,

00:36:08:080 - 00:36:13:106
Unknown
anyone listening to this who conducts a lot of tissue tests and, would like to see a different way of doing things.

00:36:13:106 - 00:36:21:092
Unknown
please reach out. Where? Fully commercial with potatoes and corn right now, adding onions, canola and looking to be in every crop eventually. So,

00:36:21:092 - 00:36:26:056
Unknown
yeah, we're we have stations available and hopefully we can reach a wider amount of people here.

00:36:26:056 - 00:36:28:028
Unknown
So amazing. Awesome.

00:36:28:028 - 00:36:31:019
Unknown
I think from, from our standpoint, we are,

00:36:31:019 - 00:36:33:078
Unknown
we're always looking for people to collaborate with,

00:36:33:078 - 00:36:41:118
Unknown
both people to join our autonomous working group. So we're looking for farmer representatives to do join. We,

00:36:41:118 - 00:36:46:086
Unknown
we meet every Friday morning. So people want to know more about what's going on in,

00:36:46:086 - 00:36:48:055
Unknown
in the automation sector.

00:36:48:065 - 00:36:57:004
Unknown
And then we're very excited to be launching our Innovation Farm network, as I mentioned earlier. And people want to know more about that. It is a work in progress.

00:36:57:004 - 00:36:58:117
Unknown
we are figuring this out as we go, but

00:36:58:117 - 00:37:03:102
Unknown
we're very excited about this, about this project for the next five years. Amazing. Thank you.

00:37:03:102 - 00:37:13:011
Unknown
I guess I'd probably like to end on the fact that I mentioned the black box of soil biology, and one of the things that's happened is that we we know a lot more about what's happening below ground.

00:37:13:011 - 00:37:14:108
Unknown
And the good news is that,

00:37:14:108 - 00:37:28:003
Unknown
the belowground ecology functions much in the same way as the above ground ecology. And we can make sense of it. We can understand why things are happening. We can understand cause and effect. We have the tools with which to detect the cause and effect.

00:37:28:003 - 00:37:33:094
Unknown
and we have the increased knowledge base to start to make sense of why the system is behaving the way it is.

00:37:33:104 - 00:37:42:092
Unknown
So it is a it is a logical system. It's a living system. And we are beginning to understand exactly how the different farming activities,

00:37:42:092 - 00:37:57:080
Unknown
alter that system for, for good and for bad. So it's no longer that that dark matter of that black box that we really are making. It may not seem like it sometimes from the outside, but we really are making great strides in understanding, the, the engine that's driving the farm.

00:37:57:090 - 00:38:02:086
Unknown
It's incredible. I'm so upset that dinner is being served right now. So if I a

00:38:02:086 - 00:38:06:043
Unknown
chat with you guys all day, like, genuinely a wonderful,

00:38:06:043 - 00:38:07:062
Unknown
fulfilling conversation.

00:38:07:062 - 00:38:12:080
Unknown
so happy to have you guys on, on the show. Everyone tuning in at home. Thank you so much for watching.

00:38:12:080 - 00:38:18:069
Unknown
we have Laurie, Chuck and Xavier, their information, all their contact information will be in the bio,

00:38:18:069 - 00:38:19:082
Unknown
the description below.

00:38:19:082 - 00:38:19:118
Unknown
And,

00:38:19:118 - 00:38:24:014
Unknown
once again, thank you guys so much. It was a pleasure program. Thank you guys. Thank you.

00:38:24:014 - 00:38:27:020