Bayer discusses the future of farming

At a recent Future of Farming dialogue organised by Bayer, the summary view was that the global seed and crop protection markets will continue to grow. This is more of a global comment as most people within the EU may foresee a different outcome, in the near term at least.

Liam Condon, a member of Bayer’s management board and president of the crop science division, said that its crop science business is well positioned to fulfil future customer, market and societal needs.

In this regard, there is greater need than ever before for all of society’s players to cooperate to make the world’s food system more sustainable into the future.

High population growth, changing consumption patterns, changing lifestyles and a demand for sustainable food will all affect food production. And the growing global demand for feed and biofuels will support increasing demand to drive the crop protection business.

Innovation crucial

Liam reiterated the commitment of the crop science division to invest in innovation and in developing customised agronomic solutions for individual farmers. He described the proposed acquisition of Monsanto as an opportunity to positively shape the future of farming through innovation for farmers, large and small, all over the world.

Acquisition

The time frame for the conclusion of the acquisition of Monsanto is now likely to be the first quarter of 2018 rather than late 2017. This follows an application by Bayer to extend the EU review deadline by 10 working days. This is to accommodate the need to supply a range of information sought by the European Commission. The company has submitted clearance applications to almost 30 relevant competition authorities and about one-third of these have already given their approval.

It is inevitable that some competition authorities will demand the divesting of certain current products and this matter will be dealt with when the need arises, Liam stated.

One of the big demands that emerged in the most recent EU glyphosate registration debacle was the need for transparency in all of the safety-related information that pertains to any active. In this regard, Monsanto did make most of this information available but now Bayer have gone one step further.

Responsibility and transparency

Recognising its commitment to social responsibility, Adrian Percy, global head of research and development at Bayer’s Crop Science division, stated that the company is preparing to grant online access to all safety-related crop protection study information used in the registration process. And this information will be made available for all current as well future actives.

This is a huge task and a huge commitment. He also said that the company will provide additional information in the form of video tutorials, infographics and further elaborated scientific material to help consumers understand the content and its relevance.

The website is expected be go online at the end of 2017.

Adrian sees this as a great opportunity to open beneficial dialogue with the public about how Bayer ensures the safety of its products.

“We want everyone – from the general public to members of the scientific community – to be able to access the information they want in a way that is fast and easy to understand,” he said.

Close the gap between producer and consumer

“The future of food depends on a stronger bond between agriculture and society,” Adrian commented. He called for a multi-stakeholder approach to better engage society, especially younger consumers, through active listening, dialogue and education about the benefits of innovation.

Bayer currently operates a number of programmes to help achieve these objectives. Examples would be their AgVocacy initiative for industry, the BayLabs for students, the Youth Ag-Summit and other dialogue platforms for agricultural education to help bridge the gap between producer and consumer.

“Without industry’s involvement in research, the innovations needed in agriculture to address our future food needs would be greatly diminished,” Adrian concluded.

Bayer brings a high-tech mobile exhibition to many events around Europe where consumers gather. This is another educational medium and is really quite impressive.

Digital farming products

Bayer has gone digital, or at least it is going that way. Liam Condon told us that the company is committed to investing at least €200m in digital farming technologies between 2015 and 2020. We need to stay in touch with what’s happening on farm and develop products that further utilise precision farming technologies.

“Innovative digital farming technologies help farmers, big and small, to grow healthier crops more efficiently and more sustainably,” Liam stated. But they can also be used to help meet society’s rising requirements in terms of transparency and sustainability.

For this reason, Bayer is now collaborating closely with competent partners such as Bosch and FaunaPhotonics, universities, startup companies and non-profit organisations like Quantified Planet. Bayer currently provides digital solutions in more than 30 countries, and increasing. The new technologies have huge potential on both large developed farms and smallholder units in developing countries.

Examples of products already in the market include Xarvio Field manager and Xarvio Scouting. These are products to help sharpen application timing and decision making or to actually do remote crop inspections.

At the event, a Bayer operative programmed a quad-copter drone to do a weed inspection on a field. Off went the drone, did its programmed mapping and came back to communicate with a computer. This then identified all the weeds and their location and then selected herbicides to kill the weeds. The drone data was used to create detailed real-time field maps that allow for precise application through a sprayer.

The company is also operating a ForwardFarming initiative on real commercial farms in a number of countries. This involves the electronic linking together of many farm operations, along with some small changes to the farming operations, to either help save on costs or to improve overall sustainability. These farms are then used to show how precision farming technologies, plus small changes in farm practices, can have a big impact on the sustainability of farming.

Bayer has been investing approximately €1bn annually in research and development to bring new products to the market. Examples include Luna and Aviator Xpro fungicides, Sivanto insecticide, LibertyLink soya bean seeds and hybrid InVigor canola varieties using pod shatter reduction technology.

Crop protection

Bayer is also working on a variety of biological crop protection solutions such as Poncho™/VOTiVO™. However, there are very few new crop protection products amongst the 15 new commercial products in the development pipeline. Two new actives coming through include an insecticide and a new fungicide.

In recent years, the average development cost to bring any new product to market has increased, mainly due to more stringent regulatory requirements. While a figure was not stated at the event, it is commonly suggested that this could be up to $350m per active. So to enable investment to continue, the industry needs a political and regulatory environment that fosters innovation and collaboration along the value chain.