John Mesko (00:07):

Resource positive agriculture describes what we all want, a food and farming system which makes full and responsible use of the natural world. In this podcast, I’ll explore how agriculture can be a force for good on everything from the environment to people and our society.

 

(00:34):

This is John Mesko, and welcome to the Resource Positive Agriculture Podcast. I’m really excited about today’s episode. We’ve got a couple of people that have been really, really helpful to PSA over the last few months, even the last few years. As most people are aware, Syngenta is one of the PSA member organizations and as an Alliance, we draw on, and really count on the involvement from our members to help us, and to move our program forward. And Syngenta has certainly done that with us here recently. Today on our call we have Liz Hunt, who is the head of sustainable and responsible business for North America, and Jeff Lail, a senior data analyst. Thank you both for joining me.

 

Jeff Lail (01:23):

Glad to be here.

 

Liz Hunt (01:24):

Thanks, John.

 

John Mesko (01:25):

And really, we’ve done so much together here in the last little bit to try and get an understanding of some of the things that are going on with data collection, data reporting around sustainability. Today we’re going to talk about the Sustainable Outcomes in Agriculture (SOA) Standard that Syngenta has developed. We’re going to talk a little bit about the Cropwise Sustainability app that’s available for farmers to use, and to report their sustainability progress, and to track their sustainability progress. But before we get into all of that, I was hoping that the two of you would have a chance to maybe give an introduction. I’m interested to hear a little bit about your backgrounds, how you got into agriculture, how you got into sustainability. And I know you both have been contributing to PSA for a long time, so maybe share a little bit about that. And I’d like to start with Liz, you can maybe kick us off.

 

Liz Hunt (02:21):

Sure. Thanks for that, John. So Liz Hunt, like you mentioned, I lead our sustainable and responsible business team for Syngenta, which we can dig into a little bit more about what that means. But I guess my background in agriculture, I grew up in a rural community in eastern Iowa, and maybe a little less conventional approach to getting into agriculture than most in that I got a job at a greenhouse part-time when I was 15, and fell in love with plants then, and went on to get a horticulture degree and actually worked in flower breeding and flower product development for nearly 20 years at a couple of different companies, including Syngenta.

 

(03:08)

I moved over to our digital ag space and our sustainability team about nine years ago in Syngenta. So probably one of the great things about Syngenta is you can make moves like that, going from flowers, to digital, to sustainability, and your only real limitation is how much you’re willing to learn. So it’s been a great journey and I have really enjoyed working with a number of different organizations in sustainability, looking at metrics, standards, and such, but have really enjoyed learning more about PSA and how you want to promote sustainable potatoes throughout the value chain. So it’s been a fun journey working with you, John, in this capacity, and, of course, when our paths have crossed in the past.

 

John Mesko (03:55):

Sure. Yeah, that’s great. And I agree, how nice it is to have such a varied background. That’s great. And it’s kind of what helps us see the forest for the trees when you have that kind of varied background. So it’s great to hear that from you, and I’m really proud of Syngenta for having that kind of flexibility.

 

Liz Hunt (04:18):

It’s been super.

 

John Mesko (04:20):

All right, Jeff, tell us a little bit about your background.

 

Jeff Lail (04:23):

Speaking of varied backgrounds, I was an administrator at a university for about ten years and got really interested in all the data we were gathering and where that was going. Ended up following that passion into pursuing a master’s in statistics, decided that I had gone as far as I could go at the university and looked to branch out, and I saw an opportunity at Syngenta. I knew it was a great company, and I’d actually spoken to my supervisor about an internship a few years before then and landed with our digital agriculture solutions team.

 

(05:01):

And my role has been working on sustainability data for, I’ve been at Syngenta nearly six years and I’ve been working on sustainability data all that time, starting out on what Liz likes to call our deep-end analytics. So working on carbon projects associated with Field to Market and the Cool Farm Tool, and have expanded into survey work both for some other value chain companies in the PSA. I was involved with PSA a few years ago leading the IPM team as we tried to work through revising the survey and been working on this survey approach that became Cropwise Sustainability in the SOA for about four years of pilots and iterations and improvements. So happy to be here, and glad to have been working with PSA on this project for the last few months.

 

John Mesko (05:52):

Well, and we’re certainly glad to have you working with us as well. One of the things that we value at PSA is trying to streamline the data collection. Potato growers across North America, many of them are taking multiple surveys, multiple different questions, and data being shared. And we’re really looking for ways to streamline that, to lighten that burden, and also give meaningful feedback to them so they can make good decisions. And that’s an important part of the implicit contract that we have with farmers, that we ask them for a lot of information, but we want to make sure it’s worth their while to share that. And what has really led us to invest time and energy in understanding the Sustainable Outcomes in Agriculture app, Standard, excuse me, as well as the Cropwise app. But I wanted to talk a little bit about the investment that Syngenta is making in sustainability data.

 

(06:59):

I just came back from the Commodity Classic that was held here in Orlando last week, and it was really interesting. I went to the Syngenta booth and heard all about the Cropwise app from a different perspective. This was from the row crop perspective, and I hadn’t been aware of that. And it was really interesting, and it became obvious to me that this is a very big effort within your company, and some of the things that you’re doing. So I’m curious, how did that all get started, and the value that it is to the organization, and to agriculture as a whole?

 

Liz Hunt (07:32):

So, a couple of thoughts around that, John. First, you mentioned Cropwise, and Cropwise is the Syngenta ecosystem for digital tools and digital capabilities. So a lot of different functionality based on the needs of farmers, based on the needs of their crops and really based on global needs. For us, our focus has been on our Cropwise Sustainability tool. And you mentioned making an investment in sustainability data. And I want to just clarify, we’re making an investment in how can we make sustainability easy and accessible for all farmers. Regardless of the crop that you grow, regardless of where you sit in the world, we want to make sustainability something that all farmers can start to really look into and understand what it means for their farm. We’ve done a lot of work to make this simple, inviting, engaging and get insightful for farmers. So while we have deep field level analytics tools that we can do with tools like our Cropwise Financials, which is more of a farm management type software, we also have our Cropwise Sustainability, which Jeff mentioned this before, the deep end of the swimming pool.

 

(08:54):

Cropwise Sustainability is the shallow end of the swimming pool. So we’re asking a lot of questions: yes, no, check all that apply. If you like data, quantitative data points. And then we can put all that information together to give farmers the insights that they need to understand how they are performing against their peers? What are their opportunities for improvement, and what can they do to make changes over time? So it’s really important for Syngenta to give growers the opportunity to start to understand their operation through the lens of sustainability, but then also give them the tools that they need to action those insights. Jeff, what would you add to that?

 

Jeff Lail (09:38):

I would say it like this, Syngenta’s been in the sustainability space a really long time. I think the Field to Market 1.0 algorithm was built into Land.db, our legacy farm management system, Liz, that was 15 years ago? It predates me by quite a bit. And so we’ve been working in this space quite a long time, and what we identified, and the thing we’re trying to meet with Cropwise Sustainability and SOA Standard is making a grower pain point less painful. And our sustainable solution strategy is really built around making sustainability easier for the farmer, and for the value chain.

 

(10:21):

We used to have a saying when I worked in education that all the changes going on with education, online education, whatnot, it was leading to a many routes to many places solution to education. And I would say our solution is leading to a one route to many places. So how do we minimize the amount that a farmer is having to do to enter and gather data, and get them the maximum value out of that? And I think we’re on the path there. We have a roadmap that are going to bring some other exciting solutions in, and Cropwise is going to be a huge effort. And Cropwise Sustainability is just one part of it, but that sustainability strategy is really built around reducing pain points for the farmer and the value chain.

 

John Mesko (11:59):

Well, it’s really interesting you talk about the motivations and the priorities for how we work in sustainability. But we talk a lot, especially in the potato world, about farmers being required to share information because customers, because buyers and investors in the food value chain want to know where their food is coming from, how sustainably it’s produced, the impact of the production of those raw food products on the environment, and on the communities, and so forth and so on.

 

(12:37):

And it feels kind of one-sided. But as I work in this, and as I talk with farmers, I find myself wanting to say, “Understanding the sustainability of your farm operation, or farms in general, or of an industry like the potato industry, is helpful to each individual business, to each individual farm. Understanding where you’re at is important, not just because you’re being required to do it, or because you’re being asked by your market to do it. It’s helpful to the business.” And I’m curious if you guys could share maybe a little bit of thought on that as it relates to how you are injecting the resources and the effort at Syngenta into this discussion.

 

Liz Hunt (13:29):

So I’m going to actually call on Jeff to answer this because Jeff has worked so much on our data analytics from our early iterations of grower reports and aggregate reports as well, all the way to what we’re delivering with Cropwise Sustainability for farmers. So making sure that they get insights from their data as well, and it’s not just a one-way street of data flow. And then multiple discussions with farmers over time to get to where we are, so it isn’t just our view of the world of what you need to see and know, but that whole process, I think, is really important, that Jeff has led to get us to this point.

 

Jeff Lail (14:16):

Well, I can start with the process of getting to the SOA Standard and Cropwise Sustainability. I think that’s what Liz is asking. We actually started iterating through a survey approach, probably four years ago. We had worked on these deeper analytics approaches and were getting a lot of feedback that this varies so much year-on-year, I’m not sure how to implement this, What are the trade-offs with me doing this particular practice versus this particular one? And it’s dragging on this other score. And also, if anybody’s ever done one of those approaches, it is a significant time investment and a record-keeping investment. And I think the evolution on record keeping is still happening, specifically digital record keeping. And so we started piling this approach that was practice-based driven by ask me a simple question on what I’m doing on farm, give me a yes/no answer, and then we’ll try to deliver some insights that are more actionable. And as we worked through that approach, we saw some opportunity.

 

(15:26):

I think that tying these standards into a global standard that companies like value chain companies can recognize is a really significant thing to do, and provides a lot of value to the farmer. So if we can deliver an insight that’s more actionable whenever a farmer completes an assessment, and deliver them association to a standard that is global and recognized by most of the companies in the value chain, that’s value on both ends. I mean, I sit in an office in Greensboro. I’m never going to be a total expert on somebody’s farm that I don’t live and work on. But I can look at the data and say, “Based on you, based on your peer groups, based on this global standard, here’s what we’d recommend you acting on.” And maybe that’s something the farmer has been considering acting on anyway, and that drives action. And what you hear from these value chain companies all the time is continuous improvement, continuous improvement, continuous improvement. We’re trying to provide a conduit to that continuous improvement that doesn’t bury the farmer in data and then they get very little out of it.

 

John Mesko (16:37):

Yeah, I think that’s just a great approach, and we see that all the time too. As you said, getting to a hard and fast number on any single metric is difficult, and the usefulness of that is really questionable as an isolated measurement. But showing a trend, showing continuous improvement is I think what everybody wants this to be, and that’s what we’re so excited about with this app, and some of the feedback that we’re seeing that we can help demonstrate that. But I do want to talk a little bit about the standard, and the real effort that’s been made to achieve SAI Gold certification. Haven’t talked a lot about that on this podcast, I’d like to have another episode at some point talking about that and its importance. But Liz or Jeff, can you give us a shortened version of the importance of that standard, and why it’s becoming a more important measurement, a more important standard in the industry?

 

Liz Hunt (17:39):

Sure. I’ll go ahead and kick that off if you want. And Jeff, you can add in some additional information as well. So Jeff mentioned that this has been a bit of a process to get to this point, and we tested a lot of different approaches over the last three to four years, including just doing surveys. And we could do that all day long. That would be pretty easy to do, but we needed something that was a little bit more robust and more credible to meet the needs of the value chain, and to also give farmers confidence in what we’ve put together is going to be meaningful for their customers, and for themselves. So we determined writing a standard would be the best way to do that. So Syngenta can write a standard and follow all of the rules of writing a standard to make sure it has all the right components, and the right robustness to that.

 

(18:38):

But we wanted to also gain additional credibility for that standard. So our first stop on that journey was to benchmark to the Sustainable Ag Initiative Farm Sustainability Assessment, and we did the 3.0 version, which is their most current version of the standard that they offer. The reason we went with that is it is one of the more thorough and robust standards out there that allows for benchmarking. It was a good process for us to go through to understand what’s required for benchmarking, but it also helped us to see, hey, here’s some gaps in what we wrote, and where we can make our standard even better. So through that process, we worked with that organization and some others to guide us through that. In the end, we are benchmarked to the SAI FSA 3.0 Gold level. So this makes it something that’s usable for multiple actors within the value chain.

 

(19:45):

A number of different food companies, consumer retail companies can use our standard with its benchmarking to FSA and work with FSA and SAI to write what kind of, how do they want to make those claims, what do they want to say about it? I will note we’re also in the process of continuing to benchmark to other standards and other organizations with our standard, because we do want to move to that place where this can meet the needs of multiple stakeholders for growers. So we’re avoiding what you were describing in the beginning, John, of each person asking for something different. If we can come up with something that’s meaningful to the farmer to start, but then can also meet other needs within the value chain, then that’s what good really looks like in the end.

 

Jeff Lail (20:42):

I think that was really well said, and I’d gone into some of that before, that our goal is to be able to take this farmer where they need to go as far as other certifications, but SAI is a great globally recognized place to start, and that’s why we chose to go that direction.

 

John Mesko (21:00):

Well, that is really helpful, I think for us and for the listeners, to really understand the relationship between these different acronyms and the different standards and certifications that are out there. As we know, it’s kind of a constantly shifting sea of things that are going on as different metrics and tools and resources become available. And really the sustainability conversation continues to evolve and grow in terms of the different aspects that are being discussed within that. But I wanted to certainly highlight for listeners that at PSA our plan is that by this fall, fall of 2023, we can begin implementing the Cropwise Sustainability app. And farmers who have traditionally been taking the PSA survey will begin using this app. And so there’s a long ways to go between here and there in terms of getting people onboarded and helping folks understand how to use the app. We’ll certainly have other opportunities to go into that information as we get closer.

 

(22:08):

But one of the things that is anytime we’re sharing information or sharing data across the internet, and collecting various information from farms and businesses that are out there, one of the very first questions that comes up is data privacy, security, data sharing, and how this data is going to be used. I can tell our listeners that, and I can tell you all as you know, that at PSA, our goal is to tell the North American potato sustainability story. So our use of data is really governed by that standard expectation that we will tell a national level and a North American-level story of sustainability. We are not going to pit one region against another in terms of sharing information, or production data, or yield data, or anything like that. We want to make sure that our industry is supported by information and storytelling that really is accurate and helpful to tell that story. But I was curious about, from Syngenta’s side, what kinds of security is in place for the use of this data, for the sharing of the data? How does it all work? A little bit maybe behind the scenes on this?

 

Jeff Lail (23:38):

I think it might be good to provide a little history there. I mentioned earlier we’ve been in this space a long time. Landy.db, the farm management system that we own, has been in existence for many years, and Syngenta has historically and currently prided themselves on being a data privacy company. I think we all are used to our data being mined and stolen at every turn, probably more than most people realize. But we have prided ourselves and made that a key part of our digital strategy since our inception in this space, and now is no different. I give an example, I have to run data reports on this data, and I can’t even identify who people are because of the data privacy policies. We have put a lot of safeguards in place to make sure grower data is private, and is in the hands that it needs to be in, and no one else’s. And that is something that we have done historically, going back to the start of this digital area.

 

John Mesko (24:48):

Well, I like what the way you put that, Jeff. There is an awful lot going on in data. I think we’ve all experienced the odd situation where… I’ve had it happen. I shouldn’t say we all do. Maybe I’m the only one, but I’m talking with Sarah about something that we want to buy for the house. Hadn’t even done a Google search yet, but I was just talking with her. “Well, let’s see if we can put one of these on the patio.” And before I know it, those are the ads that are showing up on my Facebook feed. I don’t understand that. It’s a little scary. I really try not to think about it, but I don’t think we’re talking about that. One of the things I’ve noticed about the data privacy as we’ve worked through some of the details with you guys is it’s not just that you’re saying we’re not going to share data.

 

(25:44):

You’ve put together hardware and software that make it so that you can’t share the certain data, personally identifiable. So it’s a big difference, I think, between making a commitment that we won’t do it, and then making that plus, putting in some really hard and fast barriers that prevent it from happening. I think we’re all used to this like, “Oh geez, if I give up my information, what’s going to happen to it?” And knowing that there’s some concrete barriers is really helpful there.

 

(26:23):

What is the long-term view at Syngenta for sustainability? I’m not going to hold you to it, obviously. I get asked this question a lot. Where is this going? Where is sustainability headed in the future? As I’ve said earlier, and on other podcasts, the discussion is expanding beyond environmental data, agronomic data. It’s reaching into things like worker safety and the way we impact our communities. Is that evolving into this discussion for you as well?

 

Jeff Lail (26:58):

Maybe I can take the micro, and Liz can take the macro. On the micro level, we are still evolving Cropwise Sustainability. The thing that we are working through right now is a tab that will help farmers connect to resources associated with sustainability and planning tools. We are doing our user research and building out wire frames and all that good stuff, and that should be released this year. And then we are also going to, are currently rebuilding the site that does Cool Farm Tool and Field to Market analytics, and connecting that to the Cropwise Sustainability, so growers will be able to get a carbon assessment even with the small amount of data that’s required through Cropwise Sustainability. And if they want to go deeper on that, or their value chain partner is requesting that, we will be using this data to help augment those assessments. So again, reducing that data entry pain point. And I’ll hand it over to Liz for the more macro view.

 

Liz Hunt (27:56):

Yeah, thanks for that, Jeff. So from a Syngenta perspective, sustainability is core to everything that we do. We were one of the first companies to launch global sustainability commitments in 2013, and that was our Good Growth Plan. Our Good Growth Plan still stands today, but like many companies, we hit our initial targets and we had to launch new commitments into the future. So we launched our 2025 and 2030 commitments back in 2019. A lot of those commitments have to do with what you’ve been talking about, John, from the social component. And this was part of our original Good Growth Plan as well, and is around keeping workers safe. Syngenta employs a lot of farm workers, or contracts from a lot of farms globally, when you think about our seed footprint, making sure that those workers are safe and meeting fair labor standard requirements as well on each of those operations. But also, safe use of our products is extremely important in developed and developing countries. So making sure folks know how to use our product, have the right PPE available when they are handling our products, so those components are extremely important.

 

(29:21):

The other part that we launched in 2019 as part of our Good Growth Plan is around partnering for impact. And to me, this is one of my favorite commitments, and I think this hits some of the social components that you’re talking about as well. And this is a recognition that sustainability is really hard. It’s even harder to try and do it yourself. So where you can find those opportunities to work together to scale sustainability, that’s where you can have a lot of wins. And I think that’s what we see happening with the Potato Sustainability Alliance and Syngenta. We both have strengths in our areas, but when we can put those together, that’s where it’s going to make the difference, and make things more effective and more efficient for farmers, and improve for consumers, and what consumer expectations are as well. So lots going on in the sustainability space at Syngenta. Certainly an important topic to us, and you’ll see more coming over the coming months as well, as we look at what’s next for us in sustainability. So excited to share that when it’s available, as well.

 

John Mesko (30:35):

That sounds great. That would be a super opportunity to have you guys back on and talk a little bit more about that. I feel like what we’ve had here today was very helpful to help us learn a little bit about some of the things going on with Sustainable Outcomes in Agriculture Standard, the Cropwise app that’s coming down the road and we hope to implement here this fall at PSA. This is very exciting, and I really want to thank you both individually, but also thank your company for its membership in PSA, its partnership with PSA.

 

(31:14):

You know, a lot of times I find myself reminding people that we are an alliance as an organization. We are really made up of member companies, and organizations, and farmer groups really all focused on the things we’ve been talking about. Making sustainability easy for farmers to tell the story, and then providing that story back to them, giving them tools that they can use to advance their own sustainability story, and satisfying the needs of customers who are interested in learning more about how that is being done. And the ability to partner with Syngenta in this app, and to be able to use this app to help us achieve those goals, it is really the definition of how an alliance works. And so, really, really, really appreciate everything you guys have done, and thank you for joining me on the podcast today.

 

Liz Hunt (32:13):

Thanks for having us, John. And we’re grateful for the opportunity to work with PSA and all of its members into the many years to come on sustainability.

 

John Mesko (32:24):

You’re welcome. And this is John Mesko. Thank you for joining the Resource Positive Agriculture Podcast. My guests today have been Liz Hunt, head of Sustainable and Responsible Business for North America at Syngenta. And Jeff Lail, also with Syngenta, a senior data analyst. Thank you both. Appreciate it very much. And this is the Resource Positive Agriculture podcast.

 

(32:48):

This is John Mesko with PSA, and I’m looking forward to the 2023 PSA Summer Symposium. We’re holding it this year from June 20th through June 22nd at the Sysco headquarters in Houston, Texas. And the registration link is now live. You can go to our website, potatosustainability.org/2023symposium for all the details and secure your ticket. See you there.

 

(33:22):

Thanks for tuning in to today’s episode. To hear more podcasts like this, please rate, review, and subscribe to Resource Positive Agriculture. We want to hear from you. Remember to visit potatosustainability.org for show notes from this episode, leave your feedback, and to learn more about how PSA is collaborating for potato sustainability. Thank you. And remember, stay positive.