farm

Why Precision Farming Should Start in the Office

We’ve been hearing about precision farming for quite a number of years now. It’s common practice
among early adopters. It’s getting a lot of face time in the media. It is a strategic decision that should
elevate a farm’s production efficiencies to new heights not seen before.

Proponents say that variable rate is not a treatment, but a management practice. They would be correct.

I’ve watched in awe the business men and women who recognize the benefits of increasing their
acumen in a certain aspect of their farm. One of those is precision farming/variable rate and it is
awesome. In fact, I believe that in the future VR will be the second greatest determining factor affecting
gross margins, second only to marketing of course.

But what is more awesome is seeing those farms that have taken precision farming into the offices and
applied it to financial management practices. Think about this: it was early December 2013, right after
the largest harvest in almost forever, as commodity prices were already on a crazy carpet for a ride
down the trading charts. I was in a conversation with an aggressive 30-something farmer when he said,
“I’m looking forward to $8.50 canola and $4 wheat, because I know I can still make money at those
prices and a lot of guys can’t. That’s going to create opportunity for me.”

You’ll recall Issue #3 of Growing Farm Profits Weekly on Cost of Production? Well, this guy knows his
costs on everything, right down to the penny per acre. THAT is precision farming!

Now imagine how easy it is for this farmer to make the decision on if he should invest in variable rate
right now or not, considering he knows his costs to the penny across his whole farm. He can quickly and
accurately calculate the projected benefit against the capital cost to invest in the technology. He isn’t
making decisions on emotion. He isn’t making decisions on pride (being the first guy in town to VR his
whole farm.) He’s making decisions on an expectation of profit. And trust me, his net worth statement
shows that he’s made several profitable decisions.

Direct Questions

Your farm requires excellence in 3 areas: production, marketing, financial management. Are you
focusing heavily on one or two areas to the detriment of the others?

Are you meticulous where your skills and interest lie, and improvident elsewhere?
Would decisions be easier to make if you knew exactly your financial position at all times?

From the Home Quarter

It’s been said time and time again that “you can’t manage what you don’t control.” Precision farming,
whether it’s in the field or in the office, is all about taking full control; it’s about collecting and using
data. It is projected that when under full VR, your farm can reasonably expect to gain ~$35/ac in a
combination of costs savings and increased yields once the practice has been in place for a number of
years. How long will it take to achieve a $35/ac benefit from implementing precision farming in the
office? I’d say pretty quick, depending on how committed you are to it. Plus, the capital investment will
be a lot less too.

Cost of Production

I got a little worked up last week when I saw a tweet that read “Cost of production matters in 2015 –
The Western Producer” and included a link to the article. Even though that wasn’t the article’s title, I still
had to sit down and scribe this.

Let me be very clear: cost of production matters every year. Period.

Cost of Production is the most basic principle that must be employed when making marketing decisions.
If you don’t have a clear understanding of your COP, then you are putting the survival of your business
at grave risk. Why? Because how would you know if you’re selling for a profit or not?

 

venne2

The WP article states, “A 38 bu. (canola) crop and a $9.45 price could yield $70 per acre before labour
and equipment costs.” That’s nice, but why would we not include our labor and equipment costs? Will
the crop magically seed and harvest itself?

COP only begins with your seed, chemical and fertilizer costs. It must also include all other operating
costs AND your fixed costs.

Now work back from your actual, or projected, yield and we come to the real figure that matters: unit
cost of production.

If you know that it costs your farm $6 to grow a bushel of canola, isn’t a $9/bu selling price a nice
target? By the way, that’s 50% ROI.

 

Direct Questions

What was your gross margin per acre in 2014?

Do you include your fixed costs when working out Cost of Production calculations? If no, why not?
How do you know what is a profitable selling price for your crop if you don’t know what it cost you to
grow it?

Do you discover whether or not you’re profitable only when you receive the accountant prepared
financial statements?

From the Home Quarter

In the simple calculation of “Revenue – Costs = Profit,” how can we be expected to make profitable
decisions without intimately knowing our costs? Every business that produces anything, from ocean
freighters to widgets, knows exactly what it costs to produce one item. Why doesn’t every farm know
their costs the same way?

As a special offer to the readers of this blog, I will conduct a Farm Financial
Review™ for up to 5 qualifying farm businesses at $475 (normally a $875 value.) This will include a
review of your 2014 financial results and a Cost of Production Analysis. Work must be booked by the end
of January and completed by the end of February. Please call or email for details.

Nurturing Your Business

In Issue #1 of Growing Farm Profits Weekly, we introduced how nurturing your business was one of
many critical factors that can affect your business success. This week, we’ll look deeper at nurturing
your business and how to leverage this often overlooked aspect of owning and operating a successful
enterprise.

Increasing wealth is the goal of any business, and only a healthy business can deliver accordingly. And
how you view wealth can be as unique as you are. The obvious answer is “profit at the bottom line,” or
“strong equity,” but some will argue that wealth is “discretionary time.” How do you define “wealth?”
Give it some thought; it will provide clarity in how you run your business.

There is a healthy ratio of nurturing that applies to 3 key aspects of your business:

venne
Crop

As discussed in the previous issue of Growing Farm Profits Weekly, your crop gets substantial amounts
of your attention because you know that investing significantly in your crop will grow you a better crop.
And a better crop leads to better marketing opportunities, which lead to stronger cash flow and higher
margins, which lead to profit. Simple as that? If only…

Assets

Yes, this means the tractors and combines, the trucks and trailers, the sprayers and swathers…the equipment on the farm needs to receive adequate nurture; these are the tools of your trade, and they need to perform when you need them. This is why you service regularly, send equipment into the shop for a certified tech to go through it in the off-season, and consistently use recommended operating procedures to ensure you minimize the risk of downtime.

But how much time do you spend nurturing your “other” assets?

Your HUMAN ASSETS (ie. your family and hired staff) require nurturing too. Unlike a piece of equipment
that runs the same whether you yell at it & operate with great disregard or if you treat it like a treasure,
your human assets often require a specialized approach. Just like you can relate and react better or
worse with certain people and their approach, your HUMAN ASSETS will also respond better or worse to
your approach. And if you view your human assets with the same regard you view your equipment, or
with less esteem than you give your equipment, then you’d better take a long hard look at your business
because it will be vastly different in a year or two.

If we consider the cost of owning/leasing and operating your farm equipment, it’s a safe bet you’d be in
the range of $40-$90/ac. Yes, that’s a big range, but there are big differences in each farm’s expense
management (we’ll tackle this in a future issue.) Please note this does not include capital outlay for the
purchase price. The cost of ownership/lease and operation looks at operating costs (fuel, oil, repairs,
etc.) lease costs, and “real” depreciation (not necessarily what CRA allows you to claim as a non-cash
expense.) We also consider custom work when calculating machinery cost per acre. Now that we’ve
established that your iron has a significant cost, why would anyone consider putting a $15/hr operator
in it? In one hour, you’ve paid an operator $15 to run equipment across upwards of 25ac or so that can
carry a machinery cost of $500-$1,000. Again, if you view your human assets as dispensable, this isn’t a
surprise in your line of thinking. But then it also shouldn’t be a surprise when that same operator isn’t

too concerned about stopping to rectify those plugged hoses on the air-drill.

If you’ve spent time building specific processes around HR management, you already recognize the need
to nurture your human assets. Congratulations, you’re on your way to ensuring the future success of
your business. Some processes you will want to implement are:

  • Recruiting, interviewing and selection
  • Performance management
  • Wages and incentives

There are many more items for this list, but we’ll save that for a future issue.

Relationships

While grain farming in North America is a commodity based industry, successful operation of your
business requires your adeptness at managing several key relationships. These relationships cover the spectrum from your professional advisors all the way to the part-time weekend counter staff at the equipment dealer.

I’ve seen some who give their least regard to the relationship with their accountant. True story; they see
the accountant as a “necessary expense” in order to file the “necessary tax forms.” Sadly, there are
many farmers out there who share that view. They do not recognize the importance of evaluating
business results against expectations or projections. I suppose these are also the businesses which do
not make business plans or projections.

How about service relationships? It’s easy to commoditize the grain buyer, the inputs retailer, or the fuel
supplier because there is always competition vying for your business. But if you don’t nurture the
relationship with your fuel supplier, what are the odds you’ll get that urgent May long-weekend
delivery?

Do service relationships extend to your staff? Do you pay them to provide you and your business with a
service, or are they integral members of your farm team? What do they need? What motivates them?
Why are they working for you and not somewhere else? If you don’t know the answers to these
questions, you’ve got 4 more days this week to find out…get on it!

Direct Questions

How do YOU define “wealth?”

Are you getting the most out of your crop? By that I mean “are you maximizing the most efficient
processes” available to produce your crops? It’s not about the highest yield at the coffee-shop; it’s about
gross margin (yet another future issue.)

Have you calculated the ROI on nurturing your human assets relative to the ROI on your iron assets?
What processes and procedures have you implemented to support your efforts to nurture your human
assets?

Ask yourself how you value the relationship you have with the following:

  • Agronomist
  • Business Advisor
  • Accountant
  • Banker
  • Lawyer
  • Commodity Markets Advisor
  • Equipment Dealer
  • Inputs Retailer
  • Fuel Supplier
  • Family
  • Staff

Is there one way you can strengthen each relationship this month?

Are you nurturing one aspect of your farm to the detriment of another? Why? Have you calculated the
net cost of this practice?

From the Home Quarter

We invest our resources in a manner that we expect to provide us with a return. And no matter if that return is tangible or intangible, it all creates the net benefit to our business: positive or negative.

You’ll notice I will rarely refer to the weather in this writing because we cannot control the weather. As a
business advisor, I focus on what we can control. For example, how do we invest and allocate our
resources: financial, intellectual, human, equipment, and most importantly, time. I believe in Alan
Weiss’ theory that “wealth is discretionary time.”

For any business owner to achieve maximum discretionary time, he/she must recognize what they do
best, and get help with the rest. Business owners must nurture their business in such a manner that
maximizes ROI, because as Alan Weiss says, “real wealth is discretionary time, but money is the fuel for
that wealth.”

Don’t get so caught up in earning money that you have no wealth.

Profit is not a swear word.

Time is the most precious, non-renewable, intangible resource we could ever spend. Treat it as such.
Growing Farm Profits™ provides topical and pragmatic business management tips and tools for primary
producers in Canadian agriculture.