John Deere launches digital farming hub

Designed specifically for Australian and New Zealand farmers, the John Deere Digital Agriculture Hub, features information on the power of data in decision-making, easy-to-understand how to videos and case studies with primary producers speaking about how digital farming has transformed their businesses.

John Deere precision agriculture manager Ben Kelly said the website was built to support farmers with tools and knowledge to make adoption of digital technology both as simple and as profitable as possible.

"Many farmers have digital tools inbuilt in their farm equipment but may not be aware of how to get the most from that technology," Mr Kelly said.

"We saw the opportunity to help them do this by providing resources such as how to content and simple guides and we hope this will also ignite more conversations about the practical application of precision agriculture to achieve greater efficiency and profitability."

The Australian Farm Institute estimates $20.3 billion can be added to the gross value of agricultural production through digital technology, while the National Farmers' Federation has identified it as one of the keys to making agriculture a $100b industry by 2030.

Mr Kelly said advances in connectivity and data transfer now meant more farmers than ever could contribute to these exciting industry goals while directly benefitting their own businesses.

"There is no doubt that a decade ago implementing precision ag technology was more challenging," he said.

"For example, it was common to have to manually input data, save it on a USB and carry that with you from machine-to-machine and back to the office.

"But connectivity is improving and the movement of data is increasingly automated, meaning information is much more readily available.

"These days, you can simply turn the key of the tractor and drive, safe in the knowledge updates are streaming securely to your account and are available on your smartphone or tablet, as well as in the office.

"This information can then be used to make decisions that have powerful impacts on an operation's performance."

While the new Digital Agriculture Hub focuses on John Deere's digital platforms, farmers with any brand of equipment can create a MyJohnDeere account, load in their farm machinery and gain access to the John Deere Operations Center and the MyOperations app, to experience the benefits of the John Deere Digital Ecosystem.

The level of automation for non-John Deere machinery will be the only major difference for users.

"The information on the site provided by our local solutions specialists and farmers, ranges from how to set up an account through to the 'Help Me Improve' section for those who are already using technology but want to be able to extract more value from it," Mr Kelly said.

"We have something for everyone, no matter how progressed they are, as well as resources that allow people to gradually build on their knowledge."

The site will be consistently updated with new information, advice and case studies to make it an evolving tool and library of information for use by industry.