Representatives from Brazil’s largest family farming operation visited Toowoomba on Monday as part of their Australian farm tour, to learn about the country’s cutting-edge farming technology and practices.
Vantage NEA, formerly BMS Laser Sat, was invited to talk to 18 agronomists and farm managers from Bom Futuro, a Brazilian cotton and grains company that consists of 93,000 hectares of cotton country and 1.4 million ha of grain production.
Bom Futuro operates 110 farms across the state of Mato Grosso, with different levels of technology being implemented on all of them.
Benchmarking of their technology use and practices was a key priority for the group during the discussion- they wanted to compare what technology Australian farmers were using with what they’re implementing on their own productions back in Brazil.
Vantage NEA precision agronomist Bryan Granshaw went through the latest Trimble Agriculture range, then went into detail about how Australian farmers were utilising to technology by incorporating methods like traffic control, water management, UAV imagery and variable rate application into their farming practice.
Vantage NEA’s Soil Information Solution (SiS) service was of particular interest to the group, as the technology provides a unique soil surveying method that produces high resolution, 3D, spatially correct data on soil’s chemical and physical attributes.
Mr Granshaw said there were huge opportunities for this technology in Brazil as it would allow farmers to more precisely manage their broad scale farming operations.
“Today they operate everything on such a broad scale, so they’re wanting to have a finer resolution with their agronomic approach,” he said.
“Our technology would help them to refine their farms into zones, allowing them to be more precise with their farming applications.”