291 Adrien Pelletier - Why all farmers or most farmers need to become seed breeders again

A conversation with Adrien Pelletier, farmer, breeder, and baker, about wheat, seeds, no till organic farming, why all farmers or most farmers need to become seed breeders again, and why it is really difficult to bake sourdough with traditional organic wheat seeds that are not breed for high productive farms.

Why Adrien want to start changing the world in the most difficult place, at home, which is a large industrial, mostly extractive, commodity wheat-growing region in France? Picture a sea of wheat, large relatively flat fields and no trees. He argues we are in the prehistoric area of organic farming, and there is so much to discover, especially around population wheats. We also learn about no till organic farming is the way to go (and super difficult).
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The above references an opinion and is for information and educational purposes only. It is not intended to be investment advice. Seek a duly licensed professional for investment advice.

https://foodhub.nl/en/opleidingen/your-path-forward-in-regenerative-food-and-agriculture/

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:20

A check-in interview with Clint Bauer about his dream to get chemicals and massive, very expensive machinery out of broad-acre row crop farming, aka soy and corn farming, which currently occupies millions of acres around the world, especially in large industrialized agriculture countries. We check in what has happened and has changed. Farmers and many others in the space see that the era of chemicals is ending. It might not look like it, but we have already one Industrial-free, broad-acre farming is totally possible, and now it's about execution. What else has changed? And is Clint still interested in integrating animals and why has he partly invested in the company?

Speaker 1: 1:11

This is the investing in regenerative agriculture and food podcast investing as if the planet mattered, where we talk to the pioneers in the regenerative food and agriculture space to learn more on how to put our money to work to regenerate soil, people, local communities and ecosystems, while making an appropriate and fair return. Why my focus on soil and regeneration? Because so many of the pressing issues we face today have their roots in how we treat our land and our sea, grow our food, what we eat, where and consume, and it's time that we as investors big and small and consumers, start paying much more attention to the dirt slash, soil underneath our feet To make it easy for fans to support our work. We launched our membership community and so many of you have joined us as a member. Thank you, if our work created value for you and if you have the means and only if you have the means consider joining us. Find out more on comroadcom slash investing in Regen Ag. That is, comroadcom slash investing in Regen Ag, or find the link below.

Speaker 1: 2:24

Welcome back to another episode today with the founder and CEO of Greenfield Camp 3, ai powered robotics. They're swarming the fields across the country. They're based in Kansas, usa, and we already had Clint on the podcast and I checked it before going live three and a half years ago. So in the summer of 2020, they're still there, which is already a huge accomplishment, and I'm looking forward to checking in, see what has happened on the chem-free side of things, on the robotics side, and so much more. So welcome back, clint.

Speaker 2: 2:56

Hey, glad to be back. Yeah, it's a borderline miracle. We're still here, so thrilled.

Speaker 1: 3:02

And for the people, of course, I will link the previous interview in the show notes below and in the description, but just to give them a bit of a snapshot, Actually now, of Greenfield. When you're at a dinner party or somewhere, or in a flight or next to somebody, there's no clue what you're doing and they ask what do you do? How do you normally I mean, keep it nicely in polite and not go into two hours of rambling about chemicals how do you normally describe yourself and describe your company?

Speaker 2: 3:32

Yeah, it's pretty simple Robots that eliminate chemicals and infields crop fields and keep the carbon in the ground.

Speaker 1: 3:42

That's interesting. I think you added that the carbon piece. Is that a recent addition to the tech or to the interline?

Speaker 2: 3:50

I don't know it. Just I'm not sure when we added that, but that's always been the goal is no till, you know, so enabling no till to scale without chemicals. So yeah, I mean, I think a lot of folks are worried about carbon, as we know, so I figure well, it's worth them understanding that, else it leads to, oh well, why not organic? And all that.

Speaker 1: 4:12

And just to make it visual for people like swarming the fields and of course you have to, and now, even though you probably were doing that before as well mention AI in your title, otherwise People might lose interest. But what does swarming the fields mean? How big are they? How, unless you've seen them on Instagram or in real life? Just to give people an understanding of what swarming and the fields in this case mean, how do you deploy these today? Fly out of a truck today? Are they in the thousands? What does swarming mean?

Speaker 2: 4:45

Not in the thousands yet, but we'll deploy. This last season, we had 10 bots on most of the fields running at a given time, and they're running between the rows Currently is the way they operate, and so all 10 of them. One person this last year could keep an eye on about 10 of them, and so that's what they do, and so they're weeding between the rows currently, and eventually they'll do more.

Speaker 1: 5:14

And yeah, because we discussed that last time as well, I think there was an animal integration thought there, but between the rows of, let's say, corn, soy, like your standard, actually many, many hectares and acres in the US specifically, but many other places where are planted with that and your goal is to get the chemicals out of that rotation or get the chemical out of that production system without over-complicating your life or actually just making it possible. Because I think a strong point of your previous conversation was it's almost, if not impossible, to do it without the robots or you go hand-weeding but yeah, that doesn't really like weeds is a huge issue for a no-till.

Speaker 2: 5:59

Yeah, that's right when you look at a no-till environment and I'll just speak to where we're at in South Central Kansas but a lot of the other methods that are being used to weed are dependent on what you do before you plant the crop, meaning till, and if you don't till, in this region and a lot of places, you'll have a grass or a vining weed that simply you can't use lasers or other methods to get rid of, because they're just too numerous, and so you need to have mechanical capabilities, and that's why chemicals are one right. They're super efficient, and so that's sort of what we're up against is how do we replace chemicals with mechanical capabilities?

Speaker 1: 6:44

And the autonomous piece. What has changed in the last three and a half years? Let's say, in robotics, I think there have been a few other companies popping up, there might already been working on it and, of course, the AI boom exploded. But on the robotics piece, have there been huge advantages in terms of core technology, or what have you seen in the last three and a half years on the robotics piece?

Speaker 2: 7:10

Yeah, you're starting to see. I mean, if you're indoor and you're in highly structured systems indoor, there are a bunch of technologies there that are available. I think you're looking at ROS and ROS2 robotic operating system, which they're not really operating systems. Those are becoming pretty standard, but you can't rely on that at this point. I think anyone who's doing what we're doing or attempting to do anything in fields either has learned that or is about to learn that, and so the standards are improving, but they're nowhere near where they'll be 10 years from now. And it's kind of like I always tell people I started on the internet in 1997, and the stuff we were doing in 1997 is really easy. Now, right, everyone can do and it's just simple, and even an AI could do it now and so, but in 1997, it was incredibly difficult. So I see the same thing with robotics. It will develop over the next 10 years and some of the things we're doing today will be easier about then.

Speaker 1: 8:19

And how has been the reception by farmers and by? Because they're taking quite a risk. If it doesn't work, I mean they still have to go out and spray. And maybe I mean what's been the reception on the farmer side to others and not a person I mean, you're a third generation farmer, there's a very fundamental difference piece there but another person that comes with a fancy tech solution to do something and they've seen probably 100 plus and 100 plus in the graveyard as well. So what has been your reception with farmers, customers, clients that need to accept your robots into their fields?

Speaker 2: 9:00

Yeah, I think at a high level. The thing that's changed really in the last 15 years since I came back to Kansas with farmers is they all agree the chemicals need to go. That's changed. They all see the risk and that kind of stuff, but we don't even ask them to agree with that. We don't even really have that conversation unless they want to have it. We really just start very simply and say look, there's no resistance to blades, and so that's step one. And the second thing is our robots actually damage. This year we should be at 1% or less of the crop on the entire field, and when you run a big spray rig you're at 3% plus, and so we just break it down very easily.

Speaker 1: 9:43

Being the sprayer and the big tractor, it's actually damage about 3% of your plants that are out there and your robots should be down by 1 third, basically, of that.

Speaker 2: 9:53

Yep, on a 30-inch row crop, that's about the right 3% plus. And so we just say, listen, you've almost half paid for us in this region at that point. And so we just start there. And it's very simple from that perspective. And they can always go scramble a spray rig if something goes wrong. But last year we had, I think, zero instances of that, maybe one. So when we had it before that, it was just because we were moving slower than we had hoped. But now we're moving at a pretty good clip.

Speaker 1: 10:28

And just to come back to the point you made, compared to 15 years ago, farmers agree chemicals need to go. What has made that shift? Why is that? Let's say consciousness or that. Why has that moved in the last 15 years?

Speaker 2: 10:49

I think there is an awareness that have grown around them that one, farmers are starting to look at the sheer amount of money that they're spending on chemicals and the resistance genes and what's happening in sort of a loss of control not only over the weeds but their own operations to some extent. But then I think the second thing is I got into this because of my dad's Parkinson's, which I think came from farm chemicals, and the rest of my family thinks so too, and so the it's considered a farmer disease, like a work related disease in France, no questions asked.

Speaker 1: 11:24

You get an unemployment benefit if you're a farmer and you get Parkinson's. Really, that's fascinating Because the connection has been made and I've seen, because there's a huge discussion and they lost it actually in Europe on pesticide reduction and France was very strong about it because they've acknowledged that a long time ago and the simple lawyers in the court case were like, yeah, we have the cases, it's not even a discussion anymore. You just get unemployment benefits and for quite a few years now it's considered a work related disease, which is horrible. But at least we're at two dead level. But it's unfortunately only France, not the rest of Europe. So the pesticide reduction law didn't get through the parliament. But yeah, we're working on it. That's amazing.

Speaker 2: 12:08

I actually didn't realize that. Yeah, and I think that folks are seeing more and more the Parkinson's. Let's just focus on that for now. The Parkinson's incidence is growing. I mean, I don't?

Speaker 2: 12:20

It's interesting when I just talk with folks about this farmers or otherwise in the area almost everyone knows some of the Parkinson's now and I don't think that was the case 15 years ago, and so it's just growing and growing and growing. And so I think that is a big part of it. And I think any farmer has to think about okay, when I'm cleaning out my spray rig, what am I doing at my farm? Where is that going? Even if you use best methods, it's probably using a garden hose and it's probably somewhere on your farm and you have kids running around and it's just not a great thing. And so when they see that we have an alternative and starting to understand the greater vision, they buy into it and they want to be supportive, and I think what I hear now most of the time is we want to see you win. In fact, I hear that almost every single time.

Speaker 1: 13:13

And for farmers you mentioned, it pays for itself already like half of it through the simple reduction in loss of crop. And then how does the business case work for the other half? Like, how interesting is it? You're still small company, there's still a lot of things moving, but you're working with quite a few customers. Like, how interesting is the business case If I'm only interested I don't believe the Parkinson's piece, I'm ignoring the carbon piece and ignoring everything else, but I'm interested in pure dollars. Like how?

Speaker 2: 13:46

do you convince me? Yeah, normally we have it at that point, to be honest. But I think after that, if I feel any skepticism which is pretty rare past that point. But we just talk about look, go, walk out in your soybean field after it's sprayed and let me know what you see in the heat of the day. And they're suffering, even with the genetics, and so we don't have that problem, and so we're not creating suffering on the plants by over the top spraying, and so there's some yield loss happening there when a plant's suffering. We don't have that data hard data. There are reports and stuff. We're gathering data on it and researching it, but we don't put a number forward with them on that like we do the other. So there's that.

Speaker 2: 14:32

And then the last thing I ask them is do you want to be in control of your own business eventually or not? Do you want to reduce your dependencies someday? And right now you're dependent on these genetics built into every single seed and you can't save your seed. You have to pay extra for those genetics, so the sprays will work with it. And are you happy with that? Because we're on a path to get rid of all of them? And then you opens up a whole different world of seed choices. And do you want to be a farmer that is growing plants or do you want to be a farmer that's talking about your equipment and your chemical choices all day? So I think most farmers would rather be growing interesting crops and enjoying the biology of it in the grazing and all that, than chemical selection, arguing whether they're efficient or not and buying really expensive equipment and financing it.

Speaker 1: 15:26

So it's yeah, and in your customer set, how many are then jumping beyond the GMO, beyond the plug and play set that most others are doing, like, how enabling is this technology? I think is what I'm wondering about.

Speaker 2: 15:46

Well, the non-GMO.

Speaker 1: 15:48

Or they maybe wanted to do it anyway and they use it as okay, this is the moment to go.

Speaker 2: 15:53

Yeah, I wouldn't say that's happening right now and we're not asking them to, because right now I'm still saying, look, have a backup and go ahead and buy those genetically modified seeds right now and use them like you always do and you have a safety net until you get comfortable working with us. So we don't make that ask yet, and so that's kind of where it stands currently. So I'm not aware of anyone going. Okay, great, I'm running around trying to buy non-GMOC. That said, since the Chipotle investment, we've always had quite a few farms coming to our doors from all over the world, and I don't have a number on that, but it has exploded since the Chipotle deal was announced and so, and a lot of those farms are saying they're growing non-GMO crops, stuff like that, because they really do struggle with weed control on a post-plant basis.

Speaker 1: 16:51

And so you brought it up yourself. Of course we're going to talk about it, but let's do that now. So something else that has changed significantly in the last three and a half years was a relatively recent chipotle. The fast, casual, fast food chain in the US has agreed to invest. So how did that come about? I mean, they've been quite vocal about the rule in the food chain or the food system for a long time and they've made some investments, left and right, I think. But how did they come to you? Or how did they land robotics and row cropping and chemicals? I mean the chemical piece I find easy, but the rest, how did they deal with that?

Speaker 2: 17:33

Yeah, it was Cultivate Next, which is their venture arm, and we got to know those guys and reached out to them and they got back to us and eventually and they came out and saw what we were doing. And I think the biggest challenge we've had is that we're based in Kansas and a lot of firms just won't take the time to fly and understand what agriculture looks like here. So they did and, to be blunt, I believe every single potential investor that's been to the farm invested and so I could be wrong on that, but I'm pretty sure that's true.

Speaker 2: 18:12

Yeah, and I think the filter, and I think when you see them, you realize, hey, there's some great potential here. And so I think the other thing that was notable to them was just the fact I built this regenerative supply chain with Canada pet food and that the robots are now integrating into that, and so we understand a little bit about ingredients, supply chains and the complexity involved, and I think that was a portion of it, and so, but yeah, I think the math that they've bought into is the same as ours. That longer term, really small machines that are reconfigurable makes a lot of sense and financial sense, as well as the chemical no chemical mandate that we're working towards.

Speaker 1: 19:05

And are they going to connect you to farm I mean many are reaching out now. Connect you to farmers in their supply chain, or how does it work? Is it a pure financial investment, or is there also supply chain interest, let's say from their procurement arm or however that works with them?

Speaker 2: 19:23

Yeah, I think that's one of the interesting things about Chipotle and Cultivate. Next is they seem to work together and they have other investments and companies that are being implemented with their farm partners, and so that was one of the compelling things to us, and in fact I'll be out there pretty soon walking around with at least the first set of farms and kind of seeing, okay, how do we integrate into this potentially? So they seem to work through that and it's not just talk. So that's super compelling from my perspective.

Speaker 1: 19:59

No, of course. And then, just on a practical level, how many robots have you buzzing around now? Or in terms of scale, just to understand, is it in the tens, in the hundreds or in the thousands? And if Chipotle says we have 10 farms here that need them, how easy is it to get to the numbers that? Or are they rotating? You don't need so many because you're rotating. How many robots are you going to control by the end of the year?

Speaker 2: 20:28

Yeah, we're in a phase now where we're slowly expanding.

Speaker 2: 20:34

We got to a point about halfway through last summer season and we pulled back some of the fleet to engineering to start working on adding other capabilities and refining what we had, meaning other attachments and other capabilities of the robots, and so on a broad acre basis meaning all the crops you mentioned plus cotton and sorghum and stuff like that here in the Midwest, the robots will be running well over starting April, moving forward about 240 days a year.

Speaker 2: 21:07

They're going to be doing a lot more than just cutting weeds, and so we're working on cover cropping and spraying and soil testing automated, and so that really is where we're going with it. So, the expansion of the fleet, we're moving a little bit slower to make sure that we can add those capabilities, because why build another robot too many of them before you know how to add all those capabilities to them, and so that's where we're at. So we have to answer your question directly. We have 20 robots today that were running last summer and we'll add another 10 by April, hopefully running in Texas and maybe doing some soil testing up here in Kansas, and then we'll add a few each month and that pace will accelerate until we get to what we hope is a close to profit in 2025. And so that's sort of the plan.

Speaker 1: 22:09

And then from I'm going to ask about the NOPs later, but then from the supply chain stuff because I see you still work with the pet food company, which is great, meaning they're still around. And I think snack to this as well, like, how has that world changed a bit or a lot or not at all? Let's say, since we last talked in terms of interest for chemical free interest for different sourcing, etc. Has there been a shift there from the big buyers?

Speaker 2: 22:42

let's say, yeah, the work with Canada started before we even started Greenfield and, of course, canada has been through several acquisitions and mergers and each time it occurred I thought, well, maybe this is the end of the road, and actually each subsequent investor, group or owner or whoever has actually increased their interest. Now, every time you have a change, there's some adjustment period and that's slow to stand a few times and I think everybody can understand that. But this group now, I think, is committed and I know their head of marketing is a guy who has a background in regenerative ag to some extent and is really into it and they came here and presented to about 35 farmers here at my farm, which is Greenfield HQ, and committed to, in a few years, all of our grains and legumes hopefully being sourced through farms that are on that regenerative track. And so I think what you're seeing and Cohen, you've seen this for sure is just this growing recognition among supply chains that this regenerative movement has legs, that it's growing. It's real, yeah, it's real, and I think that has in 2015,.

Speaker 2: 24:03

Heck, I didn't even know the word regenerative when I started down the path with the supply chain with them. I was still calling it, I called it integrated farming. And then we had a consultant a couple of years later. Go listen, somebody's kind of doing these things you're working on and it's called regenerative. I'm like, oh okay, that's great, let's Google that.

Speaker 2: 24:20

And yeah, I'm like, oh good, I don't have to, like, learn all these things. So a lot of guys have already figured out a fair amount of these things, so, and there's a name up for it, and so I think that is changing. You know, with that, the complexity of supply chains are substantial, right? And you're looking at the storage, which could be anything from refrigeration to grain storage, which means you have to divide it and separate it. Identity preserved, I guess, is the term, and then you have to just think about what happens if you have a bad crop right, and so for Canada, I believe, most, if not all, the sorghum that goes into their pet food, last year we grew using, I mean, the robots.

Speaker 2: 25:07

We did all those fields and for that, one of the things we've done which I think is interesting if we look at sort of regenerative adoption is one of the largest grain cooperatives in the US, actually invested in Greenfield a couple of years ago and partners with us, and they're named MKC, and so they have over 40 grain storage facilities and they're finishing their third train loader, which means they can load about 100 cars with grain every six hours train cars, and then they have these local facilities.

Speaker 2: 25:38

So we've taken one of the local facilities that was maybe not being used as much and now Canada works with them and that's where all the sorghum is hauled to and kept separate from the rest, and so in that you have a very large grain cooperative that's in the commodity business, that's now getting in the identity preserved and they actually help us with sort of the finance part of it and they do the storage, they do the logistics, they help us find the farmers and you know it won't always be this good, but I'm happy to say the farmers this past year got a substantial premium versus cash price at the time of harvest, and I mean substantial.

Speaker 2: 26:23

And so the farmers are starting to see that in this region and I never promise, hey, we're going to get you in on these types of deals. The fact of the matter is there's 250 million acres of broad acre in the United States and not everyone's going to get a premium, but it is a good way to spur also early adoption. Hey, as we make these deals, the earlier you get on the list, the better chance this could happen. But we make no guarantees, right.

Speaker 1: 26:54

And so, but I think also last on the list, it's not going to happen.

Speaker 2: 26:58

That's right. The only way to see the attitude is not going to pay.

Speaker 1: 27:04

And so that's given after being others, because of course one company could just be an exception of. I mean, if they change ownership a few times, that might be stronger trend. But have you seen others that are knocking on the door and wanting to get the chemical free supply identity preserved, et cetera?

Speaker 2: 27:24

Yes, I think there's. We've had a lot of those discussions and I'll be running around California pretty soon and, like I said, after the Chipotle announcement a lot of more people realized we exist.

Speaker 1: 27:35

I mean we've kept pretty quiet and part of that was I mean you follow that you follow your LinkedIn and you can get a good impression that you're silent there, and for good reason. So yeah, you have to really not follow this space. Let's say, but yeah, of course, if Chipotle announces something, it travels everywhere and press releases get shared and things like that.

Speaker 2: 27:59

Yeah, yeah, it does, it does, and so that's made a big difference. And, yes, I think we're going to see more and more of this. But again, you've got to work through the complexity, right.

Speaker 1: 28:10

And.

Speaker 2: 28:10

I know that some of the farms I'm going to look at, some of the brands I'm going to work with, I could tell they'd appreciate it when I say, well, look, I just need to come see your operation and understand how you work right before we try to even put anything together right. And so I think that instead of showing up and ag or food or supply chains or farmers, you don't show up and tell them how it's going to be. You show up and you listen. And since I am a farmer that's been good on broad acre, I kind of have a pretty good idea of how it goes. But some of these other deals that we're looking at, I need to go and listen and some of our other guys will go and listen and we'll figure out how to make it work for them right.

Speaker 1: 28:48

Because weeds are an issue not only in broad acre. That's what you're hinting to.

Speaker 2: 28:52

Yeah, and cover cropping and all these things that folks want to do.

Speaker 1: 28:57

And then how far is the animal integration piece down the list? Because last time you hinted towards that, and then it's of course way more complex than weeding, which is already complex. Imagine cover crop planting, imagine soil monitoring and research automatically. What are your thoughts there?

Speaker 2: 29:18

Yeah, I'll tell you. You know, everyone's got their apple Newton experience or the thing that they wish they had not gotten down the path the way they went down the path, and we've got a few chassis sitting around, pretty good sized ones on this grazing thing that we weren't too happy with in the end, and we've changed course a bit. I remain steadfast, and I know this is correct. We're doing it on my farm, in that all crop land will be graced at some point. It is absolutely financially the right move and with cover crops it makes a lot of sense. And so, on my farm specifically, we're kind of going back old school. We're putting fence around all of my land this year and we are, of course, grazing it, but we were doing it with these various apparatus that were automated or semi-automated. But it's a very difficult thing to win at. We have one more idea, and I've promised myself not to spend one more dime or amount of time on that particular idea until every other thing we have going is just cruising.

Speaker 2: 30:35

And so but with putting electric fence. Yeah, but we're putting a three line electric fence around the edge of all of our fields, Next to the highways. We're actually putting a more intense fence than that, even since we have sheep and, but guess what? We have robots that can follow things, and so they're actually going to cut if there's weeds growing to try to ground out the fence. They'll run along the fence and cut the weeds underneath the fence, so it doesn't ground them out. And so for now, that's the way we see this working, Because a lot of times I thought electrified maybe animals won't reach under there to keep that from happening, which is why the fences were removed years ago, decades ago.

Speaker 1: 31:20

Because they were removed because of the. It was too time consuming to cut underneath.

Speaker 2: 31:28

Yeah, because the fence, you know, the weeds would grow up and then you can't get rid of them and then they go to seed and have weeds in getting in your cropland, and so that's why a lot of fences, almost all cropland, had fences in this area at one point and then it, you know, like my grandpa, ripped them out, because you know two reasons. One, what I just stated to you don't want the plow to hit the fence and all these types of things that are now less of a problem and less of an issue yeah.

Speaker 2: 31:58

And so I'm like well, let's, let's take, make a simpler thing here and let's just get the fence around the things around the edge of the that.

Speaker 1: 32:04

let's eliminate that problem and fight another day you know, and so you're going down the route of cover crops seeding and also make this like what's. If then it's not going to be grazed, it has to be cut at some point, or it has to be mowed in, or like what is your? What is your approach there with cover crops?

Speaker 2: 32:27

Yeah, the cycle that we're working on right now is this, and let's just use one scenario you have a sorghum or milo crop which grows in the summer in in South Central Kansas, and so you plant that crop in. Let's just start at plant time, you know, april, may in this area, or as late as almost up to 4th of July, I believe. You plant that crop and somewhere between July and middle of September you'll go in between the rows with our robots and you'll put a cover crop with a little bit of seed to soil contact between those rows and we've tested with cereal rye so far. So you put that cover crop in there. Your sorghum doesn't get harvested until well, in drought. Hopefully you're not harvesting in September, but once in a while now you do. But September, october, november, right. Once you harvest that you should have that rye or whatever you planted growing. And if you did it with our robots, you don't have to go in and drill it in post plant and knock down all that milo or sorghum.

Speaker 2: 33:30

So those creatures, whether they're sheep or cattle in this instance, in this region, can graze, not just the milo stalks that tear the leaves off them, and this is a common practice, but now you have cereal rye or whatever growing underneath those stalks, that nice green stuff to eat through the winter in this area.

Speaker 2: 33:49

And so now you've got that growing and then you do that through the winter and then you can let that cover grow out in the spring and you could, you know, in theory, let it go all the way to roller crimp or our next robot that's coming.

Speaker 2: 34:03

That I'm not going to talk about in detail today works it's been three years in the making can work with that cover crop to eliminate any need for a burn down or residual herbicide, and so, and then you can plant the crop. So that's what it does. You feed your animals through the winter, you get use of all the plant material that's there, you avoid knocking into the ground so the cattle or sheep aren't eating as much right on the ground. And now you're setting yourself up for less weed pressure, especially in the case of cereal rye, and as long as you're following with a crop that cereal rye can't impact, you set yourself up well for the spring, and then you moved down to the next rotation, and so on and so forth. And so, literally, is the cycle we are pursuing today, with farmers that plant sorghum or sunflowers or crops in 30 inch rows.

Speaker 1: 35:04

How much of a jump is that for your neighbors, let's say? Or how much of a shift in practice, or in theory as well, and in mindset, et cetera, to operate like that?

Speaker 2: 35:19

Yeah, there's a couple things. One, if you already have cattle, you recognize that value immediately. It's just a no-brainer. It really is. I mean any ones that are farmers, they get it right away. Oh yeah, sure it drives my feet costs down. I have nice green stuff to eat through the winter. Wonderful For guys that don't have cattle or sheep and they don't want to get into cattle or sheep. Then the question is do you want incremental revenue through the winter on your soil? Do you want an asset that's producing more revenue for you, or do you want to just sit around? That's up to you. But me, as a farmer, I'll take that revenue. It comes back to what Gabe says about signing the back of the checks versus the front. I always think that's the greatest saying ever that he came up with Gabe Brown, yeah.

Speaker 2: 36:08

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 36:09

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 36:11

If I say Gabe, I don't know Gabe at all, it's not like we're buddies One of my facts there.

Speaker 1: 36:15

You had Ray Archuleta on your phone. Yeah, that's the closest you got.

Speaker 2: 36:18

Yeah, In the last week, yeah, so I think that that's the way I look at it is regenerative ag. I think your arguments as much as I'd like to see it. I think you know as well as I do People don't do things that lose money One and two that are difficult with no immediate payoff, and so that second scenario is one that someone has to think through. I want to put fence around it, and how do I handle it and how do I deal with that?

Speaker 1: 36:54

Yeah, that's working, with a shift from my normal winter. Like say yeah.

Speaker 2: 36:57

That's right. And water. And in the US there is a program and I'll be honest, I haven't had time to sign up for it on my land yet but you could put solar pumps in and the government helps to fray some of those costs because you got to have water right. That's the other challenge. You can't just put them out in the field and they're not camels, and so there are some water needs even through the winter months and certainly in the summer months.

Speaker 1: 37:23

Yeah, and then having living creatures that need daily moving in many cases or need care and checking in and all of that. Of course they could run through fences every now and then and things like that. It's very, very different. I can imagine that's a massive Quite, a big jump to go from that to integrating animals, even though it probably is the biggest thing you can do, plus the cover crops and feeding them and etc. Etc. But probably the biggest lever you have to kickstart soil biology and all of those nice things. It's not to be taken lightly in terms of what it means for daily, for your daily life basically.

Speaker 2: 38:06

I agree, and it's an idea. That's time I think is coming right now, with commodity prices falling again and more and more proof starting to show that, look, if you get the soil biology correct, and even during the process, your need for synthetic fertilizer is reduced, and so I think, as commodity prices go down, you'll hear more and more reception around this Right, and that's just kind of how it works. So our timing is pretty good.

Speaker 1: 38:41

But maybe not with a machine yet or with a robot yet, from your garage or your hanger or your storage. So what are other things you have changed your mind about in the last three, three and a half years? I mean not that racing is going to happen everywhere, but maybe not with the next iteration of the robot. What are other things you've significantly changed your mind about?

Speaker 2: 39:10

I think that's about it. That's one of the things we talk about at Greenfields. We really haven't made any substantial pivots and, by the way, the failed system we were working on that's going to happen. I just don't know exactly what the form factor will be and how it's going to work yet. But no, nothing has changed, because I think their regenerative processes are still true and it will end up looking different than we all see it today, 20 years from now. But I still think the idea of the concept of and it's beyond concept for a lot of farms now but cover crops and cash crops and how those interplay and animals being involved on it, I think on broad acre ag, is absolutely true and we're seeing it more and more and I certainly see it on my farm, and so nothing really has changed. There hasn't been a pivot from our perspective at all really.

Speaker 1: 40:11

And so does it seem to you. I mean, is there a momentum building around Regentivac? I mean apart from the farmer side, but let's say beyond? I mean the fact that it chipotle comes out and visit and affect that other companies start to at least procure part of their things like does it feel like a momentum shift compared to three, four, even 10 years ago, or is it still very, very early in your, in your opinion?

Speaker 2: 40:40

No, I don't think it's very, very early anymore. I think you're on LinkedIn and you see it. I mean you have guys running tractors between orchard rows and putting cover crops in right, and so you're seeing that in all types of farming and people thinking through it. So we're certainly, you know, in the learning phase of the adoption curve. You know, before it's just sort of, you know, universities adopt and there's a stamped out way sort of people do this as a base system. But I think that's, by the way, one of the ways we'll know is when universities start teaching this and this is sort of the base system right Right now, that it is not what's happening to my knowledge. So, but no, we're beyond these early, early phases.

Speaker 2: 41:23

I think at this point we talk about the sometime at Greenfield. Stephen and I, you know how do we compare this to the internet right, which we were, stephen, started in, I believe, in 1992 or 1994 or somewhere in there, and so I talked to. We talk about that and we compare this to the internet right In terms of robotics, adoption, but also regenerative ag, and so we don't have a clear consensus. It's a little bit different when you're talking about physical stuff versus mostly digital, but we certainly are beyond, you know, the very early days, in my opinion.

Speaker 1: 42:01

And how? I mean talking about the technology piece. How has the technology piece developed, especially the software, especially AI, which got a lot of attention last year and years before as well. But I didn't think three, four years ago there wasn't a hype yet. I think it was a different hype and like has that significantly? Has that made your life easier or not really yet? Or like what have you seen on the?

Speaker 2: 42:30

picture recognition the software piece, etc.

Speaker 2: 42:33

Yeah, it's so early stage still. I mean, we're pretty basic stuff that we're doing. That I guess you could call AI and we do, but it's pretty basic. What will change, I believe, over time is, you know, this year we're looking at running upwards of, you know, you ask thousands versus tens of thousands of acres. Well, we're going for tens of thousands this year and that'll start capturing some data over time and I think we'll learn a bit over what's going on. And again we're down low so we can start capturing a lot more detailed data as to what's happening. So it's not high on our priority list for this season, but it won't be very hard to start adding some you know, capabilities and cameras and start recording, you know, on tens of thousands than the hundreds of thousands. And that's when I think AI really takes off. We've seen that with the LLMs and stuff, what they're doing. The more data, the more they learn and the way you can go. So, although we're not working on language, but so we'll see, We'll see how it all plays out over time but I'm very practical about it is let's make sure we create the conditions and we solve a fundamental problem for the farmer.

Speaker 2: 43:53

First, the more of a footprint you have, the more you can learn and the more we will learn and the farmers will learn with us, and then the AI and such can learn alongside all of us as to what we're doing at that point. So the one notion I will reject today is the idea that we know exactly where seed was planted. No, we don't. We have seen that over and over in fields. It is not as precise as everyone once stacked. There is no RTK perfect position for every single seed that is planted, but it is pretty good you know where things are and the rows and the variances are much less than they were 30 years ago.

Speaker 2: 44:38

And the second notion is that we're going to take care of plants on a plant-by-plant basis. I'm not saying that won't happen in broad acre ag at some point, but I've been through this before in the internet where we were going to take care of customers on a customer-by-customer profile basis and it took quite some time before that was reality and that was in the digital world where it's much easier to do. And I was a data science guy before I moved back to Kansas and now you can right, you've got all the profiles, facebook and Google and all that compiles data, but it took a long time in the digital world, doing it on a plant-by plant.

Speaker 1: 45:17

100,000 plants an acre soybean basis is not going to happen tomorrow, so and then, as a sort of final one, you mentioned the soil measurement piece. Is that because farmers are asking for it? Is it because you find it interesting? Who's the customer or the client there that wants that or is interested? And also, ultimately it's going to pay for that?

Speaker 2: 45:41

Yeah, we have a soil testing partner MKC is obviously working with us and another partner where we're trying to kind of finalize a deal with, and the idea is this I start very simple again grid sampling. A lot of farmers do this, whether you agree with it or don't agree with it, and the idea is to drive down those costs so they can do it more often and maybe tune their prescriptions a little bit better. And so that's where we're coming from is to look at it from a pure cost savings perspective, not just on the testing itself, but also on your prescriptions be more accurate for what you're doing. So that's the goal there.

Speaker 1: 46:32

And because we've seen many startups, I think as well, in the soil measurement space, and how has that space evolved over the last years? Or what do you see as the biggest potential breakthroughs or potential bottlenecks? And because you've been in this for a while, doing stuff in-field which most people haven't, what's your view there on the carbon piece, Of course we get a lot of hype still around that, but also in soil biology in general or really understanding what's happening in it, what do you see there as a veteran in the field stuff?

Speaker 2: 47:12

I wouldn't call myself a veteran yet that's for sure. Ask me, in 20,000 acres, what I think of soil testing with the bots. But we are not there. Listen, I think there's a lot of companies working on these digital probes and we've got one partner and another one we're working on finalizing and deal with.

Speaker 2: 47:33

I don't think anyone's saying they're perfect or they're the in-state, but it's a massive improvement over pulling a massive amount of samples and mailing them off somewhere. You're just trying to get close to an answer. That, I think, is a big shift here, as we get more and more to where we can digitalize on-site results versus pulling something the soil containing the data and shipping it off and instead recognizing the soil data in its native format right there in the field. That drives us down and allows things to become a little bit actionable at a much faster pace and much lower cost. Right now, when a farmer is doing grid sampling, they're doing it about every three or four years. This could get it down to where it'll be up to the farmer, but every one to two years, really, it could get to the point they're doing it every year and this should be.

Speaker 1: 48:39

They're fascinating. How that? Because we really have very little clue of what happening in field by field basis or in general, because it's just not being sampled and not regularly.

Speaker 2: 48:52

Yeah, You're nodding no.

Speaker 1: 48:53

You're like. Nobody sees that. Like what's the?

Speaker 2: 48:56

No, no, listen, no, I think that I think there is. Listen. You know what have we been trying to you and I know this, and I think a lot of people are coming to recognize this, Both in human health and in soil health. We've been playing God for a long time and we thought we could control the variables that we didn't even understand, all the variables. We don't know what's in our gut, we know very little, and this started when I was 25 years old and I'm 50 now, and so I recognized this 25 years ago, healing myself and in my soil gut or not my soil gut, my gut.

Speaker 1: 49:31

And I started figuring out there was a good mistake.

Speaker 2: 49:36

And I recognized boy. There's just a lot. These guys want me to take these pills and there's a lot going on here that they don't understand. They don't know anything about. It hasn't been synthesized we don't even and not just synthesize what's in our gut, but also the interaction between them. The numbers are so massive that we still don't have a computer that's able to figure out those interactions. It's the same thing on the soil.

Speaker 2: 49:56

I think we're all starting to figure that out. I think most farmers are starting to figure that out. There's complexity there, and so the things we're measuring today. We're going to be laughing just how stupid we were 20 years from now and how little we knew.

Speaker 2: 50:11

But you got to hang your hat on something. You got to raise a crop. You have to, even if you're at the meta level instead of the actual detail level, you have to be taking action as a farmer and making some sort of supposition about what you're doing, and so we're only touching the surface of what's capable or possible at this point, but we'll get better and better at this. I think my biggest fear is that we become arrogant and we make decisions and we do things that we don't understand the implications down the road with what we're doing. And so again, that takes me back to the cover cropping, the grazing of animals and all these things that get you to a point where you need fewer and fewer things to add to your crop, as you're going right Either during season or between season.

Speaker 2: 51:00

So I'm rambling a little bit here, but I think that it's Right now. We're going to do the things that farmers are used to doing. They'll just have more frequent adjustments to what they've been doing. But hopefully we'll get beyond that and it's not, hopefully we will and we'll get better and better data and we'll make more frequent adjustments as a result of that and we'll go from there. But, by the way, it's going to be very hard to make those more frequent adjustments with an absolute monster piece of equipment, you know.

Speaker 1: 51:40

Okay, yeah, a tractor that weighs I don't know so much and compacts right away.

Speaker 2: 51:46

And your sprayer, yeah Right, and I think drones and small rovers will be where we go, you know.

Speaker 1: 51:54

What would be the role of drones?

Speaker 2: 52:01

If you think about land based. We're not going to win land speed records with our robots anytime soon.

Speaker 1: 52:08

Probably better yeah.

Speaker 2: 52:11

And so a drone can move faster. So drones can do some things, and they can also certainly collect data much, much faster, and so to enable the rover to know where it's going. So just think about our weeding scenario right now. Right now, when we run a field, we pretty much run the whole field. That won't be the case in two years, so you know we'll have better data on, you'll be selective, yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 1: 52:36

And so then you get to a point where yep, yep, and the energy savings from that alone are massive.

Speaker 2: 52:43

Right, and when we talk about energy savings, it's not just energy savings of batteries, in our case, it's the energy savings of the humans that maintain the equipment and all the wasted time you ran with those and all the wasted time someone's maintaining them, and so that you know the payoff will be massive. And I think drones and we'll have something to do with that. They already do for us.

Speaker 1: 53:10

So yeah, and there the development went really fast as well, like that's a massive I mean the higher and commercial, normal, higher and normal drones, on those consumer drones you can buy now, compared to five, 10 years ago, it's just another world and the costs compared to that completely. And so, as a final question, are you optimistic, like from what you've seen over the last years? I mean, let's say, the use of chemicals hasn't really dropped yet. The effects are starting to become much more visible, and I have become more visible over the last years. And so what, what gives you optimism? If you're optimistic, and what, what, what drives you? I mean, what drives you is clear, but what keeps you getting out of bed in the morning to see I'm going to 10,000 acres and more, but compared to what? Where it's sprayed, that's still tiny, unfortunately. What keeps you going?

Speaker 2: 54:08

Yeah, I actually think we've already won and I tell the team that I said it's just as execution. Now the time that tide has already turned and I think even the agra the guys that have been traditionally doing a lot of agra, chemicals and seed attached that actually already know that too.

Speaker 1: 54:28

And you can look at the moment was the moment that the tide turned.

Speaker 2: 54:32

Let's go look at their mergers and what companies they're buying, and that they're looking at biological smore now and stuff like that which I think is a buyer buying a few biological companies?

Speaker 1: 54:42

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 54:44

And I think there's a recognition there that chemicals are being reduced. So you look at MKCR partner right, are they still spraying chemicals? You bet Fast majority. And so when we did the deal, the announcement was look, we're looking at all paths, right. And so that's a nod to something new is coming along now and it's early in it. It won't be overnight, but the change is happening and I think the change is absolute. Listen, if I show up with an argument tomorrow that our robots could take over your fields with no chemicals involved whatsoever and create ex new revenue opportunities tomorrow and I had all the machines to do it and it was absolutely proven there is zero farmers who tell me no, not one, not one. No one's attached to what we've been doing the last 40 years anymore. Right.

Speaker 2: 55:35

So remember a lot of guys were telling that moved to no till, right and so, but it took time and so that's where we're at. And so, no, I tell the team like, we're not the one on the precipice. You know that if the wind blows sharply, we're going to fly off it. It's chemicals that are on the precipice, that are about to be blown right off over the cliff, right, and so it just doesn't look like it right now. Right, and it's similar to the internet in 1997, when people were like, oh, we'll never. You know, everyone likes to go physically shop and e-commerce won't be a big deal, or a record company that told us what. We control all of our music, so we'll decide when it gets distributed online. And the Napster appeared two years later. So it, these things move fast, but the moves slower and ag, because it's actual physical stuff, right.

Speaker 1: 56:31

I think it's a perfect end to this conversation. I want to thank you so much, clint, for the work you do and for coming on here in what must be a very busy winter, getting a lot more machines ready and getting a lot more suppliers to or buyers and they are suppliers to to buy stuff from the farmers you work with and I thank you for coming on here and share about the progress in the last three and a half and, of course, also before years.

Speaker 2: 56:56

Well, we're both still here, which is exciting. So, what did you say? 300 plus now, or about 300?.

Speaker 1: 57:04

Almost. No, yeah, we're. I think this would be depending a bit on when it gets out. I think around two, 78 or nine. And then we have one series actually with Benedict Bezos that we didn't count, which was nine episodes. So, yeah, two, 90, something like that.

Speaker 2: 57:20

That's a lot. That's a lot, that's amazing. Congrats.

Speaker 1: 57:23

Keep it going. Some people have listened to almost all of them, which I applaud them for, but it's, yeah, it's, that's over 300 hours of stuff.

Speaker 2: 57:32

Well, hopefully we have a third one in the future.

Speaker 1: 57:35

We will. We will, I mean if you make it through the first few years, the chances are just that you keep going up are pretty high, hopefully.

Speaker 2: 57:43

Thank you so much. All right Sounds good.

Speaker 1: 57:56

Thank you so much for listening all the way to the end. For the show notes and links we discussed in this episode, check out our website investing in regender agriculturecom forward slash posts. If you like this episode, why not share it with a friend? Or give us a rating on Apple podcast? That really helps. Thanks again and see you next time.