By 2025, the world will need to feed around two billion more people than today – but with less land space available for agriculture than ever before. It’s one of the greatest challenges in modern farming.
Agribusiness Syngenta produces seeds and agrochemicals for farmers and growers around the world and lately this question has been keeping its 28,000 employees busy: how do you grow more crops for an expanding global population, using fewer resources and in a more secure, environmentally sustainable way? Find out how we have helped Syngenta use digital technology to transform agricultural productivity.
Finding the cream of the crop
For years, good crop yields depended mainly on a farmer’s intuition and practices learnt or passed down from generation to generation. Then came mechanisation – where farmers moved from manual and animal labour to machinery – eventually followed by the green revolution where the use of science really started to drive step changes in yields.
Today, however, many of those gains have reached their peak. We’ve therefore been working with Syngenta on the next evolution of farming: digital. Working collaboratively and with our digital know-how, together we are transforming how Syngenta interacts with its 500,000 farmers and growers around the world, getting the right products to the right farmers faster, and unlocking significant sustainable productivity benefits at the same time.
Harvesting digital technology
To do this, we’ve helped connect the processes, major technology platforms and digital assets that integrate Syngenta’s operations across its commercial, production, supply, research and development (R&D) and support functions – ultimately transforming the business through digital.
These changes not only help Syngenta better engage and serve its customers, they help the company manage and predict its business activities by having more accurate, real time data at its fingertips.
“For the first time in the history of the company, and with Deloitte’s help, we’ve been able to design and deploy a solution that creates a basis for real competitive advantage and differentiation”
A good practical example of this was a mobile app developed for field agents to use when they visit customers. It gathers data on what the farmer has been growing, their farming experience, the conditions of their farm and the market for their crops, all of which allow Syngenta’s field agents to gain more insight into that grower and the specific issues they face. They can then provide the farmers with the appropriate package of seeds or chemicals to help grow and protect their crops. In turn, Syngenta can also analyse this data with machine intelligence to make predictions and plans for the grower, giving them insight that they would not otherwise have.
This example of working closely with Syngenta, and drawing on experience from across our global network of member firms – including teams from Switzerland, the UK and Belgium – highlights how together we’re changing the way Syngenta engages with its customers, differentiating itself from its competition, and positioning the company as a pioneer in digitising agribusiness.
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