What’s Driving the Next Generation of Ag Professionals? | The Granary

00:00:00 What drives the next generation of agricultural professionals? What will drive young people to come into our industry? 00:00:06 That's the topic we're talking about. This very fun edition of the Grainery. You ready For a conversation with some real farmers 00:00:12 about real issues? And the best part, you are invited. Support yourself. A drink, Grab a snack. 00:00:20 Most importantly, pull up a chair. Welcome to the greenery. Hey Guys. 00:00:33 Alright guys, you heard the topic. What drives and will continue to drive the youth to enter this industry? 00:00:40 How will we make sure we still have young people? We've been here since I was a kid. The average age, American farmer's, 59 00:00:44 and a half years old, all that kind of thing. But it's not just the farmer, it's also the people that serve the industry. 00:00:49 We need young people to do this. It may be a little less sexy than some industries. It's not tech, it's not ai. 00:00:54 We might be using ai, um, to con consolidating industry. There's gonna be less jobs perhaps than there were 00:01:01 because fewer companies do the work. Fewer farms, farm the land. So I'm asking that question. The reason I did that is because we got Brett Corbett. 00:01:09 He is with All Ball All Ball's, a sponsor of this episode. We very much appreciate them. 00:01:13 They're a leading manufacturer of post patent crop protection products. So we appreciate your sponsorship. Thank you for being here. 00:01:19 You're a 3-year-old guy. You got an advanced degree. You work doing research for this company. How many? 3-year-old people. 30, 29. 00:01:29 When you were going through your schooling, whenever that was. How many other people said, 00:01:32 why in the hell do you wanna go into agriculture a Lot? And I, I think this is a question that still gets asked, 00:01:38 uh, but I disagree with you. I don't mean to start the podcast out in a negative light, but 00:01:42 It's always good to Yeah. Disagree with Damien. Uh, You said you're doing great. Know, just not tech. But I think you, 00:01:47 you said the word sexy, right? And I think in order to get kids younger than myself, I guess I'd call 'em kids, uh, into agriculture, 00:01:55 is you have to expand that. We are a tech industry. I mean, look at the drones. You look at how we manage our crops, the, 00:02:01 the way the tractors are done. We are a tech industry. You're not behind the computer every single day in Silicon Valley. 00:02:07 But it is a tech industry. And I think that's, that's what we start, have to drive that message home and get people interested. 00:02:12 We think smart ass telling these young people that start by disagreeing with me. You disagree with me about everything and I still like it. 00:02:18 I know you're my good friend, Damien. I appreciate that. We are tech. We are, we are more than the average. 00:02:24 Suburbanite realizes ag is maybe not at the forefront, but not too many steps behind the forefront when it comes to tech, tech adoption. 00:02:34 Yeah. So we are, and and I guess the number one question is, is he asked a lot. He said, A lot of people ask why go into agriculture. 00:02:41 I'm 39. I'm not that much older than Brett, but hell, I'm still asking myself why. Right. And a challenging economy. 00:02:49 It makes you doubt everything. And if you ask me, you know, I've, I've kind, uh, kind of kindly insinuated to my son 00:02:56 that I'd rather he not follow in my footsteps. Um, bad to say, but it's isn't, isn't, it's the truth. Isn't he? Like, isn't he like seven Years 00:03:05 old? He's 11. Oh, I mean, he's got some time. He is got some time. But, but I mean, you know, whenever a kid, you know, he wants to be a football player, 00:03:13 then when you realize you, you don't have any of the physical measurements to be a football player, then you start trying to figure out an alternate path. 00:03:20 And, um, you know, I don't know. It's a tough industry to get into. It's just the toughest time to get into this industry. 00:03:29 Um, but my number, It's the toughest time in recent history. Yeah. The toughest time in the last 25 years. 00:03:34 You could argue hopping in in 1985. Yeah. Would've been a That's when I was born. Yeah. 00:03:38 Right, right, right, Right. A little predates me. But at the end of the day, it's still critically important because everybody's gonna first think military. 00:03:47 But to the, the base pillar of our national security comes from food spot, food Security. Right. And, 00:03:52 And, you know, take that away and watch the native turn on each other. Mm-hmm. Brett's Brett's point that we are a tech industry. 00:04:00 I'm not sure if we're sexy or not. You got a kid, is your daughter gonna be in agriculture? Yeah. She's, she's what, 11? 00:04:05 She's 12. It's still up to her. I mean, I think she can, because I think ags evolve so fast. Like there's gonna be more decisions made, 00:04:11 let's just say in the office, in the boardroom than there is in the field. You're gonna have specialists that go out to the field, 00:04:17 tell you what to spray, when to spray, stuff like that. The money's gonna be made on the managing side, probably more in the office in the future. 00:04:23 And she's good with numbers. She's, she loves digging into stuff like that. That's what I like doing. So I think 00:04:29 that that thing could be there. But one thing that, you know, I think we've gotten ourself in the situation that we are, 00:04:34 because for the last 30 years, everybody said, we don't want you coming back to the farm. We don't want you doing anything in ag. 00:04:40 And that's why we were, that's where we are today, is because of that. Me and Brian got a couple of 00:04:45 interns to work with us every summer. Most time they're not even from the ag community. And they turn out to be some of the best employees. 00:04:50 'cause they didn't hear it all growing up that they shouldn't do this. And I think that's where we're gonna start finding more 00:04:55 and more of our future is, is from the intern side or from kids that didn't grow up in ag, that just love doing something different every day. 00:05:01 Not sitting in the office doing the same exact thing every day. Not in the lab, doing the exact same trial every day. 00:05:06 Being able to do unlimited. That's the future. You gotta make it fun to 'em again. That's what keeps us in it, is if me 00:05:13 and Brian had to wake up and do the exact same thing every day, we wouldn't do it. 00:05:16 No one, nobody would. If you had to give the same talk every day, would you do it? No. So it changes that. And I got, I got, 00:05:21 by the way, I forgot it. You know, uh, our producer would've already put in the graphics of saying that you're Brian Adams 00:05:27 and your Johnny Verell, uh, Jackson, Tennessee Farmer and a, a worker here with volunteer Ag Services in North Delta bio. 00:05:33 So anyway, I, I apologize. I didn't do that. I got so busy introducing our friend Brett. And, and I kind of wish he hadn't. 00:05:40 'cause he went straight to disagreeing. And that's the thing about these young kids. He's upstart. So anyway, I don't mind that you disagree. 00:05:45 And actually, I, I think you're very right. Is AG sexy? Is ag sexy, I guess was the question that we kind of threw over there. 00:05:52 But then I want to go with, uh, the other part of what Johnny did. So first off, is it sexy? 00:05:57 I I think it can be. I think, I think you can make it sexy. Um, and I think you can get the, the right people 00:06:03 to, to jump into it. But what you're saying about the negativity that comes with it, you know, if you grew up on a farm, uh, you hear 00:06:10 how hard times are is in one of the hardest jobs. Right. It's not rocket science. It's harder. 'cause you're dealing with living plants. 00:06:16 You're not sending just a rocket off the space. Um, so it's a one is already a challenging job. And then two, in order to make it sexy, 00:06:23 you gotta get interest of young people. Mm-hmm. And so podcasts, for example, you know, tiktoks, like, how, how can you make it fun? 00:06:29 And I think with AI coming to forefront with, with drones, talking about management manage money, I think that's 00:06:36 how you make it a sexy thing. Talking about feeding the world. Every kid wants a purpose, right? 00:06:41 You, you, when you're 10 years old or five years old, whatever, you, you try to be a doctor or whatever in your living room. 00:06:47 'cause it has a purpose, right? I think farming has a purpose. So how do you get that message across in a fun way? 00:06:52 That's how you, that's how you make it a sexy industry. And it starts young because I can tell you, growing up, you get asked to go to career days at schools. 00:06:59 Right? And you go to a career day with a, with a tractor. Every kid there, all they wanna do is climb 00:07:04 all over it in the firetruck. Yeah. Right. But it's like, after that, we start telling people, oh, you don't need 00:07:09 to do this, or You're gonna have to work hard. You're gonna have to work more than 36 hours a week if you do this. 00:07:13 So we start turning people's minds. And that's, that's something we've conditioned. So it's funny you say that first off. Yes. 00:07:18 Uh, when, when you go and when the, when the career day is, John Rell pulls in there in a 425 horsepower tractor. 00:07:24 It's all shining up. And then the other people in the career day are, uh, 00:07:29 In suit, uh, A CPA. Like, uh, let's see. What do you do? I I I do math. Oh, I don't like math. Uh, what do you do? 00:07:37 I drive a tractor. Oh. Oh, that's cool. Here's the thing though. You said a couple of things about your daughter and the future 00:07:43 and what will drive them to be in it. And you said, well, the money's been made on the management side. 00:07:47 It already is there. You're better at your desk than your dad was. Not because he was bad at it, because you had to be. Yeah. 00:07:55 And the future's gonna be that way, which does make it start to sound a little bit like just another job. 00:08:02 I mean, it's not driving tractors necessarily. Kelly Yur will make the point. He didn't even hang onto a wheel anymore. 00:08:08 He says it's just not this. I, I, I just got so much other things to manage. So it might lose a little bit of that sexy factor. 00:08:15 It might, but some people might not enjoy driving the tractors anyways. You know, some people love digging into numbers, 00:08:19 doing all that type of thing. I used to spend six days a week on a combine, or six days a week on a tractor. 00:08:25 I'd probably do good now to be on a tractor three days a week, four days a week. 'cause so much time needs to be spent. Yeah. 00:08:29 You run the business, you put stuff off, it's costing you money. So, you know, keeping up with paperwork, doing 00:08:34 that type of thing is just as important. But there's so many other things. He's talked about drones. One of the interns that was with us this summer, 00:08:39 he was fascinated with drones. We have a drone that we used for research on the farm and stuff like that. 00:08:45 He did a lot of stuff. He's hooked on it. Yeah. He wants to go get his license, he wants to do this. He wants his own drone service. 00:08:50 That's how you start that spark with these kids nowadays, is to give 'em a chance, show 'em that there's other things 00:08:55 to do other than to setting a tractor and hold a steering wheel. Some people love that too. Yeah. 00:08:59 But I'm just talking about the kids nowadays that are wanting to go to vo-tech school, wanting to go to college, whatever it is, they want something 00:09:04 that's trendy, neat, new. That's where they're wanting to be. And right now, drones is it for sure. 00:09:09 But there'll be something else in five years. That'll be it too. Exactly. Yeah. Because I mean, you know, my grandpa plowing, 00:09:15 you know, horse and plow, then my dad got tractors and then, you know, you get to my generation and, you know, before you had to go in the field 00:09:23 and scout, you're dirty all day long. You're, you're, you know, trying to figure out what disease, what insect, what pest you have, 00:09:28 what weed you have, what do you need to spray. There's AI modeling for that. You need to know what's in your soil. 00:09:33 You can put live soil, you know, meters in there now where it's a app on your phone. You're talking about management. Those are the things 00:09:39 that we're gonna, you're gonna spend less time on the tractors, more time looking through data, analyzing that. So I think data, like data analyst, learning how 00:09:48 to use this technology that I, to me that sounds fun and exciting. I mean, I, I do like driving a tractor, but 00:09:55 after about an hour I'm ready to get back, you know, get back in the house. Especially, we were too poor 00:09:58 to have the big nice ones with the GPS system. So it's dusty, it's windy, it's hot. Um, so I, I do think it's, 00:10:04 it can be a sexy industry and organization. Um, but it's just, you know, how do you get, how do you, how do you market to that? And that's, 00:10:13 I wanna go to our Brian buddy here because you said it is a tough time to get in. Well, we've only really been in this downturn. 00:10:18 We're recording this in September of 2025. So we are in about a year now of this downturn, maybe year and a half. 00:10:24 We're not talking about an extended downturn, like obviously the eighties there by references. And as you pointed out, you're born then, um, I I, 00:10:33 I wonder if it's gonna dampen the enthusiasm. I go to the farm progress show and I see still a bunch of FFA kids run around. 00:10:38 They're all excited. Well, mostly to get free crap from the booth. But the part of me is there's still a lot of enthusiasm. 00:10:43 Hasn't dampened the enthusiasm yet. Uh, no, I don't. If you went to Mississippi State right now where you graduated from multiple times, 00:10:55 there's still a bunch of kids in the Ag school over there. Yep. And 21 3, whatever, get an advanced degree, 00:11:00 they're still thinking this is a place for them. Yeah. And, and I would say that if I look back at, at 23-year-old me, a certain level 00:11:10 of naivety at that point Right. Of, of not even really realizing what's going on in the industry. 00:11:15 Right. So, no, I don't, I don't know that it's really dampened and I wouldn't want to be the one to dampen it. 00:11:20 Um, I think we all hit our, our frustrating times. Uh, the industry has been at better days, certainly. 00:11:29 Um, like you said, about two years in out of this, um, it's, I find myself staying more 00:11:34 frustrated probably than I used to. Um, but you know, on the, on the days that it all works out, I still, I find myself probably rewarded as much, 00:11:42 if not more than I ever have because of it. Um, so you certainly gotta learn to take the good with bad. But I would say no at this point. 00:11:49 But I would also argue that that or point those spirits haven't been dampened of those people coming into the industry. 00:11:57 But again, I think it goes back to at least me, 23-year-old me was an idiot at, at best. So, well, we all, Were we right. We 00:12:06 we got that right. But, you know, you real, you know, your perspective of what was really going on in the broader scheme of things is, 00:12:14 uh, not nearly as broad as it is once you've been here a while, you Have a tremendous amount more perspective on, 00:12:19 on the breadth of agriculture today at age 40 or three. But You also know where to go get jobs 00:12:24 after you've been there for a while. And I always say that, I tell 'em all the time they interns, if I go get to go talk to kids at school, 00:12:30 is I always do something to be different. You know, if, if seven, if 70% of the kids are going to be in one degree, don't be in the 70%. 00:12:38 Yeah. Right. Right. Go something else because you graduate and you're in the 5%, 00:12:41 you got a lot higher chance of getting a job better. And it's not, might not be the easiest track, but I think a lot of times people wanna hit the easy button. 00:12:47 But there's still plenty of things going on in ag through these down times. There'll be companies that get started up that'll be 00:12:52 thriving during this economy that we have here. Right. Yeah. Now, they might not thrive as much when things turn, 00:12:57 but there's always, if you can pivot and, and adjust, you can make it happen. Oh, I, I think it's exciting times. 00:13:02 I know we're in a downtime, but I think it's exciting if you 21-year-old kid, 'cause you're solving world problems. 00:13:08 Yeah. You have meaning. Right. The technology that we're gonna have is exciting. There's gonna be new ais that are launched 00:13:15 that are new classes of chemistry, new modes of action. You're gonna, your inputs are gonna be a lot different. You're talking about, you know, $400,000 for a tractor 00:13:22 or whatever, you know, saying earlier. Mm-hmm. You know, those inputs are going to other places. Mm. Um, because of the technology. Mm-hmm. 00:13:29 And where we're heading, you know, people are And farming's evolving. Yeah, absolutely. You know, there's new weeds 00:13:32 that are getting more resistant. There's new, there's new bug. We Got new problem. We got, we're 00:13:36 gonna dragon to slay. And, and, but that's the thing. It's not the same as it always the Dragon to slay forever. 00:13:41 That drove us to this point, at least until the last 40 years was we've gotta make more food. We're all gonna starve. We started conquering that 00:13:47 by the 1980s, which is why we had the 1980s. We had a massive amounts of supply and surplus. And a lot of people don't want to believe that. 00:13:53 That was what was the, the, the beginning of the eighties was because of supply. The new dragons is to, to slay. 00:14:00 If I'm a young person and someone asked me, I say, uh, environmental issues, food waste, um, continual reduction of applied nutrients 00:14:10 because we've over applied them. Again, a lot of those things are, have an environmental component 00:14:15 to them without sacrificing yield. And then of course, nutrients. Nutrients in our food. We've got massive amounts of calories. 00:14:21 But look around, we also have massive amounts of food related problems. Whether that's ags fault 00:14:27 or not, I mean, obviously there we got some obesity, we got diabetes, we got stuff that we've never had before. I think those are the new dragons to lay in agriculture. 00:14:36 Am I right? You you've got a perspective. Yeah. Uh, no, I agree with everything you're saying. Um, I, i, Making up for the earlier 00:14:45 disagreement, I would say, Brian. Yeah, Well you, you hit it. And, and going back to what, 00:14:50 what Brett was saying about trying to make this a more attractive or a more sexy industry, you look at everything 00:14:56 that's happening right now along the, the nutrient reduction because of the over application, how to balance our soils 00:15:02 or what we're using now, whether it be, you know, true living biology, whether it be polymer technologies, whatever it may be, there's, there's a million rabbits 00:15:11 to chase down those holes right there. And, and I think everybody's looking for the, the one thing, and I don't, I don't know that it leaves right now, 00:15:18 the track we're on, there's not gonna be a one thing. But figuring out how to put all this together, um, from a standpoint of environmental safety. 00:15:27 Mm-hmm. Right. Because we do care. I, I've never met a farmer that doesn't wanna steward that land to the best of their ability. 00:15:32 Right. That's how they make their livelihood. So that's number one at the forefront of their mind, regardless of what public would wanna tell you. 00:15:39 But being able to chase that rabbit and turn that into a system that is, is profitable and economical for the farm, uh, 00:15:45 to put us back into a position where we can be successful on the turn rope. Well, that's the next thing. 00:15:51 When we open this thing by saying what drives and will drive the next generation, obviously we care and we got more youth and you're in your early forties. 00:16:00 I started thinking, what's the handoff? What's this thing look like? And I'm not talking about just farming, I'm talking about the entire food processing, 00:16:08 the stuff that comes out of the, the, you know, the where that goes to our grocery store. 00:16:11 Everything in between. Well, obviously what drives everything is need and finance. Is the money going to be there? 00:16:18 Um, farming's gonna have to change. 'cause clearly where that is, and then a bunch of our other stuff at the consumer level 00:16:27 and grocery level are going to have to do some evolution also because we've whittled it down 00:16:32 with a commodity mindset production to, there's no margin anywhere. And I think the money part of it, probably a bunch 00:16:40 of people said to Brett, why are you doing this, man? Go work over here. It's, uh, and make more money. I'm sure you got told that. Yeah, 00:16:47 Absolutely. I don't know if you could have I what the, I don't know what, what they pay you and I 00:16:50 don't know what the competitive is. Hell haven't interfered your job for a long time. Yeah. I mean I, I obviously if you're big enough growers, 00:16:58 you know, there's, and then chemical companies and stuff like that, there's, there's money to be made. Um, but it, yeah. 00:17:03 I don't know if it was the first thing the forefront, you know, if you, if you're looking at it as just solely profit, 00:17:08 I don't know if you picked this industry. Yeah. Unless you, unless you're inheriting something, but there's always niches out there 00:17:13 that you can make. You can a hundred percent Yeah. Make your own path. Yeah. It's real easy for, uh, if, 00:17:18 you know, if you're saying, I'm gonna be in the production side, if you've got a tremendous amount 00:17:21 of inherited capital, this game gets really easy. Yeah. You, you suffer through poultry margins, but you also have certain tax advantages, uh, you know, 00:17:28 mechanisms, et cetera, et cetera. Well, if you're talking about coming into the industry, entrepreneurial, uh, venture 00:17:34 or working in corporate, I don't know, did you get in, did, did, did you get headhunted 00:17:38 by other companies that weren't an ag? Not really, no. I, I had a, a did probably similar experience in grad school, was very, 00:17:46 you know, single lane. Lane. You were lane you were going to go into this space. Yeah. Yeah. 00:17:50 But I mean, in all fairness, I chose this industry. Um, and this wasn't my original plan. My dad was a farmer, my grandpa was a farmer. 00:17:59 I wanted to not be a farmer. You know, I thought med school was the route I did pre-med. I took them cat, I got in. Um, 00:18:05 but you know, there's something inherent in that DNA that just drives you back. Right. And even though it's a challenging job, 00:18:10 probably the hardest job, as I mentioned earlier, I, I, it's very rewarding. Well, we talked to dinner last night that a lot 00:18:16 of us came back to ag after being away from it and came back into it. And I guess you come back to your roots. 00:18:20 But then there is this thing where for a while, when there were the, when things were booming, oh my God, we're gonna, we need more people. 00:18:27 We're not have enough people. And I don't know if that's the concern now, you know, we're back to Yeah. The shrink swell Of the industry, right. 00:18:34 We do, we go through a shrink and swell because we're a cyclical business. And then parents come home 00:18:39 and say, don't get into this business. Yeah. Don't Get, I mean I'm just don't, Probably the biggest thing is hurting the business. 00:18:44 There's less farmers every year. Yeah. That's probably honestly the biggest thing that's hurting. Whether you're in the retail side 00:18:49 or whatever it is, there's less people to call on. Sure. Same acres get covered. Same amount of products get sold probably even more product. 00:18:56 You know, we're using a a, a bigger diversity of products per acre than we did probably in the 1970s, I should think. 00:19:03 But fewer decision makers. Yeah. Fewer hands. But that's okay because a lot of it was physical labor. What's the first to go A lot of these admin, 00:19:14 I guess somebody that told me that the AI is gonna replace 30% of, uh, ag retail because so much of it is just administrative 00:19:21 and repetitive stuff. Not the guy out driving the sprayer, not the person loading the rigs, 00:19:26 but the stuff that happens between you and them. Yeah. Like the accounting size, stuff like that. Yeah. I mean, I, I would say that's 00:19:34 gonna get more efficient for sure. I mean like More, more tech. But I could see big, you know, 00:19:38 the farmers are gonna get larger. They're gonna order 'em bulk too. So I mean it's, it's, I think things are gonna change, 00:19:43 but it's, ags been changing for the past 50 years. I mean, you look at where we started, you know, four generations ago we were plow with mules 00:19:51 and then where we are today, where honestly you got tractors with nobody in 'em. So, I mean, it's constantly changing. 00:19:56 There's always gonna be areas where you'd have jobs and you're just gonna need to, you might not need to be set in your ways. 00:20:01 You're only gonna do this for the rest of your life. Well, that's the big, I think there's gonna be positions. I mean, we've been hearing that automation's gonna replace 00:20:08 humans since John Henry lost to the steam shovel. So, but the problem is there's still plenty of jobs. So where are they gonna be ag? 00:20:15 'cause that will drive whether they come into it. If you said it's gonna be picking cauliflower, it ain't gonna happen. 00:20:21 If you said it's gonna be operating drones, clearly you said it's 10. Right? Alright, Well I think, you know, with AI and 00:20:27 The tech side Yeah. That's, that's a service servicing of the tech. Yeah. Uh, I think that's gonna open up some jobs. 00:20:33 So we may lose 35% and the office accounting, you know, um, you know, pension billings, whatever stuff. 00:20:39 But then, alright, let's say I have, I have to implement a thousand soil, you know, meters. And some of 'em go bad. 00:20:45 You know, you gotta have somebody come out and service those. You got, you got now manufacturers of soil meters. 00:20:49 'cause now they're getting made in bulk. So would you lose one but you're gaining in other areas And you might have, we have less employees on our farm now 00:20:56 than we did when we farmed. Uh, you know, I don't know 20% of what we do now, but there's more stuff done in the office now from record 00:21:03 keeping and stuff like that. Yeah. Some of it's ai. Yeah. Some of it you gotta make sure 00:21:06 that you're in compliance and all this stuff. It's a little more to it. It's things are evolving. I, I think the future, you know, 00:21:12 in ag is, it is still bright. I think what we've been doing is not gonna be what we're gonna do in, in the next five years. 00:21:17 From even from the end user standpoint of what we're gonna be doing with our corn, what we're gonna be doing with our soybeans. 00:21:22 All that's gonna be changing hopefully from more processors. Stuff like that. You know, 00:21:26 I think hopefully this country keeps building more and more on the backs of what we have and we start using more and more 00:21:31 of our products here versus shipping them. If we start doing that, there's all kinds of potential job opportunities coming up in a hurry. 00:21:38 Alright. Your 11-year-old you said, I don't want, I don't think I wanna encourage my kid to go in this. You also just said about the shrink and the swell that, 00:21:46 'cause we're in a cyclical business. I graduated from Purdue in 92. There was really no place to go in ag and, 00:21:52 and I would've never encouraged anybody to be in ag. And next thing you know, I'm back in it 10, 12, 15 years later and it's an exciting place to be. 00:21:59 Here's kids 11. There could be two shrinks and swells before this kid's entering the workforce. Yep. And I mean, when I say that, just, you know, 00:22:07 understand, I'm going off of what I call MRI that's more, most recent information and, and where we stand now. 00:22:13 Uh, so does some of that come from my own, uh, frustration? Sure. Um, maybe it will be a place for him if, 00:22:20 if I wanted, if, if he was gonna be here and I wanted to see him anywhere, I do think it would be probably on the tech side, possibly development, um, 00:22:31 that are, that are in, um, you know, eventually working his way into a senior level management type position because those are the ones 00:22:38 that'll deal withand. It's everything in the middle. It's gonna get, you know, consumed during the shrink swell cycle 00:22:44 Maybe except for their stuff that you still have to have a touch on. You know, I get this thing, what, you know why, I mean, 00:22:49 10 years ago I spoke at a community college that was doing, ramping up their two year program 00:22:54 because they said, you know what? We keep hearing, we need somebody that knows how to operate this machine. 00:22:58 We know how somebody that knows how has technically enough competence to do this. We don't need somebody just to send to the laptop. 00:23:04 We also don't need somebody to, you know, go out and work a shovel. It's that middle there 00:23:08 that they thought that they needed people. But of course, time marches on. Yep. Ai, you're 32, you're supposed 00:23:20 to be more adaptive and at the forefront of technology the younger you are. So you've got, uh, everybody at this table beat. 00:23:29 Are you more in touch with AI and what's happening with its application and ag than us? Probably. But what do you see that I may not? 00:23:37 Well, I think the, I think the future is a black hole, right? We, we know the direction it's going. 00:23:43 We don't know how fast it's moving. We don't really know exactly how it works. Um, and I think the education for how 00:23:49 to implement AI properly and how to, uh, kind of make the spectrum smaller to make it work in our field is what, 00:23:57 that's where the direction is. I mean, programming computers, I don't think it's there yet. No, 00:24:02 I don't, I mean I think it's still just this Yeah. Ai, it's cute to say and, but I don't, no one, I don't see it. 00:24:09 Its application friend of mine runs an ag consulting firm and he's using it to, to do what a paralegal used to do. 00:24:18 So he is already circumvented that, that's cool. For base level contractual grievance. Yeah. That ain't, that ain't revolutionary. Yeah. 00:24:27 And it's, and it's, you know, we, they have models, predictability models, right? Wind disease or wind insects coming up from South America. 00:24:34 You're gonna go spray, but are you gonna follow that today? Absolutely not. Like you're still gonna go 00:24:38 scout, you're gonna do the right things. Right. We're probably 5, 10, 15 years down the road from those. 00:24:44 I, I would, I would say for it to be accurate models, for example, when I was in grad school, we had an AI model that we were building on a, on a sprayer that's supposed 00:24:52 to pick certain weeds within, you know, different cropping systems to spray the individual weed. It worked about 30% of the time. 00:25:00 And this was the latest, greatest coming outta Switzerland. I mean, it was cutting edge stuff. 00:25:04 That was how many years ago? That was a year and a half ago. So you could argue that it's twice as good now a year 00:25:09 and a half later than it was then because that's about the pace of, of Yeah. Yeah. And just because you 00:25:14 Get it there, you still gotta have the, the, you know, the farmers gotta pick it up. Yeah. And that takes time too. 00:25:19 And, and servicing. Yeah. And you gotta program it for your field specific clays, I mean, uh, soil type sealed lo 00:25:24 and it, there's, it's, it's gonna evolve as the farmer involves, but we're still a ways away from being able to use it 00:25:31 and solely rely on it. Where Are you right now on your journey? I'm a year of saying I need to use AI more 00:25:38 and get more familiar into my journey. I mean, you're of saying I need to do it. Yeah. I mean, we're collecting a lot of data, 00:25:43 especially on irrigation, trying to figure out if we need to be water and stuff like that. 00:25:47 We're, we're using drones. We're not using 'em on every acre. I think that is the future. Drones will probably be the 00:25:53 future for a lot of spraying. It's gonna be a, it's gonna be adopted really fast when it does happen. 00:25:58 I think we're just on the cusp of if it's justifiable yet, and it takes so much manpower right now to fly two drones, 00:26:04 three drones one day you'll have 10 out there and one guy will be managing it. That's when it'll be there. You know, 00:26:09 I I think there's a lot of farmers that are constantly evolving, trying to figure out, you know, what they can do to be more efficient, 00:26:14 reduce the nutrients, reduce the inputs, reduce the seed, all that stuff that's gonna constantly 00:26:19 keep evolving over time. You know, on our operation. We've been doing a lot of that stuff for the past 20 years. I think what's gonna happen in the next five years is gonna 00:26:28 be huge though in the reduction of stuff we're gonna be doing. So I said We open what drives and we'll drive the next generation. 00:26:34 So there's the sexy factor. There's the, this is cool factor, this is tech. But there, there's sources from outside saying things like, 00:26:41 oh, why would you wanna be over there? I Is the money gonna be there because I don't care how cool and sad, I mean, yeah. 00:26:50 Uh, play. There's things that folks will do for free. They'll try comedy, sports, anything entertainment, but I'm not sure they're gonna go 00:27:00 and, uh, uh, work in a grain processing, uh, engineering, uh, job for free. 00:27:06 So there's gotta be money there. Yeah. There's gotta be money there. I do think money will be there. 00:27:10 I think there's probably, from the outside looking in, you look at the, you look at the being their backers, the metas and everybody behind 00:27:18 that pushing the ai, pushing tech. Will the money be there? Yes. Be yes. Will it look anything five years from now? 00:27:26 Like it looks right now? I don't. Probably not because it's all a shotgun. A pro track now. Like, I mean we're, we're throwing a, you know, for lack 00:27:34 of a better term, we're throwing little s**t against the wall to see what sticks. Yeah, yeah. Before we figure 00:27:38 out how to take a rifle approach. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And look, we've been putting the money in ag here lately. Yeah. It's not ag. It's not ag at all. It's not ag. No. 00:27:45 They know where the money, they know where they can get the biggest return. Yeah. It's on some of these new innovations. Yeah. 00:27:50 Which is when the money drives. I, I've made that point to an audience. When there's money flowing in, 00:27:54 it should still make you don't, let's, let's, let's not, you know, let's not jump on the lifeboats yet. 00:27:57 The shipping going down when there's money coming into this industry. But, uh, Brian's point, it's coming. 00:28:03 It's so spora it as biologicals, it was, uh, controlled environment agriculture. Remember we were all gonna, we're all gonna obsessed on 00:28:11 lettuce grown in an old warehouse south of Cleveland. Yeah. You know, and they were gonna replace the Salinas Valley. 00:28:16 There's b******t. It was never gonna happen. Yeah. So there, there was just still money coming in here, but it seems so disjointed that I'm not sure 00:28:23 that the money hasn't a good idea where the future's going. What do you think? I agree. 00:28:27 I agree with you. I think, um, you know, it's not a defined approach where it's coming in at, I think, you know, uh, it's a plethora 00:28:34 of different platforms and, and, uh, inputs right now. And I, I don't know which direction it's headed. I think that's why you see so many startups, 00:28:42 startups are now, and people willing to throw money after startups to see what, what is gonna stick, right? Like you got these people money right now that with the cost 00:28:52 of money, it doesn't do, does it? Do you any good to keep the bank? No. You wanna put it somewhere where it's gonna make something. 00:28:57 Right? So that money that's sitting there for these, from these billionaire, you know, whatever you wanna call 'em, tech top firms or, or people. 00:29:05 They're wanting to be a part of that and you're route, they say where the money's gonna, where their return's gonna come from. 00:29:09 They just don't know exactly where. By the way, I did this with Chad and Temple and they lose their mind 00:29:15 and they like, they, they hit a spoon and threaten to hit me. 'cause they said they don't like Nick pointing 'em. 00:29:19 So I'm sorry I just did that money coming into ag from that, from that investor class generally then has a lot 00:29:26 of excitement attached to it. You talk about what's gonna drive the next generation that yeah. 00:29:30 Oh, I wanna go and work for this company that makes, uh, you know, corn starch just like they have since the 1896. 00:29:38 No, I wanna go over to this startup that's doing this crazy new thing in agriculture. That's exciting. Yeah. That's sexy. 00:29:44 That's as long as there's money coming in doing that kind of stuff, I think we have no problem 00:29:47 bringing the next generation in. Absolutely. Are we gonna be overpopulated then At some Point, few years? 00:29:53 I'm not talking about humans on the planet. 'cause we know that ain't gonna happen. I'm talking about, you know, our industry. 00:29:56 We have too many over, we have too many people in this business, and all of a sudden they start giving guys like you a golden handshake. 00:30:01 It's the swell or the shrink. You know, that that's the swell before the shrink and you got enough money out. 00:30:07 You, you can take my golden handcuffs off off of the house. What do you think? Uh, are there too 00:30:14 Many people your generation in or there not enough? Well The, the recent study was less than, was it 6%? 00:30:19 Um, in America was less than 35% in farming. Um, so I I think there's there's room to grow. Yeah. There's gotta be room to grow. 00:30:26 How else we wouldn't be having this conversation about the next generation coming in. 00:30:29 Yeah. So, um, I think it has to, um, I don't know if there's gotta be, you know, the baby boomers get out, there's gonna be a large shoes to fill. Yeah. 00:30:39 And look at it from my side, from the farmer's side. We don't have the generation coming up fast enough to take over what's out there. 00:30:44 Yeah. And smaller families too. Yeah. Used to have three, four sons, or three four kids and now you're having one at nine kids. 00:30:50 Yeah. The generation that you and I are a part of, I mean, I look back, I went to a very rural high school in the middle of, of, 00:30:57 and maybe it's not big ag you know, country in, in terms of Iowa, Illinois or even, you know, 00:31:03 specialty markets out in California. But a very rural, very ag focused community. Less than 1% of people I graduated 00:31:09 with are are in agriculture. Yeah. Right. So we asked the question, what drives it? I it's gotta be the money. It's gotta be the sexy factor. 00:31:18 You talked about tech, tech brings 'em back. You think it's gonna be based on the schweller thewell of the shrink? 00:31:23 If there's a necessity, the money's there. Some, Some, some of all. Yeah. Yeah. Some of all the above. 00:31:29 And you think it's gonna be, there's gonna be so few people in it. Yeah. You think there's gonna be a dearth, a shortage 00:31:37 of human capital and that's what will make the opportunity? Uh, I think so. 'cause I mean, we see it already now 00:31:42 that people that are didn't grow up in ag are already wanting to be involved in ag. They think it's neat. They think it's cool 00:31:47 what we're doing, the drones and there's A bit of a vacuum. Yeah. And it, and it pulls 'em in 00:31:51 and they tell their friends and they all wanna come too. I mean it's, you know, 00:31:55 there's people to pick from right now. Are you concerned? Uh, I'm not overly concerned, excited. 00:32:00 I'm a little excited. Yeah. More competition. Uh, I it's very nichey, right? Yeah. It's, uh, at a party. 00:32:08 You sitting there talking, they're like, Hey, what do you do for a living? You explain. You work for, 00:32:11 in ag industry, I work for a chemical company. I'm the only person there that does that. And it gets, it gains interest, as you were saying, 00:32:18 from outside perspective. So I, yeah, I I think it's, I think it's exciting and cool. Absolutely. 00:32:23 And the money's gonna be there. I think the money will be there. Yeah. And the new excitement when you talk about mission 00:32:28 or you talk purpose, you said purpose. Purpose. I think pur I think a lot of people, um, I'm not sure 00:32:33 That I'm not, I'm, I'm not, I'm not kidding. I don't think that my generation and older really cared. The boomers all cared, pretended they did. 00:32:38 They burned their draft cards and whatever thought they were changing the world. They might've thought. But I'm not sure that your, 00:32:43 your generation, I think there really is something more about purpose than there is for the others. Yeah, I Agree. I think, I think 00:32:48 people are purpose driven. And I think the fact that, you know, you know, you see the billboards or whatever, 00:32:53 and you think a farmer, if you have three meals a day, I think that type of mentality, uh, is what's gonna help save this industry. 00:33:01 I gonna leave it right there. His name is Brett Corbett. He's with a company called All Ball. 00:33:04 All Ball sponsored this episode as well as another one. And they are a business partner here at Extreme Ag. So if you get a chance, you wanna learn about their lineup 00:33:11 of post patent products for crop protection, you can go to all Ball.com, A-L-B-A-U-G h.com. 00:33:18 Johnny Verell, Brian, my friend Adams, right here up from Tennessee, sitting at the Grainery. And you just gotta sit at the Grainery. 00:33:25 Also, we invite you to check out all of our fun episodes. Pull up a chair, pour yourself a 00:33:29 drink, join the conversation. If you have something you wants to cover at the grainery, please drop us a line. 00:33:33 We'd love to make this something that you know is even more interesting to you. Good luck doing this. And we have dozens 00:33:39 and dozens of episodes out there. Please share this with somebody that can enjoy it. Also, go to our YouTube channel, subscribed. 00:33:44 Till next time, thank you very much for joining us right here at thery. 00:33:47.085 --> 00:33:47.965