Crop challenge victor credits managing strategy for win

Wednesday, January 2, 2013

by BETTER FARMING STAFF

Thanks to an acre of corn, Staffa-area farmer Mark Brock and his wife Sandi are heading to Warsaw, Poland, this summer to attend the 2013 International Farm Management Association congress. The trip is the grand prize in the Agricultural Management Institute’s (AMI) first-ever Most Profitable Acre Challenge. He won with an acre of corn yielding 252 bushels, but yield is not all it took to win.

Ashley Honsberger, communication and client services lead at AMI, says part of the calculation was based on input costs and yield but part of the calculation was also based on management practices.

“We looked at the survey (filled out by contestants) and said, ‘Who was engaging in more management behavior?’ That’s what it came down to,” she says.

Brock says the win “comes down to management inputs and doing a good job of providing the crop what it needs to achieve that. I think we can mindlessly blanket-apply stuff and expect a decent yield but I think you have to go one step further and bring it down to, ‘What do I really need to achieve what I want?’ ”

So how did they get yield and profit built into the assessed acre? Brock says they used standard inputs, added nitrogen, increased the seed count and aerial applied a fungicide to add “some disease protection with higher plant populations.”

He says the survey they filled out for the competition included questions about marketing, business approaches, and continuing education including management courses. “It was quite a questionnaire they wanted filled out.”

Brock says he and his wife share in the management of the farm and they are both looking forward to attending the conference in Warsaw from July 21 to 26.

“It’s a good opportunity to get some international exposure but it’s also an opportunity to interact and engage with farmers from around the world,” he says. “It will be interesting to see what works in other parts of the world, both from a crop and management standpoint.” He says part of his interest is in how European Union farmers navigate regulations that could eventually be imposed on Canadian farmers. BF