14 November 2024

6 minute read

By: Lee Williamson

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Nicole Buckley Biggs, PhD, vice president, sustainability, AgriWebb, spoke to The Cattle Site’s Sarah Mikesell at the Cattle Industry Convention & NCBA Trade Show in Orlando, Florida.

Tell us about AgriWebb.

AgriWebb is a livestock management software company originally based out of Australia that expanded into the UK, US, Brazil, and basically anywhere there are grazing animals and ranchers who want to track them.

We help producers capture all their ranch records in one place. Whether it is stocking rates, genetics, pasture seeding or fertilizer, we help them capture all the records they would want to have now in digital form, and in a format from which they are able to gain more insights. This helps them get more out of their business by understanding what they have been implementing, how it is impacting their profit and gross margins, and how different family members or employees can be a part of that process. We are excited to be in this business and here at NCBA.

Data is the name of the game right now. Can you explain what that means?

When we say data, what we really mean is ranch records. It might be your fertilizer use or your stocking rates. That's really the valuable information that you as a producer can get insights from, and increasingly we see that third parties are interested in this data. Whether it's your financial lender, agronomic advisor, or sustainability programs that are coming on board, these entities are all looking for this kind of data coming from ranches to understand what's really happening at the ground level.

Let's talk about corporations and sustainability. How are corporations getting involved with sustainability and engaging with the whole value chain?

There are a few dynamics at play. Consumers want to know where their food comes from, how it was grown, and increasingly they care about the sustainability of it. Companies are responding to that. There's also pressure coming from some countries and policies that are pushing more for sustainability and transparency. Many corporations are setting their own voluntary targets. That's coming from the shareholders, from the CEO level, and they're committing to things such as reducing carbon emissions 30% by 2030, or climate neutrality by 2050. So that's the context that we are in, where companies are trying to act to meet those targets that they have set.

How do farmers and ranchers fit into all of this?

It turns out food doesn't just come from a machine; it comes from a farm. When you are a retailer, if you are a grocery store, a McDonald's, a Burger King, or any kind of retailer that is selling a product, such as a hamburger, if you want to tackle your sustainability, you must tackle the sustainability of those ingredients. It turns out that one of the ingredients with a large carbon profile is beef. It comes from ruminant animals and every day the cows are out in the pasture, they are emitting methane.

There's a carbon cycle happening there. When corporations want to reduce the carbon intensity of beef or they want to improve the sustainability of the beef that they are buying, they need to engage with the supply chain. That means the feed yards, the stockers, the backgrounders, even down to the cow-calf level. They need to work with producers to reduce methane and nitrous oxide and improve soil carbon. There are many different ways to do that. Which one is used in any given operation really depends on where they are, what they have already done today and what goals they have as ranchers. The corporation is, in many cases, now helping to invest at the ranch level in those improvements.

In moderating a Cattle Chat here at NCBA, you talked about carbon credits. Can you share that with readers?

Often what we hear about is carbon offsets. To break that down, carbon offsets are part of a bigger picture of carbon credits. There are two forms of carbon credits. One is a carbon offset, and one is what we call a carbon inset. Maybe people haven't necessarily heard of insets unless they are in this space.

Carbon Offset: What makes a carbon offset happen is if a rancher improves their soil carbon. Maybe by reducing their methane or their fertilizer use, they can produce a carbon offset. The buyer of that carbon offset is usually a company that is outside the industry. It might be Microsoft, Shell Oil, an oil and gas company, and they use that carbon offset to reduce the carbon in their own accounting books. In that case the rancher themselves cannot claim the beef that they produced was that much more sustainable because they sold the right to claim it.

Carbon Inset: The alternative is a carbon inset, where it is basically similar to a carbon offset except the buyer, in this case, is a company that's in the actual food and ag supply chain. It might be Walmart, McDonald's, or it could be a grocery store, but basically the carbon credential stays with the commodity as it flows through the supply chain. Ranchers have both options on the table right now, and they should look at what makes the most sense for their operation.

They are both income opportunities but they look very different, and they have a different future vision for the industry. Ranchers have lots to think about when they are navigating this.

Is this a revenue stream that people need to look at to see what the options are?

This is a way of diversifying income. Most ranchers are looking for ways to improve profitability. If you are doing things on your ranch to become more sustainable, such as improving genetics, culling practices, or weaning weights, it can mean that you will be paid more for the product that you are selling. It also means the next generation comes into a business with these different income sources and can build resiliency into the business.

This can be confusing and it is new for people, right?

Absolutely. We have heard about certifications for a long time, things like organic. That is one form of income diversification. We have carbon credits. Now we have these carbon offsets, and then carbon insets through corporate programs. So, there are many options on the table. I would encourage all ranchers to educate themselves first before jumping into any given program to make sure it makes sense for them, for their families and is the right type of diversification for them.

How is AgriWebb a resource to assist ranchers?

We focus on the data. All these programs require ranchers to share their data in some form such as their stocking rates or fertilizer use. It can be a pain for producers to gather all their written records and give them to somebody or drive down driveways to share their records. Now, instead, if a producer has digital records on AgriWebb, with one click of the button they can send their data where it is needed in a secure form. It's digital, permission-based, and the rancher owns the data and can fully control where it goes. That's important for us. Especially if, in two years, the rancher decides to do a different program, they can control that. If they want, they can send that data to a different program. It gives them flexibility over time.

We are excited to help producers navigate this space and be on the journey with them. We are all learning all the time. Next year there will be more programs coming online. We want to make sure the data piece is easy and does not keep producers up at night. AgriWebb helps streamline the process.