Indigo In the News

2018 Indigo Corn™ Demonstrates Yield Improvement Across 48,000 Acres in the U.S.

Written by Indigo Agriculture | Feb 14, 2019 3:16:38 PM
  • Indigo Corn thrived nationwide, demonstrating a 10.1 bushel per acre yield increase over neighboring fields, or a 5.5% median uplift.
  • Indigo captured full-season data on over 48,000 acres, a dramatic increase in scale compared to the industry standard side-by-side small plot trials.
  • Analyzing performance results across tens of thousands of acres allows Indigo to measure the performance of any agriculture technology under real-world conditions.

Boston, Massachusetts, February 14, 2019 Indigo Agriculture, a company dedicated to harnessing nature to help farmers sustainably feed the planet, has released 2018 corn harvest data from over 48,000 acres contracted with Indigo. Nationwide, Indigo’s grower partners saw an average yield increase of 10.1 bushels per acre when compared to neighboring fields, translating to a 5.5% median uplift. Leveraging satellite technology, data was gathered on more than 2,100 fields across the country. For the analysis, Indigo controlled for weather and land factors impacting specific regions and agriculture practices implemented by different growers.

Yield performance for Indigo Corn in previous years was gathered from side-by-side trials, a method critical to determining the beneficial impact of the company’s early-stage microbial seed treatments. The data announced today represents comparisons across commercial acres encompassing 122 counties and 15 states. Similar to the 2018 Indigo Wheat harvest analysis, satellite technology was leveraged to understand Indigo Corn’s performance. Corn growers contracted with Indigo experiencing the same uplift in 2019 stand to earn $30 more for each acre. If selling through Indigo MarketplaceTM, Indigo will pay growers an additional 5¢ per bushel, or an average of $9 per acre.

Homer Unruh, a farmer operating out of the High Plains, saw marked success working with Indigo this past season. “The Indigo Corn I’m growing is fantastic,” he said. “I think it’s some of the best corn that we’ve ever grown, and our best for the land and the water that we have.”

“At a time when many technologies in agriculture are plateauing, Indigo’s microbe-coated seeds and data-driven agronomic advice are delivering real impact to growers across the US,” said Geoffrey von Maltzahn, Indigo’s Chief Innovation Officer and Co-Founder. “These results represent our largest analysis of Indigo crop performance relative to neighboring fields to date, including over 2.8 billion remote sensing data-points collected on Indigo-treated and neighboring control fields.”

 “Satellite imagery has been a significant advantage for us as we optimize our microbial seed solutions for growers,” said David Perry, Indigo’s CEO. “While Indigo’s technologies span the supply chain, we continue to improve on our founding hypothesis: microbes can unlock the health and productivity of crops to help growers increase yield and ultimately reduce the amount of fertilizer and chemicals used.”

For the 2019 growing season, Indigo Corn is offered through Indigo Certified Crops™, which is intended to improve grower profitability while ensuring flexibility in decision-making. The offer’s base agreement includes microbial-treated seeds, grain quality testing, and data-driven agronomic support. All growers can participate in  Indigo Marketplace and take advantage of enhanced services such as Indigo Transport and the company’s grain storage program.

Darren Perry, a grower from Oklahoma said, “As a young farmer, I really love the aspect that Indigo brings to the table: additional income that farmers aren’t accustomed to. As we go further, it’ll be interesting to see how Indigo changes their business model to help the farmer. I do believe Indigo puts the farmers’ best interest at heart, and you can tell that by their contracts. That’s what I really appreciate about doing business with Indigo.”

Interested in understanding more about Biological products? Learn more about Indigo Biologicals and biotrinsic™ here.

 

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