Bringing the Farm of the Future to life

In 2023, Giordano received a four-year $4.3 million grant from the United States Department of Agriculture’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture (USDA NIFA) to establish CAST at Cornell as part of the federal Farm of the Future program. Since then, he and his colleagues have created the infrastructure necessary for CAST to function as both a testbed and a demonstration site for novel, data-driven products and management practices for crops and livestock. 

“When we started CAST two years ago, we had a limited number of different technologies working at our farms,” Giordano said. “Now we have around 20. But it’s not just about how many digital tools and devices we have; it’s about the number and wide variety of data streams they generate and how these data are used. These data streams help us better understand and successfully manage the complex biological systems involved in field crops and dairy production.”

"These data streams [from on-farm digital tools] help us better understand and successfully manage the complex biological systems involved in field crops and dairy production.” 

- Julio Giordano

CAST has approximately 40 data streams these days. Giordano and his colleagues are working on methodologies to combine the streams in various ways to facilitate farm decision-making. For instance, combining data from soil moisture monitors, robotic nitrogen application and yield monitors can help agricultural producers make informed decisions about what, when, and where to plant.

“By combining all these devices and the data they generate, we have increased tremendously our capacity to understand our cows, our soils and our crops,” Giordano said. “We used to monitor and understand a small portion of what was happening. Now we can monitor and understand a lot more.” 

Ultimately CAST seeks to develop a prototype ecosystem of networked technologies and techniques. An ecosystem such as that can generate integrated data, which producers can use to understand everything that is happening on their farms, Giordano explained. Then they can make informed decisions that will help them increase production, sustainability and animal welfare.

To reach this goal, CAST also engages in partnerships with leading crop and animal technology providers. Currently CAST has over 15 partnerships, with more companies joining all the time. The industry partners range from companies seeking to test or demonstrate a new iteration of a commercial technology to startups working on novel innovations not yet on the market.

One of CAST’s earliest industry partners is Labby Inc., an agritech startup located in Rochester, New York, that is currently pioneering real-time on-farm milk testing for the modern dairy supply chain. All three of Labby’s product lines underwent iterative testing at CAST. 

“The operational expertise of the CAST team out at CURC gave us a true proving ground to pressure-test our products in a real commercial farming environment,” said Julia Somerdin, Labby co-founder and chief executive officer. “The collaboration helps us shorten our product development cycle and bring market-ready solutions to the dairy industry much faster. 

"Through CAST, Labby validated the accuracy and reliable of its inline milk analyzer and flow meter," she continued. "The real-world setting also helped us introduce new innovations – including a camera-based cow identification system.”

Rowbot Systems, a Minnesota company developing a multi-use robotic platform for row crops, is another CAST partner. Last summer, Rowbot brought its robotic platform to CAST for testing in the field at Musgrave Research Farm. 

“Working with CAST researchers to test our platform’s cover crop seeding ability helped improve our understanding of what questions researchers find most pressing and how their work can impact farmers,” said Kent Cavender-Bares ’88, Rowbot co-founder and chief executive officer. “It’s always good to be involved in path-breaking activities like CAST because it can help provide exposure to researchers and farmers.”

Somerdin, too, is excited about the new doors CAST can open for Labby. “The collaboration has been transformative,” she said. “With our newly refined products, we are preparing to expand our installations across more farms. Additionally, CAST not only helped us improve product performance but also open doors to strategic networks across the agritech and dairy ecosystem.”

Jackie Swift is the communications specialist for the Cornell CALS Department of Animal Science.