May 6, 2026 • 15 mins
Blue Shed Diary host, Milton Munro, and his colleague Shane McDowall, have seen the future of farming. Back from their whirlwind tour of the USA—including a visit to Microsoft in Seattle, Washington and the World Agri-Tech Innovation Summit in San Francisco, California—Milton and Shane have peered into the crystal ball and gotten insight into what innovations and technology are on the horizon for New Zealand's farmers and growers.
Joining the conversation is Agritrade National Manager, Shane McDowall.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:10):
Welcome to Blue Shift Diary, a podcast about and for our
farmers and growers. My name is Milton Monroe,
Technical team manager and your host.
Today's conversation is a littlebit different.
I'm actually joined by one of mycolleagues, Shane McDowell.
By day, you'll find him becomingbeing the national manager for
Agri trade. But the last couple of weeks him
(00:32):
and I have been travelling companions, and we've just
returned from a whirlwind tour in the US that included the
World Agri Tech Innovation Summit in San Francisco and a
brief trip through to the Microsoft campus in Seattle.
We've got a lot of insights intothe possible future of
agriculture, and now that the jet lags worn off and we've got
our feet back under the table, I'm keen to get his thoughts.
(00:55):
Welcome to the show, Shane. Thank you my friend, thanks for
having me. It's my pleasure.
So let's start off with the the World Agritech Innovation Summit
a couple of days, a large scale Agri tech conference, kind of a
bit of the one of the world's leading ones.
To be fair, 1500 people descended on to San Francisco
(01:17):
and I, I certainly know we both gathered a lot of insights out
of that session. What was the the key take home
message for you? For me, there were a lot of buzz
words that you would expect to get from their conferences like
this and in the biggest one without any doubt with AI and
there be no surprise there. And obviously a in this context
(01:39):
meaning artificial intelligence rather than the other a I that
we that. We know solutely.
But one of the key things to come out of it quite strongly is
that while there's a lot of technology out there and it can
be very easy to jump straight tothat and around I data
platforms, gadgets and and so forth.
(02:00):
What we really need to do and focus on is, you know, how we
can help farmers make better decisions with less time, lower
their risk, increase their efficiency, increase their
yields. So, you know, a lot of the use
of data can help supplement a lot of those things.
You're right, we did hear a lot about a I and in particular, you
(02:23):
know, the, you know, designing and developing a I agents, so
very specialised AI systems thatto help with what you're talking
about there, you know, taking that on farm data and using it
to create some some important insights.
Did you you know any of your perspectives changed with what
you heard at the conference? And a prospective didn't change
(02:48):
because I, I see data and a I isbeing extremely valuable for us
as an industry, as every other industry has found out, we're
just done an agriculture quite abit slower and well behind
others. But one of the, the I get one of
the other key insights that comeout of it is, you know, quite a
keyword, which is around trust, because the A I will come back
(03:10):
with an answer and I'll tell youwhat you could do, but you need
to trust that answer and you need to trust what's coming out
of it. So what come through quite
clearly from the conference is that this am I in in the answers
that are going to come back and the recommendations that make
won't make. It can be there to help the
decision making, but you're still going to need the
(03:31):
individual involved in making the decision.
So you're not cutting out the individual completely.
The individual is there to help and the data in their work will
assist them and making those decisions.
There was a really key theme that came through after a lot of
the speakers talking around the fact that you can't get rid of
(03:51):
the person, you know, and especially in in in the primary
industries and agriculture, you know, those relationships are
critically important. So we're not looking at
developing I systems that are going to replace us, but it's
trying to to work alongside us. Yeah, absolutely correct.
(04:12):
You know, you know, the the the future record culture, you know
it it is still going to be deeply human and that their data
and then I just going to enable us to make better calls,
hopefully with less effort. Yep.
It's all about trying to improvethose efficiencies and make
better decisions faster, but nottrying to to replace the
(04:34):
relationship aspect of of a lot of where we subservice and
supply agriculture. I know we sort of wanted to talk
about some of the big things and, and try and avoid the the
the shiny gadget stuff, but it wouldn't be a conversation
between the two of us if we didn't go down the pathway of at
(04:55):
least a few shiny things. One of the things I really
enjoyed from the conference was there was there were actually 2
exhibition halls, one of them with more traditional kind of
established businesses and one of them with start-ups.
Let's start with perhaps some ofthe more established things.
What did you see there that thatcaught your eye, Shane?
(05:16):
Would you say there was a, a couple of halls there and
there's one around some of the established businesses that
there and they've got some, you know, really cool technology in.
And for me, not being the least technical person in terms of the
farming, you know, I had a lot more interest in around those
that are providing solutions, you know, utilising the data
(05:36):
and, and a I and how to make life easier for, for all, you
know, moving towards, you know, voice to text come across very,
very strongly is that in a lot of their teams, adoption can be
a bit of a challenge. So the more the way we can make
it easier is getting into that, that rooster tech space and
making it easier for for all victims and interacting with,
(05:58):
with the agents, you know, via voice as opposed to going and
finding information, having to enter it.
Then then there was also in the,the technology space around the
biologicals. And that's where it sort of
started flying a bit over my head and, and yourself got all
excited all about it and startedtalking jargon that Yep, I was a
(06:21):
bit lost time. But it was really, really good
to see how they're doing it and how they're talking about the
speed of being able to get new products and new technology to
market. It's far, far quicker than it's
ever been in. That was quite exciting.
But I don't know if you've got some more insight into these
pieces. Bobby it for me to have an
opinion here, but sure, why not?You know, you're right, some of
(06:42):
that biology, you know, we really interesting to see the
intersection between agritech and and sort of developing these
biological systems. You know, we've been trying to
to some degrees of success implement some of these
biological alternatives into air, into a crop protection and
(07:02):
crop management programmes. And it has been mixed levels of
success. But using Agritech as a way to
really open the door either to try and improve the efficacy of
some of these biological optionsor to try and really improve the
timing of application and the use pattern of them.
(07:24):
This was really exciting. This was something quite new to
me and I've been to conferences where been to biological
conferences before, but this wasthe first time I really saw that
intersection between using things like AI and large data
pools to try and really improve the efficacy of these biological
molecules. And that was it was quite
(07:44):
exciting. Now, I certainly learned a lot
about it between that and the, uh, the satellite imagery stuff,
that was that really. Yeah, that.
Will vote that looked really cool even from the South was
going that well. It just with that technology is
hitting him where it will be andeven in the coming years is
going to get even better and better.
(08:05):
Now you're quite right, you know, we're starting to gain
access to what used to be military grade precision from
now from just standard satellites that are in orbit.
And some when you're down to sort of five metre resolution.
These are, you know, starting toreally be able to see some quite
(08:26):
detailed images and really pull out some interesting insights,
all, all from the comfort of your armchair and the, the
computer in front of you. Let's change tax now and let's
talk a little bit about Microsoft.
So Microsoft, you know, one of the, one of the biggest
(08:46):
computing companies in the world.
So they've got their, one of their flagship sites up in
Seattle and we were lucky enoughto go there and meet with some
of the the developers they've got.
What were the key insights you really took away from that time
with Microsoft? Copilot.
Yeah, and again, I only agents, I think we it's the, it was
(09:09):
definitely the theme for the five days was, was AI agents,
everyone's developing AI agents and Microsoft is no different.
But um, it's dive a little bit further into it.
Yeah, put Harry Potter's becausea bit like in the conference a I
come across in recent recession and to the point that near the
end of the conference started toJacob, can we try not to talk
(09:32):
about it? But they just couldn't get away
from it. Same thing with Microsoft and no
surprise that they're pushing copilot and they're they're AII
version across all of their different applications they're
doing now to the point they talked about that every
individual will have a copilot and every process will have a
have an agent or a copilot agentdoing it.
(09:53):
So what we're talking about there is that again, like we
talked about the World Agri Techconference, a copilot is there
to assist individuals in during their daily tasks and to make
them more efficient and get themto the answers thereafter much
more quickly. And we talked about some of the
examples we saw in there, which were really quite exciting from,
(10:14):
you know, from my perspective, you know, in terms of the
business that I'm managing, how we can get to it.
But linking up our data to a copilot and being able to ask
the question, you know, why is my margin back in these areas
right now? I've got to go into a number of
different reports drilled down on them and try and understand
what's, what's, what's happening.
(10:35):
Where's the copilot can surface that answer back to me, you
know, in a matter of less than aminute.
And then I can then I can continue to interrogate and ask
questions. Get it.
So that sort of thing there, I think being extremely valuable
for, you know, a lot of our managers around the business
who, who are having to, to look at these particular areas and,
(10:56):
and making life easier. There was a big push like we saw
in a few other ones. Voice to text was another one
that been pushing and the Co pilots have been developed in
the past. They will surface information
back to you. You're going to type in there
and you're gonna do it. Whereas with the voice to text
it now the ability to interact with the copilot.
And so this is a lock we're having here a bit of a
(11:18):
conversation. You have a conversation with the
copilot to get the information that you're after.
Do research around customers, make suggestions around, you
know, opportunities that you might have.
Really, really powerful stuff. Voice to text is, I mean, that
was one of the key take homes I took away as well is just how
(11:38):
this will open the door for accessibility.
Now we've got a lot of there, a lot of their farmers out there.
We've even got a lot of our own people in the business, but they
haven't grown up. Technology is not something
that's natural to them and beingable to just have that kind of
organic conversation, it's goingto be a real door opener for
them to actually be able to engage with tools like this.
(12:01):
Any other big broad insights that you pulled?
Anything that that has really kept you thinking and pondering
over there the week or so we've been back.
No, one of the other areas, which was really good for us to
have the opportunity to meet up with Ranveer Chandra, who's
there CR4 for agriculture, for Microsoft worldwide.
(12:25):
He has been involved in a numberof different initiatives over
the years with Microsoft, some really good ones.
They're looking at, you know, how Microsoft and the data and
the solutions have got can add value to customers and have been
much more efficient. What they're doing, providing
the information they need when they need it.
So it's good having a catch up with him and talking about how
(12:47):
New Zealand, while we're small down the bottom end of the
world, but you know, we've got some unique opportunities down
here are things that we could doand we could work with Microsoft
for them to work with us to comeup some options, some ideas
which they can then take globally and and and grow them.
They're not able to speed down here.
(13:07):
We've got some really, really good farmers.
We've got a lot of really good people passionate about the
industry. You know, we know is in New
Zealand and we want to grow our outputs to the world.
And I believe that, you know, through the use of data and
working with partners such as Microsoft, we could, we could
help our farmers being much moreefficient and grow the returns
(13:31):
that they're getting into and you're through yield gains and
live weight gains, etcetera. Hmm.
Now while we were where we were there, we were actually able to
see a couple of case studies from, from other partners who
have worked with Microsoft who have been able to, to change the
way they do the business. And we've seen a goal that
sometime in the next 5 years, it'll be us on display there in
(13:53):
in Microsoft headquarters, showcasing what we've been able
to do, developing some of these tools and bringing them to their
growers and farmers. If you're would be great to see
their names up in there, but yetnot there at the moment.
There will be a project for us to work on.
And listen, Shane, thank you very much for your time today.
(14:13):
Great to get some insights on it.
And yeah, it does certainly feellike it's in, it's an exciting
time and that agritech space at the moment, I really do feel
like we've shifted away from from some conceptual quite big
ideas to actually starting to see somethings that are actually
going to philtre through to the to the farmer level and they're
(14:33):
really going to actually make animpact on their businesses.
Yeah, absolutely true. It's not all about the big
flashy tools. It sure they can, they can play
a part, but it's around how we can work, you know, with farmers
and is as an industry how we can, you know, juggle more
decisions, you know, more often less time.
That's where we really can and do it.
(14:54):
And, and I the I guess the best model was pretty where
technology has a lot of the heavy lifting for us to help us,
you know, provide that the information we need to be able
to make the best judgement and using experience to help guide
them as well. Not sounds brilliant.
Ohh. Well, as we start to put some of
these these tools into place andstart to see some of them
(15:17):
philtre out through the business, we'll have to get you
back again to talking a little bit more detail about them.
Sounds good to me. Fantastic.
Thanks, Shane. Thank you, Motion.
Welcome to Blue Shift Diary, a podcast about and for our
farmers and growers. My name is Milton Monroe,
Technical team manager and your host.
Today's conversation is a littlebit different.
I'm actually joined by one of mycolleagues, Shane McDowell.
By day, you'll find him becomingbeing the national manager for
Agri trade. But the last couple of weeks him
(00:32):
and I have been travelling companions, and we've just
returned from a whirlwind tour in the US that included the
World Agri Tech Innovation Summit in San Francisco and a
brief trip through to the Microsoft campus in Seattle.
We've got a lot of insights intothe possible future of
agriculture, and now that the jet lags worn off and we've got
our feet back under the table, I'm keen to get his thoughts.
(00:55):
Welcome to the show, Shane. Thank you my friend, thanks for
having me. It's my pleasure.
So let's start off with the the World Agritech Innovation Summit
a couple of days, a large scale Agri tech conference, kind of a
bit of the one of the world's leading ones.
To be fair, 1500 people descended on to San Francisco
(01:17):
and I, I certainly know we both gathered a lot of insights out
of that session. What was the the key take home
message for you? For me, there were a lot of buzz
words that you would expect to get from their conferences like
this and in the biggest one without any doubt with AI and
there be no surprise there. And obviously a in this context
(01:39):
meaning artificial intelligence rather than the other a I that
we that. We know solutely.
But one of the key things to come out of it quite strongly is
that while there's a lot of technology out there and it can
be very easy to jump straight tothat and around I data
platforms, gadgets and and so forth.
(02:00):
What we really need to do and focus on is, you know, how we
can help farmers make better decisions with less time, lower
their risk, increase their efficiency, increase their
yields. So, you know, a lot of the use
of data can help supplement a lot of those things.
You're right, we did hear a lot about a I and in particular, you
(02:23):
know, the, you know, designing and developing a I agents, so
very specialised AI systems thatto help with what you're talking
about there, you know, taking that on farm data and using it
to create some some important insights.
Did you you know any of your perspectives changed with what
you heard at the conference? And a prospective didn't change
(02:48):
because I, I see data and a I isbeing extremely valuable for us
as an industry, as every other industry has found out, we're
just done an agriculture quite abit slower and well behind
others. But one of the, the I get one of
the other key insights that comeout of it is, you know, quite a
keyword, which is around trust, because the A I will come back
(03:10):
with an answer and I'll tell youwhat you could do, but you need
to trust that answer and you need to trust what's coming out
of it. So what come through quite
clearly from the conference is that this am I in in the answers
that are going to come back and the recommendations that make
won't make. It can be there to help the
decision making, but you're still going to need the
(03:31):
individual involved in making the decision.
So you're not cutting out the individual completely.
The individual is there to help and the data in their work will
assist them and making those decisions.
There was a really key theme that came through after a lot of
the speakers talking around the fact that you can't get rid of
(03:51):
the person, you know, and especially in in in the primary
industries and agriculture, you know, those relationships are
critically important. So we're not looking at
developing I systems that are going to replace us, but it's
trying to to work alongside us. Yeah, absolutely correct.
(04:12):
You know, you know, the the the future record culture, you know
it it is still going to be deeply human and that their data
and then I just going to enable us to make better calls,
hopefully with less effort. Yep.
It's all about trying to improvethose efficiencies and make
better decisions faster, but nottrying to to replace the
(04:34):
relationship aspect of of a lot of where we subservice and
supply agriculture. I know we sort of wanted to talk
about some of the big things and, and try and avoid the the
the shiny gadget stuff, but it wouldn't be a conversation
between the two of us if we didn't go down the pathway of at
(04:55):
least a few shiny things. One of the things I really
enjoyed from the conference was there was there were actually 2
exhibition halls, one of them with more traditional kind of
established businesses and one of them with start-ups.
Let's start with perhaps some ofthe more established things.
What did you see there that thatcaught your eye, Shane?
(05:16):
Would you say there was a, a couple of halls there and
there's one around some of the established businesses that
there and they've got some, you know, really cool technology in.
And for me, not being the least technical person in terms of the
farming, you know, I had a lot more interest in around those
that are providing solutions, you know, utilising the data
(05:36):
and, and a I and how to make life easier for, for all, you
know, moving towards, you know, voice to text come across very,
very strongly is that in a lot of their teams, adoption can be
a bit of a challenge. So the more the way we can make
it easier is getting into that, that rooster tech space and
making it easier for for all victims and interacting with,
(05:58):
with the agents, you know, via voice as opposed to going and
finding information, having to enter it.
Then then there was also in the,the technology space around the
biologicals. And that's where it sort of
started flying a bit over my head and, and yourself got all
excited all about it and startedtalking jargon that Yep, I was a
(06:21):
bit lost time. But it was really, really good
to see how they're doing it and how they're talking about the
speed of being able to get new products and new technology to
market. It's far, far quicker than it's
ever been in. That was quite exciting.
But I don't know if you've got some more insight into these
pieces. Bobby it for me to have an
opinion here, but sure, why not?You know, you're right, some of
(06:42):
that biology, you know, we really interesting to see the
intersection between agritech and and sort of developing these
biological systems. You know, we've been trying to
to some degrees of success implement some of these
biological alternatives into air, into a crop protection and
(07:02):
crop management programmes. And it has been mixed levels of
success. But using Agritech as a way to
really open the door either to try and improve the efficacy of
some of these biological optionsor to try and really improve the
timing of application and the use pattern of them.
(07:24):
This was really exciting. This was something quite new to
me and I've been to conferences where been to biological
conferences before, but this wasthe first time I really saw that
intersection between using things like AI and large data
pools to try and really improve the efficacy of these biological
molecules. And that was it was quite
(07:44):
exciting. Now, I certainly learned a lot
about it between that and the, uh, the satellite imagery stuff,
that was that really. Yeah, that.
Will vote that looked really cool even from the South was
going that well. It just with that technology is
hitting him where it will be andeven in the coming years is
going to get even better and better.
(08:05):
Now you're quite right, you know, we're starting to gain
access to what used to be military grade precision from
now from just standard satellites that are in orbit.
And some when you're down to sort of five metre resolution.
These are, you know, starting toreally be able to see some quite
(08:26):
detailed images and really pull out some interesting insights,
all, all from the comfort of your armchair and the, the
computer in front of you. Let's change tax now and let's
talk a little bit about Microsoft.
So Microsoft, you know, one of the, one of the biggest
(08:46):
computing companies in the world.
So they've got their, one of their flagship sites up in
Seattle and we were lucky enoughto go there and meet with some
of the the developers they've got.
What were the key insights you really took away from that time
with Microsoft? Copilot.
Yeah, and again, I only agents, I think we it's the, it was
(09:09):
definitely the theme for the five days was, was AI agents,
everyone's developing AI agents and Microsoft is no different.
But um, it's dive a little bit further into it.
Yeah, put Harry Potter's becausea bit like in the conference a I
come across in recent recession and to the point that near the
end of the conference started toJacob, can we try not to talk
(09:32):
about it? But they just couldn't get away
from it. Same thing with Microsoft and no
surprise that they're pushing copilot and they're they're AII
version across all of their different applications they're
doing now to the point they talked about that every
individual will have a copilot and every process will have a
have an agent or a copilot agentdoing it.
(09:53):
So what we're talking about there is that again, like we
talked about the World Agri Techconference, a copilot is there
to assist individuals in during their daily tasks and to make
them more efficient and get themto the answers thereafter much
more quickly. And we talked about some of the
examples we saw in there, which were really quite exciting from,
(10:14):
you know, from my perspective, you know, in terms of the
business that I'm managing, how we can get to it.
But linking up our data to a copilot and being able to ask
the question, you know, why is my margin back in these areas
right now? I've got to go into a number of
different reports drilled down on them and try and understand
what's, what's, what's happening.
(10:35):
Where's the copilot can surface that answer back to me, you
know, in a matter of less than aminute.
And then I can then I can continue to interrogate and ask
questions. Get it.
So that sort of thing there, I think being extremely valuable
for, you know, a lot of our managers around the business
who, who are having to, to look at these particular areas and,
(10:56):
and making life easier. There was a big push like we saw
in a few other ones. Voice to text was another one
that been pushing and the Co pilots have been developed in
the past. They will surface information
back to you. You're going to type in there
and you're gonna do it. Whereas with the voice to text
it now the ability to interact with the copilot.
And so this is a lock we're having here a bit of a
(11:18):
conversation. You have a conversation with the
copilot to get the information that you're after.
Do research around customers, make suggestions around, you
know, opportunities that you might have.
Really, really powerful stuff. Voice to text is, I mean, that
was one of the key take homes I took away as well is just how
(11:38):
this will open the door for accessibility.
Now we've got a lot of there, a lot of their farmers out there.
We've even got a lot of our own people in the business, but they
haven't grown up. Technology is not something
that's natural to them and beingable to just have that kind of
organic conversation, it's goingto be a real door opener for
them to actually be able to engage with tools like this.
(12:01):
Any other big broad insights that you pulled?
Anything that that has really kept you thinking and pondering
over there the week or so we've been back.
No, one of the other areas, which was really good for us to
have the opportunity to meet up with Ranveer Chandra, who's
there CR4 for agriculture, for Microsoft worldwide.
(12:25):
He has been involved in a numberof different initiatives over
the years with Microsoft, some really good ones.
They're looking at, you know, how Microsoft and the data and
the solutions have got can add value to customers and have been
much more efficient. What they're doing, providing
the information they need when they need it.
So it's good having a catch up with him and talking about how
(12:47):
New Zealand, while we're small down the bottom end of the
world, but you know, we've got some unique opportunities down
here are things that we could doand we could work with Microsoft
for them to work with us to comeup some options, some ideas
which they can then take globally and and and grow them.
They're not able to speed down here.
(13:07):
We've got some really, really good farmers.
We've got a lot of really good people passionate about the
industry. You know, we know is in New
Zealand and we want to grow our outputs to the world.
And I believe that, you know, through the use of data and
working with partners such as Microsoft, we could, we could
help our farmers being much moreefficient and grow the returns
(13:31):
that they're getting into and you're through yield gains and
live weight gains, etcetera. Hmm.
Now while we were where we were there, we were actually able to
see a couple of case studies from, from other partners who
have worked with Microsoft who have been able to, to change the
way they do the business. And we've seen a goal that
sometime in the next 5 years, it'll be us on display there in
(13:53):
in Microsoft headquarters, showcasing what we've been able
to do, developing some of these tools and bringing them to their
growers and farmers. If you're would be great to see
their names up in there, but yetnot there at the moment.
There will be a project for us to work on.
And listen, Shane, thank you very much for your time today.
(14:13):
Great to get some insights on it.
And yeah, it does certainly feellike it's in, it's an exciting
time and that agritech space at the moment, I really do feel
like we've shifted away from from some conceptual quite big
ideas to actually starting to see somethings that are actually
going to philtre through to the to the farmer level and they're
(14:33):
really going to actually make animpact on their businesses.
Yeah, absolutely true. It's not all about the big
flashy tools. It sure they can, they can play
a part, but it's around how we can work, you know, with farmers
and is as an industry how we can, you know, juggle more
decisions, you know, more often less time.
That's where we really can and do it.
(14:54):
And, and I the I guess the best model was pretty where
technology has a lot of the heavy lifting for us to help us,
you know, provide that the information we need to be able
to make the best judgement and using experience to help guide
them as well. Not sounds brilliant.
Ohh. Well, as we start to put some of
these these tools into place andstart to see some of them
(15:17):
philtre out through the business, we'll have to get you
back again to talking a little bit more detail about them.
Sounds good to me. Fantastic.
Thanks, Shane. Thank you, Motion.
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