Ask The Agronomist

Dr. Robert Mullen, Brought to You by Nutrien's eKonomics

ADVERTORIAL

Optimizing returns on every dollar spent on fertilizer and crop nutrition holds the key to profitable crop production. Ask the Agronomist, brought to you by eKonomics, provides crucial nutrient management answers as you prepare for the 2022 growing season.

Q: What does the new eKonomics mobile app offer to growers and advisors?

Dr. Robert Mullen: Nutrien launched a new eKonomics mobile app this summer that now puts the power of our website's Return on Investment (ROI) tools in your hands for use whenever you need it. Our goal is to help growers and advisors make data work more efficiently when they are out in the field. The app features all four ROI calculator tools from our nutrien-ekonomics.com website: Nutrient ROI Calculator, Growing Degree Days Calculator, Nutrient Removal Calculator and Rainfall Tracker.

Q: How should farmers and advisors use the eKonomics mobile app?

Mullen: The Nutrient ROI Calculator can give you immediate feedback as you run different fertilizer scenarios given current prices and expected 2022 yields by crop. These economic assessment results are based on crop response models from published land grant university research. You enter soil test levels, state, nutrient of choice, acreage, yield potential, fertilizer analysis and costs.

There's real value in understanding the cost and payback of different scenarios, like the ROI of maintaining soil test levels versus the ROI of slightly higher levels that can add yield under the right circumstances or build soil test levels. Or maybe it's a year where slightly reduced levels of specific nutrients could help the bottom line. Our goal with the calculator is to help growers and advisors feel more comfortable by finding the best fertilizer investment and its potential payback.

The next tool listed on the app is the Growing Degree Days Calculator, which helps keep track of cumulative growing degree days (GDDs) or heat units during the crop season. Tracking crop development data during the season, based on your location and planting date, can provide insight for crop scouting and pest development, like when you should be looking for corn rootworm.

The other in-season tool on the app is the Rainfall Tracker. Simply add the dates you want to track, and you can see weekly and cumulative rainfall amounts for your area during the growing season. This tool provides information that can help influence your yield expectations and offer some trends given your historical rainfall patterns.

Q: What other tool on the new eKonomics mobile app can help growers right now?

Mullen: Our fourth tool on the app, the Nutrient Removal Calculator, helps growers and advisors track nutrient removal by crop given harvested yield and stover removal. It not only provides the user with an indication of how much N, P and K was removed by corn grain, for example, but it can also calculate economic value. If you enter the current cost of the nutrients you are likely to use in your 2022 crop, you can quickly grasp the replacement costs of what a crop removes from your soil every year.

You'll also notice at the bottom of each calculator results page is a link to "Send Results." You can quickly share the results by text or email with an advisor, landowner, co-worker or another valued partner.

Q: Where can growers and advisors download the new eKonomics mobile app?

Mullen: You can find the app by searching for "ekonomics by nutrien" using either the Apple or Android app stores. Simply download the free app and begin using it. There's no need to register or sign up.

Q: Where can people get more information?

Mullen: The best resource is our Nutrien eKonomics website (nutrien-ekonomics.com), which can be quickly accessed by clicking the link at the bottom of the app homepage. Along with the web-based ROI tools, you'll find a wealth of knowledge and information. It includes research, crop guides, soil management, nutrient science, news articles, geographic nutrient trends, agronomic ideas and insight from farmers and experts. You'll also find webinars and an academic section that allows the user to ask questions of agronomists and other experts.

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For More Information:

-- Visit Nutrien-eKonomics.com for news and fertility management information. It also contains valuable tools like a rainfall tracker and Growing Degree Day calculator to help farmers assess possible fertility loss and plant development needs.

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