Case study: PCAs glean short-, long-term value from agronomy platform

TELUS AGRONOMY | GAR BENNETT | POSTED OCTOBER 25, 2023

As a pest control adviser, you often step into the field much like you’re beginning to solve a puzzle. You’re looking for all the right pieces to assemble to see the image it contains. We provide a set of eyes to help find the right pieces to put together, helping you assess each pest situation quicker and more efficiently and enabling you to get it treated so you can do more of what you do best: Take care of your grower customers. 

Accurately assessing pest pressures to facilitate quick, effective treatment and maintaining field-level accountability for crop scouts are two major value propositions of our agronomy platform for Ralph Rendon, Director of Personnel and Compliance for GAR Bennett, LLC in Reedley, California. A longtime user, Rendon has taken advantage of the platform’s pest control database to enable the company’s PCAs to write pesticide recommendations and document treatments for regulatory purposes. 

Creating new value for GAR Bennett customers 

While the pest control database was initially a massive value proposition compared to handwriting similar recommendations in the past, it’s paved the way for GAR Bennett PCAs to create more value from the platform, agronomically and financially. The information they can generate and document in the platform helps them grow their roles as problem-solvers. 

“We always talk to our PCAs about not just selling product, but being problem solvers. We need to find out what our growers need and come up with the solutions for their challenges.” 

"There are so many different ways we use the platform compared to 10 or 15 years ago. TELUS Agronomy helps track the increasing amounts of data and information they need to manage for customers,” Rendon said. “We always talk to our PCAs about not just selling product, but being problem-solvers. We need to find out what our growers need and come up with the solutions for their challenges.” 

GAR Bennett employs proprietary software for managing crop protection product invoices and deliveries. Our system integrates fully into that platform; the result is a seamless dataset from initial input and crop protection recommendations all the way through procurement and invoicing. It means a new level of efficiency in delivering informed solutions to the field and documenting every step in the process. 

“We would definitely have a lot more paperwork to shuffle if we didn’t have TELUS Agronomy. It allows us to cut out a lot of extra steps in the pest management process for our growers because it talks to our other systems,” Rendon said. “It allows us to use resources for a lot of other things that we’d otherwise be using to track crop protection product applications by hand. That’s a big deal for us.” 

Next-level capabilities in the agronomy platform 

Beyond managing and tracking crop protection product application data, GAR Bennett has recently begun using our solutions in new ways. For one, it enables PCAs to verify whether field pest traps have been checked, which ultimately contributes to more effective pesticide applications. 

“Our PCAs can hold Trap Checkers accountable that they’ve checked fields. The pin drop function enables the block-checker to inform the PCA that they’ve been to a field,” Rendon said. “It helps create accountability for the trap-checker, and allows the PCA to hold him or her accountable for getting that job done. That helps make pest and disease treatment decisions much easier.” 

“We would definitely have a lot more paperwork to shuffle if we didn’t have TELUS Agronomy. It allows us to cut out a lot of extra steps in the pest management process for our growers because it talks to our other systems.” 

It’s when this seamless data is stitched together with aerial imagery and other data over multiple years that the long-term value proposition of the platform clarifies for Rendon and the GAR Bennett team. With multiple years of comprehensive pest and disease scouting and treatment records, PCAs can make more informed, effective recommendations on the ground level. It helps GAR Bennett raise the bar for grower service. 

“We can develop a better understanding of what growers are applying and see how results have changed over the years,” Rendon said. “It helps us come up with better solutions to solve specific problems and create game plans for growers having so much data with TELUS Agronomy.”