More than 30 farmers, crop advisers, scientists and other agricultural stakeholders came together last week for a three-day design sprint event to design a new decision-support tool that supports nitrogen fertilizer rate decisions. According to a news release, a design sprint is a proven methodology for answering complex questions rapidly through designing, prototyping and testing ideas with users. The event was organized by the Iowa Nutrient Research & Education Council and Iowa State University’s Department of Agronomy, with support from Google.org. “Nitrogen fertilizer is one of the most expensive inputs for crop production, but there is great uncertainty about optimum rates due to varying field conditions from field-to-field and year-to-year,” Ben Gleason, executive director of INREC, said in the release. “Farmers today have few tools to reduce this uncertainty, which creates economic risk.” The event led to a prototype for a decision-support tool to reduce uncertainty around the optimum rate of nitrogen fertilizer application for INREC and ISU to use. A team from Google facilitated and planned the event.
