3 Key Building Blocks of a Seed Business Management Solution

Author: Mike Dorris, General Manager, Cultura Seed Solutions

OVERVIEW:

Visibility, Traceability and Standardization

Determining the right amount of seed to produce to meet customer demand means the difference between a profitable season or not. Today’s modern seed businesses are complex. To successfully manage an operation of this complexity requires a management solution that can provide data seedsmen can trust when making daily decisions.

For a management solution to work for a seed business it must have these 3 key building blocks: data visibility, traceability and standardization throughout every segment of your seed business. So what do these terms mean and why are they so important?

Visibility means being able to see the accumulated data of every part of your seed business and the underlying details. The goal is a system that collates and manages the data from every aspect of your business into one database. Stop spending hours copying and manually manipulating multiple spreadsheets! Use a software solution that provides information on all aspects of the seed business at the touch of a button. Data entered into our Generation Seed Management System is available to any part of the system that needs it.

You can see your complete inventory position of any specific variety of seed – what is on hand (listed by seed lot, by size, by treatment, by package type), what quality and applicability each seed lot has, the expected production yield, what’s being shipped, what’s being processed into finished seed – Generation can provide the operational information that you need to run an efficient business because all the data is available and accessible in a single place. Make the right decisions quickly!

Traceability means being able to track a unit of seed in a specific seed lot from the invoice it was sold on back to the field it was produced in. It also means being able to identify specific seed lots and each production process or operation that they were subjected to and what the outcomes of each process were (harvested seed was cleaned from a specific sub lot or bin, screenings were collected and incinerated, clean seed was split into seed lots with differing sizes, which lots were treated with which treatments and how they were packaged.

The Generation Seed Management System provides this traceability by recording each transaction and process throughout the lifecycle of the seed. It can track back through the parent or planting seed lots that were used in the production of the seed.

Standardization means data is entered and collected the same way in every business segment. It also means that each location or facility does the same process the same way. Developing best practices throughout your business is a great way to start the march to standardization. Eliminating customized spreadsheets with formulas that each department or location devised internally is also necessary to moving toward standardization. With Generation, you can mandate that every site and every user inputs the same data the same way. This is key to consolidate the data to make meaningful reports and information. Aligning the processes and data ensures that you avoid making costly mistakes.

Generation is a software solution designed specifically for seed production and processing businesses. It covers all operational aspects: managing production contracts with growers and producers, inventory, processing of the seed to finished product plus sales and distribution. Successfully manage your seed business using the visibility, tractability and standardization in Generation.

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