Understandably, releasing data might seem like losing a competitive edge; however, Rob sees broader benefits, including potential financial incentives for farmers through sharing data.

“Essentially, if combined with input and yield data, we would have a ‘National Scale Rotational Field Trial’. This would be invaluable for developing climate-change resilience and assessing the effectiveness of soil-health management options. We would also have a continuously updating ‘live’ national soils database.

“It could be used, for example, to evaluate the efficacy of soil management options under SFI or by water companies, looking at reducing phosphorus in rivers, because they would know which fields within their catchments were associated with high levels of phosphorus and hence target management options more cost-effectively.

“There’s so much competition among growers because what they do gives them an advantage over others. However, if data were shared on cross-cutting themes important to everybody, everyone would benefit,” he adds.

Data sharing on a national scale

Looking ahead, Toby is part of the Cranfield University Team launching the new open access soil platform to enable data sharing and research collaboration within the farming community.

Using what was previously the National Soil Resources Institute’s soil information for England and Wales, the team at Cranfield University is making the data available to farmers and land managers free of charge.

“On larger farms, which may use contractors or people who have never been in that farm’s fields, data sharing and technology could provide instant insights into the quality of the land, which crops grow best, and its yield,” says Toby.

“With enough data sets and knowledge and historic patterns, you could start to model what you think would be the best strategy for that field, even if you hadn’t ever been in there,” he adds.