How Smart Irrigation Is Driving Better Decisions for U.S. Growers and Retailers
As agriculture continues to grapple with rising input costs, climate change, labor shortages, and increased pressure to conserve water, the industry’s move toward smarter, more data-driven farming is no longer optional — it’s essential. At the heart of this evolution lies precision irrigation, and few understand its full potential better than Mike Hemman, President of Netafim North America. In a recent appearance on CropLife Retail Week, Hemman shared his insights on how scalable smart technologies and AI-powered irrigation are reshaping the ag landscape, offering both growers and retailers new ways to drive ROI and make smarter decisions in real time.
Netafim, a subsidiary of global company Orbia, is well known for its innovations in drip irrigation. But as Hemman explains, their mission goes far beyond just delivering water — it’s about enabling smarter, site-specific decisions. “We’re focused across a lot of precision agriculture within the drip irrigation,” Hemman noted. “But the really important part… is how do you make the decision on how much water to deliver through that drip line? When does that water go? What’s the duration of the irrigation cycle?”
Precision Ag Meets Smart Tech
As agtech moves beyond basic monitoring, Hemman sees a clear shift from traditional precision ag into what CropLife and others are calling “smart tech.” This new phase integrates AI, IoT, and cloud-based crop models to empower autonomous decisions that improve both resource use and crop outcomes.
“For years, we’ve been able to remotely turn a valve on and off,” Hemman said. “Now, we can overlay site-specific data in the cloud, run it through a crop model, and use machine learning to say: based on the field conditions, the valve needs to turn on for this duration, which results in X amount of water, and this impact on the plant.”
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In other words, growers can stop guessing. They can act with confidence, knowing their decisions are supported by real-time data, predictive analytics, and actionable insights — all of which ultimately reduce costs and improve yields.
Simplifying the Complex
However, one of the biggest barriers to adoption, Hemman said, is complexity. “It’s got to be simple,” he emphasized. “Farmers are getting thrown so much information. It’s not about the information — it’s about what do I do with it?”
Netafim is addressing this by offering solutions that are sensor-agnostic and scalable. That means the technology can work with a farmer’s existing hardware and grow with their operation — whether they’re starting with basic monitoring or scaling up to autonomous irrigation.
Read more at CropLife.
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