Local grower Smith wins award
Innovations noted at Forbes TechAg Summit
Longtime Yuma-area grower Vic Smith was presented with the Forbes Impact Award for his support for innovation in agriculture at the Forbes TechAg Summit, held late last month in Salinas, Calif.
Smith said Wednesday in an interview from Salinas that he was honored to be the third recipient of the award, which began with the first TechAg Summit three years ago.
“Part of this summit is they do want to put the focus on people who are active in the innovation, pushing innovation in the ag tech sector,” said Smith, the president and CEO of JVSmith Companies.
Smith was cited for innovations in automated lettuce weeding and thinning, as well as for supporting collaboration by growers with the Western Growers Center for Innovation and Technology.
Sammy Duda, chairman of the Western Growers Association, presented the award to Smith June 29, saying “he has invested a lot of time, money and effort to improve the ecosystem that will improve automation.” Duda added Smith has been breaking down barriers so growers can work together, particularly through the innovation center.
The push for this business incubator was started under former Western Growers Association chairman Bruce Taylor and Smith followed it through during his term as chair, which began in November 2014.
Since then the center has made great strides in hooking farmers up with Silicon Valley startups hoping to turn a profit by using technology to increase crop yields, in a new office located in a five-story building in downtown Salinas.
“We feel that’s the bridge, because Salinas is at the north end of Salinas Valley, and Silicon Valley people can drive down in an hour and a half, and meet actual farmers, talk about things conceptually, and then these entrepreneurs or innovators can get in the pickup truck with a grower, and drive to a field and see real-life scenarios of what’s going on. It’s those kind of interactions which I think will make this thing a great success.” Smith said.
He said the ventures going on in the Salinas center are already covering a lot of ground.
“There’s a lot of energy toward the internet of things, connectivity, monitoring the farming activities, measuring the precise amount of water and fertilizers that go to the crops, and aerial imagery is another sector that several people are involved with at the center.
“(There are) innovative ideas on how to generate renewable energy and hopefully become more economical with the ag sector. They’re bringing ideas, there’s a fair amount of wind energy and solar energy in the Salinas Valley and trying to bring that into the ag sector for the large pumps that pump the water to irrigate the crops; they require so much power and they tend to be remote, or the grid doesn’t quite reach them.”
Smith, the vice chairman of the advisory board for the Yuma Center for Excellence in Desert Agriculture, said that entity works with the Salinas center. “They’re interacting very closely with this center, and (executive director) Paul Brierley, he’s working very closely with the Innovation Center and Western Growers on any technology or innovation. So there’s a very close relationship that definitely benefits Yuma,” he said.
Smith joined his father’s Yuma and Salinas-based farming operations in 1976, and took over leadership in the 1990’s. He has served on numerous area boards and been active in philanthropy, particularly to promote school nutrition and gardening programs. In January he was named 2016 Yuma County Citizen of the Year.
JVSmith Companies now grows about 19,000 acres, 8,000 each in Yuma and just over the border into Mexico, and another 3,000 in Colorado.
Smith said, “It was a great honor to be recognized, by basically your peers and the industry members, and Forbes brings a lot of credibility to this effort, as they recognize this unique relationship that’s going on in Salinas.”
The Forbes AgTech Summit, sponsored by Forbes Media, attracted about 600 people from the agriculture industry to meet with about 50 tech startups with ideas to increase food production and reduce water usage.