Yara – a company specializing in crop nutrition – has entered a partnership with IBM to build a digital farming platform, providing holistic digital service and instant agronomic advice.

Yara and IBM Services will collaborate to develop and commercialize digital agriculture solutions that will help increase global food production by drawing on the two companies’ complementary capabilities – Yara’s agronomic knowledge, backed-up by more than 800 agronomists, and IBM’s digital platform services and expertise in AI and data analytics.

“Our collaboration centers around a common goal to make a real difference in agriculture. To be able to responsibly feed a growing population, it is critical that farmers increase food production on existing farmland to avoid deforestation. Yara and IBM will develop digital solutions that empower professional and smallholder farmers to optimize farming practices to increase yields, crop quality and incomes in a sustainable way,” said Terje Knutsen, EVP Sales, and Marketing in Yara.

The joint global digital farming platform will apply AI, machine learning and in-field data to unlock new insights for farmers. The digital platform will have worldwide coverage and aspires to reach 100m hectares of farmland – which is equivalent to twice the size of Spain or close to 7% of all arable land worldwide.

“As demand for food rises along with the world’s population, the digital farming platform will play a key role in increasing global farming yields in a sustainable way. The collaboration is a perfect symbiosis of IBM’s capabilities in AI, big data management and blockchain technology and Yara’s agronomic knowledge, farmer-centric digital innovation, and proven track record in improving farming across the globe,” said Luq Niazi, IBM Global Managing Director Consumer Industries.

As a first step, Yara and IBM will establish joint innovation teams, collaborating at digital hubs in Europe, Singapore, the US, and Brazil.