CropX And IrrigationNZ Joining Forces On Irrigation Efficiency App ‘The Bucket Test’

Global farm-management company CropX has a bold vision to ensure New Zealand farmers have access to better farming data that can help them improve their efficiency.

After recently being included in the World Economic Forum’s 100 most promising Technology Pioneers of 2021, CropX has opened an office in New Zealand. It has also successfully acquired local company Regen, which provides cloud-based, precision effluent and irrigation decision support tools - including developing the irrigation efficiency app ‘The Bucket Test’ for IrrigationNZ.

IrrigationNZ and CropX have strengthened the relationship and entered a joint venture agreement for the Bucket Test app.

The Bucket Test is an irrigation efficiency tool that has been used thousands of times to determine application depth, rate and how uniformly water is being applied during an irrigation event. The simple method is based on collecting irrigation water in strategically placed buckets and measuring water collected over a certain period of time. The app is used to collate this data and walks you through the steps to collect all relevant inputs, provides the results instantly to your phone, and e-mails a summary report to you.

CropX plans to take the Bucket Test technology global, with ambitions to bring it to the Australian and American markets, where CropX is already well-established.

“We provide farm-management tools that are affordable, accurate and practical,” says Eitan Dan, who has moved from CropX HQ in Israel to become Managing Director of CropX New Zealand.

“The Bucket Test is another addition to the CropX toolkit,” explains Eitan. We’ve seen farmers in many countries crying out for an accurate way to measure irrigation efficiency, The Bucket Test offers a ready-made solution that we can now bring to them.

“We look forward to continuing to develop this technology with our New Zealand partners and providing it to farmers across the world.”

Having developed the app with Regen several years ago, IrrigationNZ is excited to work with CropX to further develop the tool.

“We’re very proud of the work we’ve done with Regen to develop a tool that takes the guesswork out of assessing irrigation infrastructure performance,” says Vanessa Winning, Chief Executive of IrrigationNZ. “It’s been used thousands of times since development with great outcomes, CropX’s expertise means we will be able to improve the app even further and deliver greater value to our members by ensuring it is brought into alignment with the IrrigationNZ Code of Practice for Irrigation Performance Assessment."

Bridgit Hawkins was previously Chief Executive of Regen and has moved across to CropX to become their Chief Sustainability Officer.

“Our goal is to help New Zealand farmers tackle the growing complexities of managing modern farm operations” says Bridgit. “Joining CropX, our farmers will get access to their transformational technology and extensive global data network to instantly assess what is happening in their paddocks."

Eitan acknowledges that environmental legislation and consumer demands are tightening the screws on New Zealand farmers. “There is an urgent need to measure environmental impacts and increase efficiency,” says Eitan, “and we believe CropX can help.

“Farmers need quality data now more than ever. They need to know that their improved practices are working, because without this, there will be reluctance by the majority to follow suit and make the required changes.”

The Bucket Test works well alongside CropX’s patented Soil Sensor which is embedded with their sophisticated, yet easy to use digital platform, and has already helped thousands of farmers across the world. It was launched in New Zealand at this year’s Mystery Creek Fieldays, where it was a finalist in the innovation awards.

“We want to simplify the on-farm experience by giving farmers access to the full package of farm management software,” says Eitan.

“The CropX solution and Bucket Test are the start of this, and over time we want to increase our offerings so we can provide New Zealand farmers with the full package of affordable and accurate farm-management tools that will allow them to farm sustainably and efficiently, without needing swarms of advisors on their farm telling them how to do it.”

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