There is a huge list of demanded input innovations by farmers, in order to be more competitive. These are the starting points, but there are several others.

In the last couple of decades world agricultural production has experienced extraordinary improvements, especially regarding yields, cost management and, mostly recently, quality as well. Much of these improvements are a direct result of the ability of farmers to face external competition since deregulation, using modern technology and production systems. Nevertheless, there is still a lot to be done in this field, even regarding yields.

The major areas of improvement in which innovation plays an important role are sustainability, with the development of technologies that allows, for example, lower water consumption; new crop varieties that present better energy conversion, are more resistant or more precocity, which would reduce the cycles and there enhance production; animal welfare; certifications and reuse of by-products.

Innovation on crop and land use decision to keep sustainability, resource conservation and on other hand, have the maximum possible use of the land. Some areas of the world allow three different crops per year;

Use of equipments that allow better usage of land, which helps increasing yield;

Innovate in water usage, developing and applying technologies that reduce consumption per area of water;

Animal welfare techniques;

Innovations in governance structures, allowing to share equipments with neighbors, selling services, better using all assets of the property, in order to be as more efficient as possible.

Competition is driven by several factors, being one of the most important innovations. To create new solutions that are winners in solving problems is the pathway for companies to profitability and sustainable advantage building. In food, where we have all the production pressure discussed in previous articles, is an area where financial resources should be more applied towards research that will provide innovations. In the next article, I will discuss needed innovations for food industry and food distribution.

The author is professor of strategic planning and food chains at the School of Economics and Business, University of Sao Paulo, Brazil (www.favaneves.org) and international speaker