Tech & Operations Playbook for Farm Pro’s. Parameters For Evaluation 6/14

Farm Management Companies. Day-to-day farming is part science, part craft. Technical mastery ensures consistency, quality, and fewer shocks for investors.

Step 1 of 4

Operational & Technical Competence

Q1: Knowledge of soil, water, and climate suitability assessment; Before sowing dreams, how do you check the ground reality—soil, water and local climate?👉 Think of it like choosing a school for your child: you don’t just see the building; you check teachers, commute, fees, and results. Similarly, a farm needs a baseline: soil health (pH, organic carbon, salts), water quality (EC, hardness, contaminants), and climate (heat units, frost risk, wind).

We mostly “go by gut.” If the neighbor grows it, we try it. No tests.

Basic soil test once; water/climate judged by local talk.

Standard package: soil & water lab tests, plus a quick climate look (IMD normals, chill/heat hours).

Full diagnostic: geo-tagged sampling plan, season-wise water testing, multi-year climate data (degree-days, wind/heat maps), plus a corrective plan (gypsum, organic carbon build-up, filtration/RO if needed).

Operational & Technical Competence

Q2: Crop planning and rotation design expertise; Do you pick crops like picking random items in a grocery basket, or do you design rotations like a chef plans a week’s menu?👉 Good rotations balance soil nutrition, pest pressure, cash flow, and market timing (e.g., leafy → fruiting → legume).

Single crop fixation; same crop every season (“yehi chalta hai”).

Two-crop shuffle without nutrient/pest logic (e.g., tomato → tomato variant).

Planned rotations (e.g., tomato → okra → cowpea cover), aligned to seasons and local demand.

Rotation as a profit-engine: intercropping where useful, staggered plantings for price windows, legume breaks, and residue management—with spreadsheets of margins/acre/season.

Operational & Technical Competence

Q3: Proficiency in irrigation design & water management; When you lay out water, do you just “open the tap,” or do you engineer it like a good plumbing & finance plan—right pipe, right time, right dose?👉 Think source → storage → filtration → distribution → scheduling (drip spacing, discharge, valves, automation).

Flood/overhead by habit; no design, no scheduling.

Drip installed but one-time design; filters/clogging ignored; schedules by guess.

Proper hydraulic design, filtration, pressure checks; weekly schedules by crop stage/ET.

Advanced: multi-zone automation, soil-moisture probes/tensiometers, fertigation tanks with venturi/DO checks, and seasonal water budgeting.

Operational & Technical Competence

Q4: Farm mechanization & infrastructure planning skills; Is your farm a hand-tool workshop or a small factory with the right machines and roads where needed?👉 Includes layout, roads, pack-shed, cold room, nursery benches, trellis, tractor/implements selection, and maintenance routines.

Ad-hoc: borrow implements, no layout drawings, “jugad” repairs.

Some planned purchases (sprayer, tiller); infrastructure grows piecemeal.

Planned CAPEX with BOQs: roads, drainage, pack-shed flow, implement list & AMC.

Lean layout & VSM mindset: one-way material flow, quick-change trellis, preventive maintenance boards, OEE metrics for key equipment.

Operational & Technical Competence

Q5: Knowledge of organic / sustainable / regenerative practices; Can you grow while giving back—soil life, biodiversity, and safe residues—without becoming a yield martyr?👉 Composting/vermi, cover crops, mulches, biostimulants, IPM, residue-limit awareness, and practical transition plans.

“Organic” only as a slogan; routine chemical dependence.

Sporadic use of bio-inputs; no system for residues/soil carbon.

Integrated approach: IPM calendars, mulches, compost, selective chemistry with PHI/MLR tracked.

Regenerative pathway with measurable outcomes (SOC %, biodiversity notes), certification roadmaps (NPOP/GAP), and market premiums targeted.

Operational & Technical Competence

Q6: Integrated Farming – Animal Husbandry; Do animals (cattle, goats, poultry, fish) live on your spreadsheet—or only on motivational posters?👉 Linkages: dung/urine → compost/biogas, fodder blocks, pond nutrients → field fertility; risk hedging with egg/milk/meat cashflows.

No integration; animals seen as distraction.

A few animals without feed/health plan; outputs not looped to fields.

Basic integration: gobar gas or FYM/jeevamrut plan; fodder plots; vet schedules.

Designed system: dairy/poultry with manure management, slurry fertigation, duck-cum-fish/azolla, by-product sales—and economics tracked monthly.

Operational & Technical Competence

Q7: Poly-house / open-field / crop-package know-how; Whether it’s protected cultivation or open field, are your Packages of Practice (PoPs) sharp and season-wise?👉 Includes variety choice, planting density, trellis/pruning, microclimate tweaks (foggers/shade), hail/frost measures.

Generic PoPs copied; same spacing/sprays everywhere.

Some adaptation by season; limited microclimate control in polyhouse.

Crop-and-season specific PoPs; pruning/trellis schedules; climate responses (shade % changes, night venting).

High-precision PoPs with data feedback (Brix/firmness logs, pest counts), and SOP binders per crop; trial blocks for new varieties.

Operational & Technical Competence

Q8: Irrigation, fertigation, pest management, and harvest planning; Day-to-day playbook: do you run calendars or firefight?👉 Think weekly fertigation recipes, scouting sheets, economic thresholds, pre-harvest intervals, and harvest maturity indices (color charts, Brix).

Reactive: feed/spray when plants “look sad,” harvest when buyer calls.

Rough calendars; records not maintained; PHI sometimes ignored.

Written schedules for fertigation and IPM; scouts log pest counts; harvest standards defined; crates/cold chain planned.

Data-driven: fertigation by phenology + leaf/soil tests, ET-based irrigation, threshold-based sprays, split harvesting for grade premiums, and cold-chain dispatch windows.

Operational & Technical Competence

Q9: Integration of advanced IT/IoT monitoring tools; Are your decisions “feel-based,” or do sensors and dashboards whisper truths to you daily?👉 Examples: soil moisture probes, weather stations, insect traps with counters, camera analytics, QR traceability, farm ERPs.

No tools; phones and memory run the farm.

A gadget here or there; data not really used.

Selected tools linked to weekly decisions (irrigation changes, spray timing), simple dashboards shared with client.

Integrated stack: sensors → alerts → actions; ERP with batch-wise costs, traceability QR, and buyer-facing reports; SOPs auto-triggered by thresholds (e.g., heatwave protocol).

Review

Operational & Technical Competence

Question :
Q1: Knowledge of soil, water, and climate suitability assessment; Before sowing dreams, how do you check the ground reality—soil, water and local climate?👉 Think of it like choosing a school for your child: you don’t just see the building; you check teachers, commute, fees, and results. Similarly, a farm needs a baseline: soil health (pH, organic carbon, salts), water quality (EC, hardness, contaminants), and climate (heat units, frost risk, wind).

We mostly “go by gut.” If the neighbor grows it, we try it. No tests.

Basic soil test once; water/climate judged by local talk.

Standard package: soil & water lab tests, plus a quick climate look (IMD normals, chill/heat hours).

Your Answer:

Operational & Technical Competence

Question :
Q2: Crop planning and rotation design expertise; Do you pick crops like picking random items in a grocery basket, or do you design rotations like a chef plans a week’s menu?👉 Good rotations balance soil nutrition, pest pressure, cash flow, and market timing (e.g., leafy → fruiting → legume).

Single crop fixation; same crop every season (“yehi chalta hai”).

Two-crop shuffle without nutrient/pest logic (e.g., tomato → tomato variant).

Planned rotations (e.g., tomato → okra → cowpea cover), aligned to seasons and local demand.

Rotation as a profit-engine: intercropping where useful, staggered plantings for price windows, legume breaks, and residue management—with spreadsheets of margins/acre/season.

Your Answer:

Operational & Technical Competence

Question :
Q3: Proficiency in irrigation design & water management; When you lay out water, do you just “open the tap,” or do you engineer it like a good plumbing & finance plan—right pipe, right time, right dose?👉 Think source → storage → filtration → distribution → scheduling (drip spacing, discharge, valves, automation).

Flood/overhead by habit; no design, no scheduling.

Drip installed but one-time design; filters/clogging ignored; schedules by guess.

Proper hydraulic design, filtration, pressure checks; weekly schedules by crop stage/ET.

Advanced: multi-zone automation, soil-moisture probes/tensiometers, fertigation tanks with venturi/DO checks, and seasonal water budgeting.

Your Answer:

Operational & Technical Competence

Question :
Q4: Farm mechanization & infrastructure planning skills; Is your farm a hand-tool workshop or a small factory with the right machines and roads where needed?👉 Includes layout, roads, pack-shed, cold room, nursery benches, trellis, tractor/implements selection, and maintenance routines.

Ad-hoc: borrow implements, no layout drawings, “jugad” repairs.

Some planned purchases (sprayer, tiller); infrastructure grows piecemeal.

Planned CAPEX with BOQs: roads, drainage, pack-shed flow, implement list & AMC.

Lean layout & VSM mindset: one-way material flow, quick-change trellis, preventive maintenance boards, OEE metrics for key equipment.

Your Answer:

Operational & Technical Competence

Question :
Q5: Knowledge of organic / sustainable / regenerative practices; Can you grow while giving back—soil life, biodiversity, and safe residues—without becoming a yield martyr?👉 Composting/vermi, cover crops, mulches, biostimulants, IPM, residue-limit awareness, and practical transition plans.

“Organic” only as a slogan; routine chemical dependence.

Sporadic use of bio-inputs; no system for residues/soil carbon.

Integrated approach: IPM calendars, mulches, compost, selective chemistry with PHI/MLR tracked.

Regenerative pathway with measurable outcomes (SOC %, biodiversity notes), certification roadmaps (NPOP/GAP), and market premiums targeted.

Your Answer:

Operational & Technical Competence

Question :
Q6: Integrated Farming – Animal Husbandry; Do animals (cattle, goats, poultry, fish) live on your spreadsheet—or only on motivational posters?👉 Linkages: dung/urine → compost/biogas, fodder blocks, pond nutrients → field fertility; risk hedging with egg/milk/meat cashflows.

No integration; animals seen as distraction.

A few animals without feed/health plan; outputs not looped to fields.

Basic integration: gobar gas or FYM/jeevamrut plan; fodder plots; vet schedules.

Designed system: dairy/poultry with manure management, slurry fertigation, duck-cum-fish/azolla, by-product sales—and economics tracked monthly.

Your Answer:

Operational & Technical Competence

Question :
Q7: Poly-house / open-field / crop-package know-how; Whether it’s protected cultivation or open field, are your Packages of Practice (PoPs) sharp and season-wise?👉 Includes variety choice, planting density, trellis/pruning, microclimate tweaks (foggers/shade), hail/frost measures.

Generic PoPs copied; same spacing/sprays everywhere.

Some adaptation by season; limited microclimate control in polyhouse.

Crop-and-season specific PoPs; pruning/trellis schedules; climate responses (shade % changes, night venting).

High-precision PoPs with data feedback (Brix/firmness logs, pest counts), and SOP binders per crop; trial blocks for new varieties.

Your Answer:

Operational & Technical Competence

Question :
Q8: Irrigation, fertigation, pest management, and harvest planning; Day-to-day playbook: do you run calendars or firefight?👉 Think weekly fertigation recipes, scouting sheets, economic thresholds, pre-harvest intervals, and harvest maturity indices (color charts, Brix).

Reactive: feed/spray when plants “look sad,” harvest when buyer calls.

Rough calendars; records not maintained; PHI sometimes ignored.

Written schedules for fertigation and IPM; scouts log pest counts; harvest standards defined; crates/cold chain planned.

Data-driven: fertigation by phenology + leaf/soil tests, ET-based irrigation, threshold-based sprays, split harvesting for grade premiums, and cold-chain dispatch windows.

Your Answer:

Operational & Technical Competence

Question :
Q9: Integration of advanced IT/IoT monitoring tools; Are your decisions “feel-based,” or do sensors and dashboards whisper truths to you daily?👉 Examples: soil moisture probes, weather stations, insect traps with counters, camera analytics, QR traceability, farm ERPs.

No tools; phones and memory run the farm.

A gadget here or there; data not really used.

Selected tools linked to weekly decisions (irrigation changes, spray timing), simple dashboards shared with client.

Integrated stack: sensors → alerts → actions; ERP with batch-wise costs, traceability QR, and buyer-facing reports; SOPs auto-triggered by thresholds (e.g., heatwave protocol).

Your Answer:

An owl blinks less, sees more 🦉. Share this and check who’s truly tech-sharp!