Trust
CEO Commentary by Mike McMorris
A big part of getting research into practice (GRIP) is successfully moving useful information along a line of people - from researcher to farmer, for example. At the end of the line, the farmer needs to make a decision of whether or not to make a change on their farm. That decision may include a large number of factors including cost, return on investment, time saved, personal preference, etc.
But key to all of the decisions is the trust that the farmer puts in the source of the information.
At the recent Agricultural Adaptation Council annual meeting, the guest speaker outlined three sources of information: institutional, cognitive and algorithmic.
Institutional includes governments, companies and other organizations. Trust in institutional sources has fallen worldwide, not just in agriculture.
Cognitive refers to personal sources, often including a relay of common experiences. Think of the gathering at Tim Horton’s or a chat at the back of the pickup truck.
Algorithmic is new and growing. It is quite eye opening to consider the number of ways that algorithms are determining the information to which we are exposed.
Each source has potential goodness and weakness. Just think how good it would be if we could align all three to provide efficient flow of highly trusted information.
