Patent Issued for Risk management on the application of crop inputs (USPTO 11145420): FMH Ag Risk Insurance Company

2021 OCT 28 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Daily News -- A patent by the inventors McComb, Shawn James (Algonquin, IL, US), Ochs, Yanhong (Waterloo, IA, US), filed on October 21, 2004, was published online on October 12, 2021, according to news reporting originating from Alexandria, Virginia, by NewsRx correspondents.

Patent number 11145420 is assigned to FMH Ag Risk Insurance Company (West Des Moines, Iowa, United States).

The following quote was obtained by the news editors from the background information supplied by the inventors: “The identity, timing and amount of application of crop inputs to a field may be determined by one or more of the following factors: maximizing yield of a crop, reducing the overall cost of a crop inputs, varying the rate of application of crop inputs to reduce the cost of crop inputs or to improve yield, complying with governmental regulations, following environmental best practices or voluntary environmental stewardship practices, applying scientific or agronomic models, complying with contractual constraints imposed by purchaser or potential purchasers of a crop, and complying with crop insurance requirements or crop insurance endorsements. For example, a scientific or computer model may be applied to estimate yield performance of a particular crop based on soil test results, environmental factors, the historic application of crop inputs, and historic yield of a previous crop to determine the timing and amount of application of the crop inputs. Crop inputs may include nutrients, such as fertilizer, nitrogen, phosphorous, potassium, and trace elements and minerals. Other crop inputs include pesticides, insecticides, herbicides, chemicals, plant hormones, water, irrigation, and other treatments for vegetation or soil.

“To minimize the risks of insufficient nutrients, excessive weeds, or insect attacks on crop yields, growers may tend to over-apply fertilizer, herbicides, insecticides, respectively, to crops in an effort to maintain consistently high yields. However, the over-application of crop inputs may raise production costs and cause pollution of surface and ground water aquifers.

“The Risk Management Agency, which is associated with the U.S. Department of Agriculture, may approve one or more endorsements (e.g., a Nutrient Best Management Practices (BMP) Endorsement) for crop insurance products based on preferential growing practices. Regulators outside of the U.S. may offer crop insurance products that are based on preferential growing practices. Although most growers are honest and operate with integrity, such endorsements may be vulnerable to fraudulent activities or negligence of the grower’s personnel. Using traditional in-person monitoring and inspection may be difficult, costly or impractical because of the geographic scope of arable land. Accordingly, there is need for improved process for risk management on the application of crop inputs to facilitate pragmatic new crop insurance products and/or to facilitate growing crops with particular traits.”

In addition to the background information obtained for this patent, NewsRx journalists also obtained the inventors’ summary information for this patent: “A system and method for managing a crop insurance program facilitates determining an input management plan for application of a crop input to a field within a defined geographic area. A field yield is measured. The field yield pertains to a yield of particular crop associated with a field in a defined geographic area. An aggregate yield is estimated. The aggregate yield relates to the particular crop associated with the defined geographic area. The aggregate yield is scaled to represent a generally equivalent land area to the field. A difference or variation is determined between the field yield and the aggregate yield. The determined difference or indication thereof is made available to a receiving entity (e.g., insurer that is associated with at least one of claims and insurance on the crop in the field).”

The claims supplied by the inventors are:

“1. A method for managing a crop insurance program or a grower compliance plan via a first data processing system comprising a data processor coupled to a data bus, the method comprising: determining an input management plan, by a planning module of the first data processing system, that specifies parameters for application of a crop input to a field having a field area within a geographic area that is greater in geographic scope than the field area, the input management plan comprising a minimum reference nitrogen level; determining whether the field is compliant with the input management plan by detecting a soil nitrogen level of the field, wherein the field is compliant with the input management plan if the soil nitrogen level of the field is above the minimum reference nitrogen level; if it is determined that the field is not compliant with the input management plan, sending an alert that the soil nitrogen level of the field is below the minimum reference nitrogen level, wherein the alert comprises instructions for correction of the soil nitrogen level by application of a corrective amount of additional nitrogen fertilizer within an allotted maximum time; if it is determined that the field is not compliant with the input management plan, applying the corrective amount of additional nitrogen fertilizer to the field to correct the soil nitrogen level to above the minimum reference nitrogen level; measuring, by a yield sensor on a harvesting work vehicle, a field yield associated with a particular crop while harvesting the particular crop from the field; determining whether other fields within the geographic area are compliant with the input management plan by detecting a soil nitrogen level of the other fields using remote sensors deployed in the other fields, wherein the remote sensors are in communication with the first data processing system; estimating, by an estimator of the first data processing system, an aggregate yield of the particular crop associated with the geographic area based on the other fields within the geographic area determined to be compliant fields that comply with the input management plan; determining, by the first data processing system, a difference between the field yield and the aggregate yield; and making available, by a communications interface of the first data processing system, the determined difference and a field identifier associated with the field to a receiving entity that is associated with at least one of claims and insurance on the field, where the making available comprises transmitting information on the determined difference and field identifier to a second data processing system via a communications network.

“2. The method according to claim 1 wherein making available comprises transmitting the difference electronically to an insurer as the receiving entity.

“3. The method according to claim 1 wherein the making available comprises transmitting the difference to the receiving entity if the field yield and the aggregate yield differs by more than a minimum threshold percentage.

“4. The method according to claim 3 wherein the minimum threshold percentage is approximately five percent.

“5. The method according to claim 1 wherein the geographic area comprises one or more of the following: a country, a state, a county, a province, a canton, a region, a weather growing zone, a rainfall zone, a climate zone, and a soil parameter zone, and wherein each soil zone is identified by soil properties associated with the depletion, leaching availability, or unavailability of one or more soil nutrients or water.

“6. The method according to claim 1 wherein the measuring of the field yield is measured by the yield sensor comprising at least one of a mass sensor, a weight sensor, flow sensor, a moisture sensor, a piezoelectric transducer, a grain flow sensor, a grain moisture sensor, a ground speed sensor, a header position switch, an impact force sensor, a plate displacement sensor, a volume measurement device, a load cell system, a radiometric system, and a capacitance sensor.

“7. The method according to claim 1 wherein the measuring of the field yield comprises detecting a first yield per land unit at the harvesting work vehicle, wherein the harvesting work vehicle is one of a harvester and a combine; and further comprising: transmitting the first yield per land unit to the first data processing system via an electromagnetic signal.

“8. The method according to claim 1 wherein the estimating the aggregate yield excludes the yields associated with compliant fields within the geographic area that follow the input management plan.

“9. The method according to claim 1 wherein the estimating the aggregate yield excludes the yields associated with noncompliant fields within the geographic area that do not follow the input management plan.

“10. The method according to claim 1 further comprising: deploying remote sensors in the field and in a geographic area outside of the field, wherein each remote sensor comprises at least one of a weather monitor, a soil moisture detector, and a nutrient level detector.

“11. The method according to claim 10 further comprising: storing historical sensor data in the deployed remote sensors; communicating the stored sensor data via an electromagnetic signal to the first data processing system upon interrogation.

“12. The method according to claim 1 wherein the first data processing system is mounted on the harvesting work vehicle, wherein the harvesting work vehicle is one of a harvester and a combine.

“13. The method according to claim 1 further comprising establishing a test strip and at least one check strip associated with the test strip in the field.

“14. The method according to claim 13 wherein a sensing station is positioned within the test strip.

“15. The method according to claim 1 further comprising: identifying different zones in the field based on at least one of soil properties and previously grown crops; and associating a test strip with each identified different zone.

“16. The method according to claim 15 wherein the zones are based on a crop history for the zone, a crop input history for the zone, a historic nutrient exposure of the zone, and a nutrient mobility rating associated with the zone, a hydraulic mobility rating associated with the zone, and an irrigated zone versus a non-irrigated zone.

“17. The method according to claim 1 wherein the aggregate yield comprises the aggregate yield scaled with reference to a land area equivalent to that of the field area.

“18. The method according to claim 1 further comprising: providing a grower of the particular crop on the field with a zone-based prescription for the application of a crop input within an allotted time for noncompliant zones within the field; and notifying the insurer or other party of noncompliance with the zone-based prescription of the grower fails to comply with the zone-based prescription within the allotted time.

“19. The method according to claim 1, wherein the yield sensor comprises a moisture detector that is configured to measure moisture content of the particular crop, and further comprising adjusting the field yield to compensate for the moisture content of the particular crop.

“20. The method according to claim 1, where the soil nitrogen level, as sensor data, is regularly or periodically detected at corresponding measurement times with time stamps and stored by a sensing station in the field, and wherein the alerting is performed using a-wireless communication of the sensing station.

“21. The method according to claim 20 further comprising: communicating the sensor data via wireless transmission from a data storage of the sensing station to the work vehicle electronics of a work vehicle and the first data processing system.”

There are additional claims. Please visit full patent to read further.

URL and more information on this patent, see: McComb, Shawn James. Risk management on the application of crop inputs. U.S. Patent Number 11145420, filed October 21, 2004, and published online on October 12, 2021. Patent URL: http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PALL&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsrchnum.htm&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=11145420.PN.&OS=PN/11145420RS=PN/11145420

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