How award-winning ag student graduated to a role in farm tech

Helping to deploy a new generation of tractors while championing better use of farm data is the next step for Farmers Weekly’s 2025 Ag Student of the Year George Elliot.

George collected his award at the ceremony in London last October.

“It was a real privilege to be seen by other people in the industry to be worthy of an award,” says the 26-year-old, who is now employed full-time for JCB providing product support nationwide.

See also: Farmers Weekly Awards 2025: Ag Student of the Year 

The Harper Adams graduate works closely with farmers and contractors to assess the performance of new Fastrac 6000s in real-world conditions.

He admits technology is a professional passion. “I’m always banging the drum about precision agriculture,” he says.

More from data

George is evangelical about the use of agricultural data from precision farming.

“I’m continuously told by farmers that we’re dealing with smaller profit margins. There’s less money in the job. Commodity prices are falling. We’ve got to do less with more,” he acknowledges.

Improving efficiency starts with measurement, he believes. “To really understand how we can be more efficient, we’ve got to understand what we do first.”

The challenge is to not just collect information but also interpret it – something farmers often grapple with, he says.

“We can record all this data, but we need some ability to analyse it and derive meaningful information.”

With the average age of UK farmers now 62, George expects significant changes in the workforce, particularly in technology and data handling.

“Data is going to be the thing which will set farmers apart.

“There’s going to be a massive influx in jobs which focus on agricultural technology, but also the handling of agricultural data,” he says.

“I don’t think it will be solely people from an agricultural background that will fill these job roles.”

George’s own route into the sector was varied. After school, he worked for livestock and machinery auctioneers before joining a large arable and vegetable business in Staffordshire.

He later pursued a degree in agriculture with mechanisation to deepen his knowledge of precision farming.

Farming ambition

George Elliott © Mark Scott/Black Star Photography

Although his career is rooted in agricultural engineering right now, George has not abandoned ambitions to farm. “I’ve never wanted to do anything else other than farming,” he says.

However, George’s travel-heavy role makes hands-on farming unrealistic for now, and he is frank about the barriers new entrants face, citing high land values and the difficulty of securing a tenancy or raising capital.

“If I won the lottery today, the first thing I’d do is buy a farm. That’s probably my ultimate dream, but I struggle to see how I could get into farming and make it work for the cost.”

His advice to others is straightforward. “Take every opportunity that comes your way,” he says. “You don’t know what it will lead to.”