Although I agree with 9rx's points mainly, here

> When did we have to stop waiting for crops to grow?

part of modern agricultural automation includes year round seasons, which means essentially you are no longer waiting for crops to grow in the way that was first discussed.

This of course is what allows us to have fresh tomatoes year round, and many other fruits and vegetables. Obviously these are not perfect, tomatoes as the example already given, quality of the automated output is significantly less in comparison to the natural - nonetheless we do not wait for many crops to grow in the same way that people did before the 1990s (when computerized climate management, hydroponics and advanced greenhouse tech took off, as some later advances on the already mentioned PLC, and enabled automation in that field of human endeavor)