How Artificial Intelligence is changing the agricultural industry
Tags: AI, Industry, Artificial Intelligence, Agriculture, Education

Agriculture is one of the oldest and most crucial professions in the world, that is responsible for mankind’s sustainability. Humans have come a long way over the years with respect to how we farm and cultivate crops. Today, with the introduction of Artificial Intelligence technologies, the farming industry has turned itself over. As the population of the world continues to grow and cultivable land becomes scarcer, we need to get more creative and become more efficient in the way we farm, in using less labor to produce more crops, and in increasing the yield and productivity of our soil.

Globally speaking, the agriculture industry is worth $5 trillion. And today, the industry is approaching and applying AI technologies to help grow better crops, reduce the problem of weed and pests, monitor the quality of soil, and check climate and weather conditions.

AI is also being used to organize data for farmers, assist with the workload. And to increase the efficiency of a wide range of agriculture-related tasks in various other industries. Let us look at some ways in which AI is impacting agriculture.

Artificial Intelligence helps in analyzing farm data

Farms and agricultural companies generate millions of data points daily, be it the number of seeds sown, crops cultivated, count of manpower, etc. One of the advantages of Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence is that farmers or managers can now analyze a variety of factors in real-time such as climate, weather conditions, amount of rainfall and temperature, water consumption, or the quality of soil collected from their farms to make informed and intelligent decisions. Technologies like AI aid farmers in optimizing planning to produce more profitable yields by helping them determine the ideal combination of crops to grow together, the best hybrid seed choices, and the utilization of resources.

AI for Precision Agriculture

AI technologies are being used to increase the quality and accuracy of harvest. This is now called precision agriculture. Precision agriculture is basically using AI technology to help in identifying defects in seeds and to recognize symptoms of diseases in plants. And pinpoint problems due to pests and weeds, and poor plant nutrition due to issues with soil in farms. Sensors that use AI technology can identify and target weeds and then make informed decisions.

About which herbicides to apply within the right areas in the farms so as to avoid harming healthy plants. This helps in avoiding over usage of herbicides and excessive chemicals that find their way to crops that ultimately become our food.

Artificial Intelligence for forecasting

Farmers are also using AI-based algorithms to develop seasonal predictive models to improve agricultural accuracy and increase yield and productivity. These models are able to forecast upcoming weather patterns based on historical data, months ahead to assist farmers in planning appropriate measures to prevent loss.

Seasonal forecasting is especially crucial for small farm businesses in developing countries as their past information and techniques can be limited. 70% of the world’s crops are produced by these small farms. And hence it is necessary that we equip them with these technologies to sustain our essential needs.

Use of AI for monitoring

Along with helping farmers on the ground, AI helps them to take their analysis to the sky so as to monitor their farms. The use of Computer vision and deep learning algorithms in processing data obtained from drones flying over the farms gives valuable information.

From these drones, cameras with AI technologies can capture pictures of the entire field. And analyze these images in almost real-time to recognize problem areas. With outside threats, and potential areas of improvement. Unmanned drones have the ability to cover far more land in significantly less time than humans on foot. This allows large farms to monitor more frequently and without human error or bias.

Use of AI in labor management

We all know that one of the many ways in which AI will change the face of the world is by solving labor problems. With fewer people entering the farming profession, most farm businesses are facing the problem of a workforce shortage. Previously farms needed many workers, mostly seasonal, to sow seeds, plow lands, remove weeds, harvest crops, and so on. However, humans have moved away from living in a traditional agrarian society with mostly everyone living on farms. With a large chunk of people living in cities, fewer people are able and willing to take care of the land. One strategy to help with this shortage of workers is the assistance of AI agriculture bots. These bots can partially replace the human labor workforce and used for various reasons. These AI bots can harvest crops at a higher volume, faster pace. And lesser errors than human laborers. They can accurately identify and eliminate weeds, thus reducing costs for farms by being a full-time workforce.

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