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Crop and soil monitoring -

The first important application of AI in agriculture is related to crop and soil monitoring. When it comes to growing crops, the soil must have the right nutrients and progress must be monitored.

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Crop and soil monitoring -

Traditionally, this would be done by humans: farmers would check soil composition manually and track crop growth by their own observation. However, this is neither accurate, nor efficient.

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Crop and soil monitoring -

Thanks to AI, farmers are now able to use drones (UAVs) to capture image data and train computer vision models in order to intelligently monitor soil and crop conditions.

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Spotting disease -

AI can also be harnessed to help farmers deal with one of the most unpredictable and disruptive aspects of farming: insects and plant disease.

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Spotting disease - Plant diseases and pests can be devastating to a farmer’s harvest. But thanks to image recognition technology, their detection can now be automated.

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Spotting disease -

There is already technology out there that uses image classification, detection, and image segmentation models to help farmers take care of their plants’ health.

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Monitoring cattle -

Of course, agriculture is not only about plants and crops. There are plenty of livestock farmers out there making use of AI technology, too.

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Monitoring cattle -

A key player in the AI agriculture game is CattleEye, a company whose product uses overhead cameras and computer vision algorithms to monitor cattle health and behavior.

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Monitoring cattle -

This has obvious benefits for farmers, since they do not need to be physically standing next to their cows in order to spot a potentially serious problem.

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Accurate spraying -

So far, we have looked at the ways in which AI can be used to spot problems on a farm. However, it can be used to prevent those problems, too.

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Accurate spraying -

Indeed, drones equipped with computer vision make it possible to automate the spraying of pesticides and/or fertilizers uniformly over a given area.

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Accurate spraying -

Able to operate with a very high level of precision, these drones significantly reduce the risk of contamination.

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Automatic weeding -

When it comes to weeds, using AI just to spot them doesn’t save farmers a huge amount of work. Instead, they need the technology to remove the unwanted visitors.

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Automatic weeding -

Enter: BoniRub, the farming robot that uses camera and image recognition technology to find weeds and then remove them by driving a bolt down into the soil.

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Automatic weeding -

BoniRub teaches itself to distinguish between weeds and crops by looking at leaf size, shape, and color. That way it can be sure to get rid of weeds, without destroying valuable crops.

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Aerial surveillance -

Indeed, AI can analyze the imagery captured by drones and satellites, in order to help farmers monitor their whole (sometimes enormous) farm.

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Aerial surveillance -

With AI, farmers can be notified automatically if something goes wrong, without having to constantly observe the land themselves.

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Sorting crops -

Finally, AI can make farmers’ lives considerably easier when it comes to sorting through crops that have already been harvested.

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Sorting crops -

In the same way that computer vision can be used to spot defects in crops as they grow, it can also be used to separate the ‘good’ produce from the 'bad.'

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Sorting crops -

By inspecting the size, shape, and color of a farmers’ fruits and vegetables, computer vision can automate the sorting process with extremely high accuracy rates.

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Overall potential -

It can be seen, then, that AI has the potential to disrupt, if not transform, the agricultural industry over the course of the 21st century.

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Overall potential -

The increasing accessibility to computer vision among farmers has the potential to significantly improve efficiency and promote sustainability, as well as provide greater health and quality of produce.

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Risks -

That does not mean that the widespread introduction of AI in agriculture is without its risks, however.

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Unemployment -

On the one hand, it could cause widespread job displacement. Indeed, passing tasks traditionally performed by humans to AI could lead to significant job losses.

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Exacerbate ownership concentration - There are also concerns that AI in agriculture could exacerbate ownership concentration and benefit large corporations or wealthy individuals at the expense of smaller farms.

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Data privacy concerns -

Finally, as with any industry, there are data privacy issues to consider when AI starts to collect huge amounts of farming data.

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Going forward -

Like it or not, AI is here to transform agriculture. Used in the right way, it could help farmers adapt to the shifting environmental and climate needs of the 21st century.

Sources: (V7) (Forbes)

See also: The secrets to making the most of your local farmers' market

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