Sunday Brunch: Agriculture needs less complex tech?

If you ate today, thank a farmer : bumper sticker from the early 2000's

If we are to build a more sustainable agricultural system globally, we need technology that is cheap, modular, and easy to implement and operate.

Sometimes technology is a big part of the answer. For instance software and AI is going to become really important in managing electricity grids, including demand management and battery operations. But in other cases it's only an element of the solution.

Agriculture is a good example of this. Yes, for large scale farms in Europe and North America, driverless, automated tractors will be game changing. But these markets are only part of the challenge. What about the rest of the world?

One theme that we come back to frequently is how hard it is to get industries and consumers to change behavior. It's a particular challenge for groups such as farmers, where the possible loss if things go badly can outweigh the promise of future benefits. One bad crop can lead to material financial distress.

This is particularly true of farmers in developing countries, where farms are often small, the upfront costs of adapting new technologies are material, information can be hard to come by, and after sales support is frequently limited. Plus, government policies are often not supportive.

And yet we need to make global farming more productive. Even if we are skeptical of forecasts suggesting a growing global population, we know that urbanisation and rising incomes will increase the demand for food. And much of this demand will be met by small farmers.

Yes, advanced precision ag technology such as automated tractors are important. But so is building solutions that are cheap, modular, and easy to implement and operate. Something for sustainability investors and impact professionals to consider.

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Agriculture needs less complex tech ?

This is not an either/or issue, it's an 'as well as' one.

Let's start at the complex end. We have all seen the press and trade coverage of technologies such as driverless tractors. And while the physical tractor and the related technology is important ...

the kingpins of any autonomous farm vehicle project are the software writers and electronics engineers who can make it all work efficiently and reliably, with a digital platform for planning the machine’s tasks and enabling 24-hour remote monitoring via a mobile device.