The agriculture sector may get a boost from AI in the future. Tech companies are working to create new AI models that focus on increasing harvests with better weather forecasting and decreasing pesticide use.
A recent Reuters article dives into how AI is improving the agriculture sector in the wake of changing weather and an overheating planet. Farming, which heavily relies on the ability to forecast and track weather changes, has been greatly impacted as weather patterns have begun to shift.
In response to these challenges, companies like ClimateAI are working to use technology to provide "more accurate but also more localized" climate trend forecasts, vice president of ClimateAI Will Kletter reported to Reuters. Having more accurate weather data helps farmers to prepare their crops.
Kletter also commented that AI technology will help farmers "make faster decisions, with less waste, that ultimately helps them bring maybe a new seed variety or new food crop to the market more quickly."
Other types of technology being created include a system called RealCoverage by AgZen, which is a device that farmers can mount to their spraying equipment to monitor plants sprayed with pesticides in real time and relay information to a tablet, and the Tumaini app, which can scan plants and detect early signs of disease.
These examples of how AI technology can benefit farmers and agriculture illustrate the technological revolution focusing on adaptation to a rapidly overheating planet. Other types of technology that are not AI are also used, such as an ultra-thin film used on crops to prevent loss from frost, or using crops and solar panels to lower air temperature with agrivoltaics.
Kletter of ClimateAI made an important point when discussing the benefits of AI. He stated to Reuters that AI technologies should be used selectively, "there isn't a lot of excess profit to grow throwing at cool ideas. They have to be really useful ideas."
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