How Agriculture Technology Is Changing Agriculture's Future |
Agriculture has had a number of significant technological improvements recently. Modern farmers use a variety of technology to boost the productivity of their farms, including both conventional farmers and indoor producers.
All of these implements fall under the broad category of "Agriculture Technology," or AgTech for short, which is basically the practice of using technology in farming. AgTech contributes to a variety of agricultural processes, including machinery, supply chain management, soil health, and every stage of seed to store production.
What cutting-edge technologies are now being applied in agriculture?
AgTech applications can be observed in numerous farming settings across the nation. Drones are now utilized in major farming operations in place of "walking the fields" to scout, map, and survey vast tracts of farmland. These drones, which have cutting-edge cameras and sensors that can measure things like moisture content and plant health, can help assess potential planting sites and inform farmers of any sections of the field that may require additional care.
On the ground, the internet of things (IoT) has made it possible for a sizable class of internet-enabled sensors to send soil conditions to farmers in real-time using sensors buried in the ground. These fancy tent stake-like sensors, which detect and record variables like temperature, humidity, and pH, can alert farmers to soil conditions that may need to be improved in order to assure a healthy crop.
Some farmers are taking advantage of the same technological breakthroughs as Tesla car owners when it comes to harvest: autonomous driving. A fleet of fully autonomous combine harvesters that can go across vast fields of maize, soybeans, and other high volume crops is now available from agricultural equipment manufacturers like John Deere. Based on the type of crop being considered, these automated harvesting systems may choose the ideal time to harvest as well as the best manner of harvesting by utilizing cutting-edge sensor and data collecting technology. They can also take into account crop health and crop variability.
Agriculture technology: what is it?
Agricultural technology uses a variety of tools, including sensors, machinery, AI, and devices, to increase productivity, efficiency, and frequently safety standards. To modernize their farms, many businesses in the agriculture sector have used AI-based agricultural technologies.
Utilizing The Bowery Farming Method to Bring Technology Indoors
In addition, Bowery's indoor vertical farms, which are run on our in-house operating system called the BoweryOS, are actively using variations of these precision agriculture technology. Every one of our farms is run by the BoweryOS, which serves as its central nervous system. It makes judgments based on information and data received from external "appendages" or hardware, guides mechanical processes based on those conclusions. Each Bowery farm is powered by the fusion of hardware, sensors, computer vision, machine learning, and software, which enables efficient harvesting and continual growth.
Do you still exist? Keep reading, as we go into more depth about this below.
How AgTech Solutions Help Bowery Achieve Scale
How could anybody care for each and every plant in this place, you might ask as you stroll through the infinite aisles of a Bowery indoor vertical farm. That would require a lot of people, which is a good point.
Our plants have a fleet of sensors and cameras that are placed all over the farm to serve as their ears and eyes. These monitoring devices keep a watchful eye on a seed from the moment it is planted until it is harvested. They also monitor agricultural factors like light intensity, humidity, temperature, and nutritional levels. All of this technology gathers information and transmits it to the BoweryOS, which decides what action to take if anything is out of balance.
These sensors and cameras allow Bowery generate customized farming settings specific to indoor growing habitats in addition to monitoring plant health. Different types of leafy greens thrive well in various environments since no two plants are alike. As they say, some people prefer it hot while others want it chilly. Sensors in these specialized growing chambers respond to which crops reach particular zones in conjunction with the BoweryOS. Then they attempt to maintain those conditions within a narrow range that is necessary for producing the best-tasting greens.
Integrating Every Process
The combination of hardware and software to automatically produce exact farming conditions is the magic of AgTech at Bowery. The information gathered by our sensors and computer vision systems is fed back into the machine learning algorithms of the BoweryOS, which interpret it in real time, evaluate the health of the plants and the farm, and make required course changes. Hardware installed in our grow room then implements those corrections at the plant level.
The BoweryOS analyzes tens of thousands of environmental "recipes" for crops over time and tweaks them based on the best agricultural yields.
This equipment is becoming more roboticized as our farms advance, enabling a fully automated growth cycle in the future. It's easy to see how hardware and software cooperate to produce delicious greens at scale by taking a look at this growing cycle.
The Growing Cycle of the Bowery: How Technology Sets the Example
The BoweryOS notifies our group of Modern Farmers each day which crops are ready for harvest and which ones should start their growth process. The objective is to constantly move content plants around the farm.
Step 1: Planting the seeds
A Modern Farmer is given a duty by the BoweryOS at the beginning of a plant's existence to get a particular crop ready for germination.
Simple steps are involved: the Modern Farmer chooses the appropriate cultivar using a machine interface, loads the drum with seeds, and presses the start button. The BoweryOS is in communication with the machine, telling it how many flats (see illustration below) to prepare and how many seeds to put in accordance with the needs of a particular crop.
Each flat is marked with a customized QR code so that The Modern Farmer can keep an eye on the entire process. A seed is initially made traceable in a Bowery farm when they scan this code.
Secondly, germination
After that, the seeded flats are transferred to a germination chamber, where they stay for a few days (each cultivar has a varied schedule based on historic preferences in a Bowery farm). Our Modern Farmers get another helpful alert from the BoweryOS when the germination stage is complete: it's time to transport those plants into the grow room!
Finding a Home in the Grow Room in Step 3
The germinated flats are removed from the germination chamber by an automated conveyor belt and placed in the grow room. The BoweryOS must solve a puzzle similar to Tetris.
This is why: Imagine a system of stacks where, on any one day, hundreds of plants must move out of the way to be harvested and hundreds more must move in. The BoweryOS must also take into account the circumstances that cultivar need in order to survive, which will further complicate this shifting plan. It can be discovered, for instance, that a particular area of the grow room has a greater humidity level, making it perfect for arugula. The BoweryOS is able to locate the ideal location for every tray of crops thanks to its ability to synthesis billions of data points from past growing cycles.
Step 4: It's time to mature
The real helicopter parenting starts once the crop is placed in the grow room. The sensors and cameras we discussed previously keep an eye on every crop around-the-clock. The BoweryOS receives reports from this hardware on how things are progressing and whether they are going well or not.
For instance, despite the fact that each plant has a varied light schedule, they all require a period of darkness to rest. Our program can keep our LED lights on the appropriate schedule since it is aware of the sort of crop that is growing in a particular location. It also has the ability to detect errors. The BoweryOS detects this with computer vision, for instance, if a light is off for a longer period of time than usual and a crop appears to be behind schedule, informing our Modern Farmers when to check things out.
Similar to how we wouldn't be able to efficiently feed the plants without a tech-enabled irrigation system. To ensure there are no toxins present, all of our water is obtained from the municipal water supply and filtered numerous times. From there, certain nutrients are added to the water to aid in the growth of the plants. Every cultivar is given the proper fertilizer mix and water schedule by The BoweryOS, which also applies the proper schedule to every tray of crops in the grow room.
5th Step: Harvest Prepared
When crops are ready to be harvested, The BoweryOS signals Modern Farmers. As a result, lush trays start to migrate from the grow chamber to the harvesting station, where they undergo a second scan. From there, Modern Farmers pack and automatically harvest the crops.
The BoweryOS sends our greens out with a farewell scan when boxes are ready to be delivered to nearby businesses. This scan informs us of which crops are going to each store.
Why is AgTech Important?
The supply chain is being innovated by agtech, but it's not just for show. This, in our opinion, is crucial for developing a more sustainable agricultural method that can face the difficulties that lie ahead as well as promote a safer, more open food system.
In addition to Bowery's indoor vertical farm, other organizations are effectively utilizing AgTech. In order to turn food waste into fertilizer, California Safe Soils, an AgTech supermarket, collects uneaten produce from supermarkets and transforms it into inexpensive liquid fertilizer intended to restore depleted soils. The IBM Food Trust is a blockchain solution developed by IT giant IBM to address the "unprecedented need for a smarter, safer food supply" and provide real-time transparency to the biggest food producers, suppliers, and retailers in the world.
The growth of artificial intelligence is poised to make these systems smarter, more dependable, and more autonomous as the AgTech industry develops to embrace increasingly adaptive hardware and software integrations.