Farming – Page 2 – Impact Lab

Automation, drones, Farming, Science & Technology News

World’s 1st fully autonomous fruit-picking drones are smarter than humans

November 6, 2020

Israel-based agricultural drone manufacturer Tevel Aerobotics Technologies Ltd. is completing its third round of funding – a $20 million financing round raising its valuation to a cool $45 million

These orders are meant for autonomous drones developed by Tevel Aerobotics which are equipped with a one-meter long mechanical claw. This mechanical extension can be used to pick fruit or for thinning and pruning tasks in orchards.

Tevel claims to use artificial intelligence capabilities on a ground-based mobile unit that acts as the autonomous brain of the drones. The brain lets them identify fruit types, blemishes, and the level of ripeness.

Even though the global fruit-cultivation is expected to grow, the company expects the number of agricultural workers in the field to reduce, projecting a a potential for $3 billion in annual sales to growers in the U.S. and Europe

The wide range of utility that drones offer is sure to make them a popular instrument in the coming years. As a testimony to this, Israel-based agricultural drone manufacturer Tevel Aerobotics Technologies Ltd. is completing its third round of funding – a $20 million financing round raising its valuation to a cool $45 million.

Continue reading… “World’s 1st fully autonomous fruit-picking drones are smarter than humans”

Agriculture, Automation, Farming, Robots, Science & Technology News

Alphabet’s Mineral moonshot wants to help farmers with robotic plant buggies

October 23, 2020

The tech could lead to more sustainable farming practices.

In 2018, Alphabet’s X lab said it was in the process of exploring how it could use artificial intelligence to improve farming. On Monday, X announced that its “computational agriculture” project is called Mineral. The Mineral team has spent the last several years “developing and testing a range of software and hardware prototypes based on breakthroughs in artificial intelligence, simulation, sensors, robotics and more.”

One of the tools that has come out of the project is a robotic plant buggy. Powered by solar panels, the machine makes its way across a farmer’s field, examining every plant it passes along the way with an array of cameras and sensors. In conjunction with satellite, weather and soil data, Mineral says the buggy and its AI software can identify patterns and give farmers insights into their crops.

Continue reading… “Alphabet’s Mineral moonshot wants to help farmers with robotic plant buggies”

Artificial Intelligence, Automation, Farming, Farms, Robots, Science & Technology News

Robot reapers and AI: Just another day on the farm

October 13, 2020

Pressures on agriculture have forced a technological revolution that are driving a new age of farming.

The agriculture industry has hit a turning point. Faced with a massive labor crunch and environmental instability, aggressive technology deployments are no longer an option for outliers in the sector, but a necessary and critical element in the success of the farm.

Enabling the transformation are a host of new developers, but also legacy companies with deep roots in agriculture. Smart technology from companies like John Deere, for example, is helping farmers to produce more with less and create more successful crops, all while having a smaller impact on the land and environment. In contrast to prevailing wisdom that you can’t teach an old dog new tricks, John Deere is employing AI and machine learning in its equipment to identify and enable needed actions at a scope and speed beyond human capacity, automating farming actions through smart robotics to enable consistent and precise actions at large scale, and providing precise, geospatial intelligence generated with machine technology and coupled with cloud-stored data to enable sustainable farming.

In other words, it’s like farming with technologies that might be more commonly associated with NASA than a tractor company. I caught up with Dr. Cristian Dima, Lead of Advanced Algorithms, John Deere Intelligent Solutions Group, to discuss the changes underway in the farming sector and what we can expect going forward.

Continue reading… “Robot reapers and AI: Just another day on the farm”

Agriculture, Farming, Legalized marijuana, Science & Technology News

Groundbreaking for a one-of-a-kind hemp processing plant in Fort Benton

September 3, 2020

FORT BENTON — Thursday was a big day in Fort Benton as the mayor, a U.S. senator, and hemp farmers broke ground on a new facility – the first of its kind in the nation.

Employees of the industrial hemp company IND HEMP were joined by Fort Benton Mayor Rick Morris and Democratic U.S. Senator Jon Tester for the ceremony, which marked the opening of the nation’s first scaled hemp decortication and fiber processing plant. The Chouteau County town, with around 1,500 residents, gained national attention for the opening event.

“Stuff like this just doesn’t come along for rural Montana,” said Morris. “It’s a big deal for Fort Benton.”

Continue reading… “Groundbreaking for a one-of-a-kind hemp processing plant in Fort Benton”

Architecture, City Planning, Farming, Science & Technology News

Unused rooftop space transformed into stunning sustainable farm

August 24, 2020

The Thammasat University Rooftop Farm measures roughly 236,800 sq ft (22,000 sq m), making it the largest organic rooftop farm in Asia

The Thammasat University Rooftop Farm (or TURF), by Landprocess, puts an abandoned rooftop area belonging to Thammasat University’s Rangsit Campus to fine use as an organic farm. The project incorporates solar power and rainwater collection, and is used to teach sustainable farming techniques.

Continue reading… “Unused rooftop space transformed into stunning sustainable farm”

Ecological Products, Farming, Food, new technology, Science & Technology News

This former semiconductor factory is now the worlds largest indoor farm, producing 10k heads of lettuce per day

July 24, 2020

This indoor Japanese farm uses LED lights and hydroponics to produce lettuce 2.5 times faster, with just 1% of the water, when compared to an outdoor farm.

When we think about factories, and what we decry as “factory farms,” we probably don’t think very highly of them as being a key component in the future of agriculture, but if we can take what factories do best, such as use technology to build efficient production lines, and pair that with what nature does best, which is growing biomass from light and water and minerals, then growing food in plant factories starts to make a lot of sense.

Converting what were formerly industrial buildings into indoor farming operations, especially in urban areas and locations that aren’t conducive to year-round outdoor food production, could be an excellent reuse of existing resources (the buildings themselves, the infrastructure that supports them, and their locations in or near cities) to help build a more sustainable food system. And this sort of operation can be done in a way that’s both highly efficient and productive (PDF), in essence turning our ideas about industrial-scale factory farming on their heads.

Continue reading… “This former semiconductor factory is now the worlds largest indoor farm, producing 10k heads of lettuce per day”

Coronavirus, Farming, Food, Science & Technology News

Tyson Foods chairman warns ‘the food supply chain is breaking’

May 15, 2020

The chairman of Tyson Foods is warning that “millions of pounds of meat will disappear” from the national food supply chain as the coronavirus outbreak forces food processing plants to shutter.

“The food supply chain is breaking,” John Tyson wrote in a full-page advertisement published Sunday in The New York Times, The Washington Post and the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.

“There will be limited supply of our products available in grocery stores until we are able to reopen our facilities that are currently closed,” he wrote in the advertisement, which was also published as a blog post on the company’s website.

In recent weeks, the major poultry producer has suspended operations at plants across the country. The company halted operations Wednesday at an Iowa plant that is crucial to the nation’s pork supply.

Continue reading… “Tyson Foods chairman warns ‘the food supply chain is breaking’”

Agriculture, Coronavirus, Farming, Food, Science & Technology News

U.S. reels toward meat shortage; world may be next

May 13, 2020

Key operations are halted in the U.S., Brazil and Canada, affecting pork and poultry production.

Plant shutdowns are leaving the U.S. dangerously close to meat shortages as coronavirus outbreaks now spread to suppliers across the Americas.

Almost a third of U.S. pork capacity is down, the first big poultry plants closed on Friday and experts are warning that domestic shortages are just weeks away. Brazil, the world’s No. 1 shipper of chicken and beef, saw its first major closure with the halt of a poultry plant owned by JBS SA, the world’s biggest meat company. Key operations are also down in Canada, the latest being a British Columbia poultry plant.

While hundreds of plants in the Americas are still running, the staggering acceleration for supply disruptions is now raising questions over global shortfalls. Taken together, the U.S., Brazil and Canada account for about 65% of world meat trade.

“It’s absolutely unprecedented,” said Brett Stuart, president of Denver-based consulting firm Global AgriTrends. “It’s a lose-lose situation where we have producers at the risk of losing everything and consumers at the risk of paying higher prices. Restaurants in a week could be out of fresh ground beef.”

Continue reading… “U.S. reels toward meat shortage; world may be next”

Biotech, Energy, Engineering, Farming, Science & Technology News

5 incredible synthetic biology holy grails that could change the world

March 3, 2020

Investors are still waiting for next-generation biotech to deliver on its enormous promise and potential, but just one of these Holy Grails would make the wait worth it.

Biotechnology has come a long way since 1978, when Herbert Boyer successfully demonstrated that human insulin could be produced from bacteria engineered with recombinant DNA. The breakthrough technology pushed a little-known company called Genentech into the spotlight and forever changed the world. Genentech was acquired by Roche for $46.8 billion in 2009. The American bioeconomy — biotech crops, biochemicals, and biologic drugs — generated an estimated $324 billion of gross domestic product in 2012. And millions of people worldwide today rely on insulin and other biologic drugs daily.

You could argue that recombinant DNA was the first Holy Grail technology delivered by the field. Several more have followed. In fact, we’ve recently been treated to the development and ongoing commercialization of the gene-editing technology known as CRISPR — a true game-changer for the biotech ecosystem. Headache-inducing legal entanglements aside, CRISPR promises to help synthetic biology deliver on its enormous potential and could even be an integral tool needed to produce several other world-changing Holy Grails. Some are closer to reality than investors may think.

Continue reading… “5 incredible synthetic biology holy grails that could change the world”

Agriculture, Farming, Food, Science & Technology News

So you’re too ethical to eat meat; but should cows go extinct?

February 5, 2020

Vegetarianism and veganism are becoming more popular. Alternative sources of protein, including lab-grown meat, are becoming available. This trend away from farmed meat-eating looks set to continue. From an environmental perspective and a welfare perspective, that’s a good thing. But how far should we go? Would it be good if the last cow died?

Many people value species diversity. Very many feel the pull of the intuition that it’s a bad thing if a species becomes extinct. In fact, we sometimes seem to value the species more than we value the individual members. Think of insects, for example. The life of a fly might be of trivial value, but each fly species seems considerably more valuable (despite the lack of any direct instrumental value to us of flies). Do we – should we – value cattle? Should we be concerned if cows (or a subspecies of cows) is threatened with extinction? Should we take steps to preserve them, just as we take steps to conserve pandas and wolves?

Continue reading… “So you’re too ethical to eat meat; but should cows go extinct?”

Farming, Food, Science & Technology News, Space

Here’s how we could feed a million people on Mars

September 30, 2019

If we want to colonize Mars, we’re going to need to figure out a way to feed ourselves there, and continuously sending food to the Red Planet isn’t a sustainable plan.

But now, a team of researchers thinks it’s figured out a way to produce enough food on Mars to feed a million people — and they say their plan to make Martian colonists self-sufficient would take just a hundred years to implement.

Continue reading… “Here’s how we could feed a million people on Mars”

Biotech, DNA, Farming, Science & Technology News

Gene-edited cattle have a major screwup in their DNA

September 6, 2019

Bid for barnyard revolution is set back after regulators find celebrity “hornless” bovines contaminated by bacterial genes.

They were the poster animals for the gene-editing revolution, appearing in story after story. By adding just a few letters of DNA to the genomes of dairy cattle, a US startup company had devised a way to make sure the animals never grew troublesome horns.

To Recombinetics—the St. Paul, Minnesota gene-editing company that made the hornless cattle—the animals were messengers of a new era of better, faster, molecular farming. “This same outcome could be achieved by breeding in the farmyard,” declared the company’s then-CEO Tammy Lee Stanoch in 2017. “This is precision breeding.”

Except it wasn’t.

Food and Drug Administration scientists who had a closer look at the genome sequence of one of the edited animals, a bull named Buri, have discovered its genome contains a stretch of bacterial DNA including a gene conferring antibiotic resistance.

Continue reading… “Gene-edited cattle have a major screwup in their DNA”