In the future, will farming be fully automated? (BBC)

(I would have posted this in the "Good Reads" forum, but it seems to have disappeared from my list.)

By Padraig Belton Technology of Business reporter
25 November 2016

In the not-too-distant future, our fields could be tilled, sown, tended and harvested entirely by fleets of co-operating autonomous machines by land and air.

And they'll be working both day and night.

Driverless tractors that can follow pre-programmed routes are already being deployed at large farms around the world.

Drones are buzzing over fields assessing crop health and soil conditions. Ground sensors are monitoring the amount of water and nutrients in the soil, triggering irrigation and fertiliser applications.

And in Japan, the world's first entirely automated lettuce farm is due for launch next year.
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more: http://www.bbc.com/news/business-38089984




Farming strikes me as a much better target for robot technology than driverless cars or freight trucks. Fields have sharply defined borders and traffic is limited, so relatively simple hardware and software solutions should prove fairly robust. Might even save a few farmers from getting killed by their own equipment. Of course, there's less profit margin, which is why you hear about the sexy driverless cars constantly but not driverless tractors.