Technological innovations in the face of sustainable agriculture

In the past, the biggest problem for farmers was obtaining the maximum yield from their crops but today the concerns are no longer based only on the need to produce food. 

They are also based on solving problems around the increase in world population, global warming, and the need to grow healthy food. 

Fortunately, technological innovations have solved several of these problems and have given way to more sustainable agriculture, overcoming problems as adverse as extreme weather conditions or the world's increased demand for food.

Thanks to technological innovations, farmers manage to raise their farms to a higher level, acquire new knowledge on how to manage the field, obtain new visions on automation and remote management of crops with the help of precision agriculture, a strategy with which they collect, process and analyze temporal, spatial and individual data to improve the efficiency in the use of resources, productivity, quality, profitability and sustainability of agricultural production.

Benjamín Hinojos, the spokesperson for Valent de México, a company specializing in agrochemicals and biorational marketing, spoke to NotiPress about the Mexican technological landscape  in agriculture, “In Mexico, we still do not have this technology [precision agriculture], but in the near future, we will be on par with several regions.” In this sense, he recognized that in Latin America there was still a need to evolve towards these agricultural technologies.

Some examples of the technology implemented in agriculture that provides the aforementioned benefits which have been adopted by most of the companies dedicated to agriculture are the following:

Big data and management software: Using mobile devices, farmers can manage operational costs and crop yield, in addition to improving their overall productivity. There are various applications available to monitor weather patterns, administer pesticides or manage hours in a given job.

Robotics: All types of machines are used to improve agricultural productivity, from robots in charge of planting, fertilizing, and fruit harvesting machines, to drones that diagnose pests, carry out pollination processes, control livestock, and even prevent fires. All of them result in better performances and reduced operating costs and labor.

Global positioning system: This tool combined with a tractor can analyze the soil and receive real-time information on the conditions of the land and determine the amount of water, fertilizer or insecticide needed, managing to optimize work by saving fuel and reducing the time of operations.

Many companies are aware of all these benefits and are increasingly implementing new technologies. The most recent example is that of the Royal Barenbrug Group, a company dedicated to creating seeds, grass and forage. This company has signed a six-year contract with the Fujitsu Company to completely transform its infrastructure and digitize virtually its entire operations.

Royal Barenbrug Group expects to have greater cost control, more secure communication, increased sales and will integrate all its services globally. To achieve this, Fujitsu will provide them with a workplace, infrastructure, network, security and support services. Besides, it will also provide a complete hardware supply and manage all the data from its main service center, managing to operate in more than 20 countries on six continents.

There are several reasons for companies to obtain this type of technology, although most agree they have done so to improve their income and optimize processes. However, it should be noted, a motivation that has been added to companies when implementing these technological innovations in the face of sustainable agriculture is the rise of agri-food eCommerce. This was due to the coronavirus pandemic, as customers demanded greater quality in food and, therefore, platforms such as Amazon Fresh allowed them to connect with companies so they could obtain fresh products with better prices.

The original Spanish version of this report is from Mi Punto de vista.