China releases first technology roadmap for intelligent agricultural machinery

China released the nation's first technology roadmap for intelligent agricultural machinery on Wednesday guided by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT), according to a CCTV report.

The roadmap is based on unmanned agricultural machinery as a final product form and proposes nine frontier and key technologies including integrated operation tools and a new energy system.

The efficiency delivered by intelligent agricultural machinery when operating full-time has continuously increased by 20 percent to 60 percent, while the operation required less manual operation by 50 percent, based on previous testing sampling data.

Moreover, operating costs have also been reduced, with the application of intelligent agricultural machinery saving 3 to 9.5 percent of fuel and reducing 30 percent use of pesticides, while lowering labor costs by 30 to 60 percent.

An official from the MIIT said that the intelligent agricultural machinery equipped with navigation technology and automatic driving capabilities will be popularized throughout China's crop growing plains, while forming a number of commercial unmanned farms largely operated by advanced machines by the end of the 14th Five-Year Plan period (2021-25).

More than 120 experts from various technical fields including agricultural machinery, vehicles and electronic information processing contributed to the roadmap, in addition to four consecutive years of unmanned agricultural operation trials across the country.