Microsoft launches FarmBeats, to eliminate guesswork for ag producers

VentureBeat.com reports: 

 

Farming is grueling business. Between 2013 and 2016, U.S. farmers and ranchers weathered a 45% dip in net farm income - the largest since the Great Depression - while the number of mouths to feed grew sharply by the day. The global population is expected to increase by 2.2 billion by 2050, and the world's farmers will have to grow about 70% more food than is now produced. 
 

 

If you ask Microsoft, the solution lies in technology. The tech giant's FarmBeats program, which launched in preview on Azure Marketplace ahead of Ignite 2019, is a multi-year effort to bring robust data analytics to the agriculture sector. With a backend built on Azure and compatibility with hardware from a range of top manufacturers, it aims to promote what Ranveer Chandra, FarmBeats project lead and chief scientist at Azure Global, calls "data-driven" farming techniques. The International Food Policy Research Institute claims these can boost farm productivity by as much as 67% while reducing resource usage. 

 

"[We're capturing] large amounts of data from farm[s] and then us[ing] AI and machine learning to translate that data into insights for the growers ... When we talk to growers, a lot of the decisions they make are based on guesswork, and we want to replace that guesswork with data," Chandra told VentureBeat in a phone interview. "It's not just about growing more food. We need to grow more nutritious food, good food, and we need to grow that increased good food without harming the environment." 

 

FarmBeats kicked off in 2015 with a prototype for an internet of things (IoT) platform for agriculture - a platform that enabled "seamless" data collection from sensors, cameras, and drones. Chandra drew personal inspiration from his grandparents' farm in India and insight from an Accenture survey that found fewer than 20% of farmers use sensors, drones, and other tech for crop planning, owing to costs and flaky connectivity. 

 

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