141–150 of 187 posts
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I know this isn't the point of this sub thread, but in UKthe prices are: The cheapest loaf of bread I can buy is 36pence or $0.47 A 250 g pack of butter is £1.45 or $1.88 A 450 g jar of thin cut orange marmalade is 49p or $0.64 This is from Lidl.
And includes sales tax And you don’t have to tip the cashier /s
I’m co-founder of the “space bots with lasers” company. Happy to answer any questions.
How efficient is laser weeding in time and energy? Like, can the robot move down the row as fast as a human weeding by hand? Can it carry a car battery and weed for an eight hour shift?
Speed of movement / detection / destruction cycle isn't as important as cost per unit of land patrolled - these are things you can easily scale up if the price per device is low enough. Compare & contrast cost of humans.
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How do you link machines to bondage? If you look at slavery from Sparta to the American South it's often had a large component of agricultural labor. Even things like serfdom where the serfs were nominally free but tied to working the land it they were doing agricultural work.
You're not wrong. But, human history goes back roughly 200,000 years. Slavery can only be dated back to 1860 BCE. One could argue that the "bondage curve" -- if there is one -- is parabolic. I.E. human bondage peeked sometime during the Atlantic Slave Trade and has been going down ever since. One could also argue that -- before modern machinery -- humans existed for nearly 200,000 years with no documented form of bon…
I have been trying to form a framework for a few years now. Small acreage farmers growing organically need automation.
Large corporate farms are already mechanized. As are most commodity crops. Speciality crops that need a lot of human labour and expertise..especially in organic operations need help from automation and robotics tech.
The trend I am seeing in the US is mostly data collecting intelligence. Everyone is doing something in AI or ML or blockchain. But small acreage farmers like me need more automation.
I have noticed that the trend in the states seems to be data collection technology which needs massive datasets. There isn’t a lot of care or use from small acreage farms. This is the biggest stumbling block for small farms(less than 100 acres) to be included in the big boys game.
We need small cheap robots that does a diverse set of tasks. At this point, for small farms, human intelligence trumps AI. But data is king. More money is made off data harvested from farmers than the actual produce itself. Because farmers sell wholesale but we pay retail for the tech.
We are lagging behind in the United States compared to endevours in the EU or down under. Not everyone can be a unicorn. Not everything has to be big.
In a way..we don’t have to try because we have super cheap migrant labour. For now. I will bet my bottom dollar that it will be gone in a few years time. What then? We are also spoilt for choice by the produce bounty from Mexico. But for how long?
As a small farmer who is interested in automation, a few thoughts : 1. I would like a robotic platform that can be modular depending on my operation. Diff farmers use diff methods. We live in diff zones and have diff pests and diff soil and diff water. One size won’t fit all. 2. There is more to farm labour than just weeding bots. 3. I need to own my farm’s data and be able to commodify it. 4. We need to be partners. Because bots are not farmers and the industry needs us to train them. Include us. I am the domain expert. Not the roboticist or the engineer. 5. I would pay upto 20-25k for a robotic platform with a certain set of features. It’s worth it for me. That’s because I have a smattering of interest about robotics and automation to know what’s possible and how much it would cost. I also know how valuable data is and I want to make money off my data. A seemingly expensive platform is still worth that to me..however, I find it very difficult to convince my fellow farmers. Why? Distrust. 6. Farmers distrust technology because we deal with perishables and tech we can’t control is our work rotting in the field. 7. Farmers don’t get enough respect. Not the farming concerns with 10s of thousands of acres or corporate farms that have lobbies and trade memberships. Not commodity farmers..but regular farmers who sell at the farmers markets or to restaurants. 8. Nobody works with us. They ask us questions and once funding comes through, they are being nudged towards larger farms. They won’t grow bitter melon or fenugreek. Those huge farms won’t grow the eggplant from Laos or India. Or that specific spicy hot pepper from some place in South America. Without small farmers, we will all be eating the same kinds of foods. Same variety of tomato or the same kind of sweet pepper bred for machine harvest and mass production.
I started out naive. I am not under any illusion anymore that I can design a small acreage robotic platform. But now I know what’s out there and how I can make it work for smaller operations. And how to integrate the many things we do seamlessly as a new kind of Ag for us. Afterall, in other countries..the average farm size is 2-3 hectares. And they feed local population. So my platform will be useful elsewhere even if it doesn’t gain traction in the states.
I also have realistic expectations of technology now. And people. I am excited every time I read about innovations across the pond. Maybe we will get it for small acreage specialty crop organic farmers here. Or maybe not. But when we consider global momentum, some really exciting things are happening. And it’s happening fast!
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Unlike what you would expect, small robots do more damage to the soil not less. Damage to soil is not linear with mass, A massive robot will do twice as much damage where it touches the ground (wheel tracks most likely, but there are other choices), but it will touch 10 times less ground to do the same work so the total averaged over all the land is much better. For the same reason, tracks generally end up doing more…
This seems a bit confusing - in the context of agriculture, when I hear "damage to the soil", then that implies (to me) that we're talking about the difference between the long-term soil erosion caused by plowing/tilling/cultivation versus growing different cultures for which the process requires less of such invasive activities and so doesn't erode the soil as much. The effect of large tires vs small tires vs tracks…
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That's why I'd be in favor of making vertical farming more prevalent- by making farmers physically closer to the coastal cities they serve the rural areas will be starved economically. At this point in time, it's my conviction that retribution for the present tyranny of the minority will best come through technological means rather than warfare or politics.
Vertical farming is a pipe dream for everything but specialized high-margin produce. There's just not enough space to grow staple crops in coastal cities. Those volume crops will always be grown in large open areas and then hauled in to population centers. And no, improvements in solar cell efficiency or whatever won't change that equation.
> “I expected farmers to be quite luddite about the adoption of new technology,” he [Ben Scott-Robinson] says, as he packs Rachel away. I actually assume farmers are very welcoming of technology. They are hard workers and good business men. Usually technology makes them more efficient and more money.
I’m co-founder of the “space bots with lasers” company. Happy to answer any questions.
Related: Can someone from the industry share what is the current status of vertical farming? Is this considered the future or the verdict is not out yet? Any good people/startups/articles to check out?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Vertical farming is a pipe dream for everything but specialized high-margin produce. There's just not enough space to grow staple crops in coastal cities. Those volume crops will always be grown in large open areas and then hauled in to population centers. And no, improvements in solar cell efficiency or whatever won't change that equation.
> in coastal cities I've never heard this being proposed- most vertical farming startups with any true prospects tend to be just outside the cities, but substantially closer than other farms. The chief advantage in vertical farming has nothing to do with actually farming within a city and everything to do with shortening supply lines. Likewise, I've never seen any company propose that they could completely replace co…