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Autonomous Robots Plant, Tend, and Harvest Entire Crop of Barley

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Re: Autonomous Robots Plant, Tend, and Harvest Entire Crop of Barley

#121

Post by kuschku »

philh wrote: post #107
kuschku wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because Starbucks has found a carefully balanced point between being affordable enough that it has mainstream appeal, and expensive enough that it seems premium. Any change, absolute or relative, would reduce their margin.

Do you claim that the current price of coffee beans is the price that happens to maximise Starbucks' profits? (This seems implausible to me, unless Starbucks has fairly strong control over the price of coffee beans.) Or is your claim more narrow than that?

My claim is that the current price of coffee beans happens by coincidence to be close to the optimum for Starbucks’ profits, and any major change would be a disadvantage.

Re: Autonomous Robots Plant, Tend, and Harvest Entire Crop of Barley

#122

Post by agumonkey »

thomas_howland wrote: post #4

The amount of labor involved in grain crops like barley per dollar of output is minimal already - the guy running the tractor/combine/etc is mostly making sure nothing breaks and keeping an eye on things (which is important when you're operating $N00,000 worth of heavy equipment on open ground). You do need guys, however, for when things do go wrong, and for all the other farm tasks (equipment maintenance, fencing, m…

How much thoughts have been put to improve farming beside fertilizers and pesticides ?

I do wish for better food, and better life for farmers. Also I'm quite annoyed by mainstream tech (find it often uselessly improving the wrong parts of life).

Re: Autonomous Robots Plant, Tend, and Harvest Entire Crop of Barley

#123

Post by Alex3917 »

prawn wrote: post #93
Alex3917 wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting. Between farm labor automation and self-driving cars, do you foresee a point where it's cost effective to give certain foods away for free and monetize via advertising? Even if it's slightly offbeat stuff like dandelion greens and seaweed or whatever?

If anyone wants to eat thistles, I'll give those away... Oxalis too.

> If anyone wants to eat thistles, I'll give those away.

How do they actually taste? I know they're in the artichoke family, but I've never actually dug one up or whatever.

Re: Autonomous Robots Plant, Tend, and Harvest Entire Crop of Barley

#124

Post by maxerickson »

randomdata wrote: post #120
mikekchar wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have to admit that even though I posted what I did, I don't really understand the dynamics of the situation. I know the result I would prefer, but I have no idea how to get there. I'm originally from Canada and my family benefited greatly from the boom cycles of farm land prices. Now I'm living in Japan where it is illegal to sell farm land. I find the different dynamics extremely interesting, but as I am not a far…

> there are very few young farmers. Of my neighbours, I think there is one guy who is about 40 and everybody else is well over 60. That is interesting, because the exact opposite is true of my neighbours. Growing up, there were eight farm families clustered fairly close together. In all but one of those cases, the next generation (all still under 40) have become heavily involved with, if not completely taken over, th…

Of course people don't enthuse over seasonal work that pays $15 an hour.

Why would they?

(I get $15 from brief research; but even at $20 or $25, seasonal work with no benefits isn't a great job)

Re: Autonomous Robots Plant, Tend, and Harvest Entire Crop of Barley

#125

Post by randomdata »

maxerickson wrote: post #124
randomdata wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> there are very few young farmers. Of my neighbours, I think there is one guy who is about 40 and everybody else is well over 60. That is interesting, because the exact opposite is true of my neighbours. Growing up, there were eight farm families clustered fairly close together. In all but one of those cases, the next generation (all still under 40) have become heavily involved with, if not completely taken over, th…

Of course people don't enthuse over seasonal work that pays $15 an hour. Why would they? (I get $15 from brief research; but even at $20 or $25, seasonal work with no benefits isn't a great job)

That seems rather low to what I've been seeing out there (granted, fast growing wages make it a big moving target). But I agree with your general sentiment.

Coupled with the fact that the most productive farming regions in Canada have the lowest unemployment rates in the country, there is no reason why anyone has to settle for a farm job. They can get a job almost anywhere. Employers in these agriculture communities are desperate across the board for labour, not just those involved in agriculture.

Anyway, the economy is fundamentally self-correcting. I don't see there being anything to worry about. I'm biased as a small farmer, but I don't see slowing down the big producers as a bad thing.

Re: Autonomous Robots Plant, Tend, and Harvest Entire Crop of Barley

#126

Post by thinkcontext »

DesiLurker wrote: post #48

what I am interested in is robots that can reforest unused land. Imagine the possibilities with having armies of robots re-establishing green cover in Amazon delta. kinda like this but with robots: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_GreenHands good thing is that would be not require nearly as much 'babysitting' as growing crops just ability to charter uneven terrain.

People (and their livestock) are a bigger problem than technology in reforestation.

Re: Autonomous Robots Plant, Tend, and Harvest Entire Crop of Barley

#127

Post by usefulcat »

randomdata wrote: post #113
zaroth wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's a myth that Roundup is used as a desiccant. However the robots are not trying to replace chemicals. As you point out, that's a losing proposition. But they can definitely reduce overall man-hours, and so provide constant value as long as they operate.

> I think it's a myth that Roundup is used as a desiccant. I can say from personal experience (I am a farmer) that it is not. My white beans get the roundup treatment. They would never dry down in time for a successful harvest otherwise. In the olden days before roundup they used to pull them and leave them to dry before harvest, but that brought its own issues, including requiring many more trips over the field. Tha…

"Operator-less equipment is inevitable, but there is no way the manufactures are going to let the farmer capture any potential gains."

In a properly functioning market, seems like competition between manufacturers would be the mechanism by which the gains would be passed along to the farmer. Are you saying that there is or will be insufficient competition in that market?

Re: Autonomous Robots Plant, Tend, and Harvest Entire Crop of Barley

#128

Post by randomdata »

usefulcat wrote: post #127
randomdata wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think it's a myth that Roundup is used as a desiccant. I can say from personal experience (I am a farmer) that it is not. My white beans get the roundup treatment. They would never dry down in time for a successful harvest otherwise. In the olden days before roundup they used to pull them and leave them to dry before harvest, but that brought its own issues, including requiring many more trips over the field. Tha…

"Operator-less equipment is inevitable, but there is no way the manufactures are going to let the farmer capture any potential gains." In a properly functioning market, seems like competition between manufacturers would be the mechanism by which the gains would be passed along to the farmer. Are you saying that there is or will be insufficient competition in that market?

> Are you saying that there is or will be insufficient competition in that market?

It think is the case. I would suggest that there are only three main players in the industry right now. And what smaller ones are out there seem to have little involvement in the kind of computer/electronics tech that would bring the automation being discussed here, but rather build simpler mechanical-focused machines.

When many of these machines can already be priced at amounts nearing $1M to buy as a farmer, I imagine the capital costs to develop that new equipment to be in the hundreds of millions, if not billions. The opportunity for a new business to build a new machine end-to-end, with that level of technology, is pretty small. It doesn't help that the market of farmers out there willing to buy these machines is also comparatively small to other markets that might appeal to someone with that skillset.

It becomes more complicated than that as not all manufactures have a strong dealership/service presence in all operating areas, so even if another manufacturer can technically offer you the same machine for less, you may not be able to consider it due to lack of reasonable service. Farm equipment breaks all the time, so service availability is an absolute necessity. That is even more important than the original purchase price.

Re: Autonomous Robots Plant, Tend, and Harvest Entire Crop of Barley

#129

Post by ndh2 »

randomdata wrote: post #113
zaroth wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's a myth that Roundup is used as a desiccant. However the robots are not trying to replace chemicals. As you point out, that's a losing proposition. But they can definitely reduce overall man-hours, and so provide constant value as long as they operate.

> I think it's a myth that Roundup is used as a desiccant. I can say from personal experience (I am a farmer) that it is not. My white beans get the roundup treatment. They would never dry down in time for a successful harvest otherwise. In the olden days before roundup they used to pull them and leave them to dry before harvest, but that brought its own issues, including requiring many more trips over the field. Tha…

> The farmers will still choose it because they are having trouble finding labour in the first place.

If a farmer has trouble finding labor, they don't pay enough. The question is whether or not automation is cheaper than the actual rate that you have to pay in order to get somebody to do the manual labor. Not the rate you would like to pay.

Maybe it's just semantics, but I don't think "trouble finding labor" is a thing.

Anyways, thank you for your comments in this thread. Very insightful.

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