Ask HN: What's happening in agricultural technology? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: What's happening in agricultural technology?

#91

Post by GFischer » Tue, Jan 24, 2017, 2:43 PM UTC

lambdadmitry wrote: post #64

agentultra wrote: post #62

Vertical farms are going to be huge. They're almost fully isolated from the outside environment save for taking in local air and removing carbon from it. They require magnitudes less water than traditional agriculture and no fertilizers. You can build them in the middle of a downtown core if you need to. And you could optimize power consumption so that the majority of your energy comes from renewable sources. See Aer…

Please note that vertical farming is mostly about producing leafy greens and other low-footprint, high-value goods. Purely from the energy standpoint there is no sense in using vertical farming for the bulk of calorie consumption. Compare traditional farming: sunshine -> green parts of the plant -> seeds -> food -> people with vertical farming: sunshine -> [... -> electricity -> LED light] -> green parts of the plant…

This is offset in part by reducing or eliminating transportation costs and intermediation.

I was reading an interesting article about the farmer's market in my country, production is actually not the largest cost, it's less than half of the actual sale price.

See for example:

http://capreform.eu/farmers-share-of-food-chain-value-added/

(spanish) the article I was reading: http://www.cnfr.org.uy/uploads/files/Manual_de_comercializac...

Re: Ask HN: What's happening in agricultural technology?

#92

Post by brootstrap » Tue, Jan 24, 2017, 2:43 PM UTC

hoschicz wrote: post #41

uuilly wrote: post #33

Relative to HN I'm probably an expert in ag. Relative to people who grow things I'm far from an expert. I was employee 3 at Blue River Technology and I've been there for four years: http://www.bluerivert.com The way the Valley generally thinks of ag is completely broken and I highly recommend avoiding Valley people if you want to learn about it. "Fully automated" is a thing people who've never farmed before assume is…

Why is fully automated agriculture impossible?

I'll take a quick stab. First off it's not a software computer system. Their are so many different elements in play. Your robot needs to know about soil science, agronomy, pests, weather predictions, stock markets, machinery, the list goes on.

Farmers have to wear many different hats. You are a seed scientists for part of year when you figure out which seed you should plant for next season. This choice involves many other factors (weather predictions, personal yield goals etc). During planting season you have to make human decisions of when to plant/not plant. Training a robot to make this decision would be very complicated and most likely involve many 'failed' attempts that cost tons of $$$.

Lets say you did get the robot to choose a good seed, then you hired a fleet of robots to plant corn on 5000 acres and they successfully chose the correct times, right plant depths, row spacing, seeding rates, and managed to get the crop fully planted without any hiccups.. At this point you would then need to be scouting the fields, most likely putting down some N after planting. Robots have to decide which fertilizer goes where, how much to put on, is each field the same or does field X get higher N on one side but less N on other??

THEN lets assume all your crops grow fine, weather behaves (never does)and your robot fleet has scouted all fields. Then the robots must go out and harvest the grain. The combine picks up grain which then gets dumped into a semi on side of the road. Again maybe there is a 'harvest semi for Uber' kind of service where automated semis drive around between combine and elevator at will.

Another decision to be made is selling the grain or storing it...

In short, there are way too many decisions and farmers (i'm thinking midwest corn/beans guys) have to make across many disciplines. These guys have an intrinsic knowledge about their land that has been accumulating for 10s or 100s of years!

Re: Ask HN: What's happening in agricultural technology?

#93

Post by brootstrap » Tue, Jan 24, 2017, 2:44 PM UTC

anubisresources wrote: post #87

sampl wrote: post #77

If you want to learn more, come work with us at FarmLogs (YC12). We've got about a third of the US farmland in our system, and we use satellite imagery, agronomy, machine telematics, and more remote sensing to help farmers precisely manage every acre.

Planning to use that data for trading? I can think of a few hedge funds who might want a look at that data.

yes yes farmlogs, sell your users data for money. Give IN to the pressures of the valley.

Re: Ask HN: What's happening in agricultural technology?

#94

Post by planteen » Tue, Jan 24, 2017, 2:45 PM UTC

robbiep wrote: post #25

rmason wrote: post #11

The fully automated farm is a few years off. Here in Michigan large families with one or two employees farm 5-10,000 acres. With good Iowa or Illinois farmland you can expect 200 bushels of corn per acre or 60 bushels of soybeans. This land by the way will cost you approximately $7,183 per acre. If you're interested in this topic you might consider attending the precision ag conference, the next one will be in 2018 h…

Those are some pretty wild corn yields - 5 ton/acre - is it irrigated? In Australia dryland farming about half as productive is around $2,000/acre

You see yields like that in the US west of the 100th meridian. It's a stark divide. On the east side, farmers put seeds in the ground, rain does the rest, and you get amazing yields. West is substantially more dry. There, you see irigation and dry land techniques.

Re: Ask HN: What's happening in agricultural technology?

#95

Post by brootstrap » Tue, Jan 24, 2017, 2:48 PM UTC

IMO a lot of companies are trying to put more sensors on things which seems kinda dumb to me. Ok you can put 100 soil moisture sensors in my one field for 'precision ag' but what happens when i drive a big ass tractor over the field and smash the sensors?

There is a push for being more 'data-driven' and many farmers are adopting these technologies now. Some companies are more of a book-keeping type thing where you can put in your activites, they will show you some satellite imagery etc. There is also a big push for sustainability now. One of these companies is http://www.agrible.com/

Re: Ask HN: What's happening in agricultural technology?

#96

Post by hluska » Tue, Jan 24, 2017, 3:04 PM UTC

hueving wrote: post #49

subtenante wrote: post #36

Agriculture in our age must shift from productivity first to sustainability first, because we are running out of fossil energy allowing to produce most of the fertilizers, and we have already killed our soil with it. A farm involving a lot of machines (i.e. a lot of need for energy) might not be the way to go in order to keep the agricultural system stable. The most you ask from the soil, the poorer it gets, and then…

I don't see any justification though for why humans need to do the labor. This guy found a nice pollination technique. Great, teach it to the robots or spend time teaching the robots how to analyze different techniques for effectiveness. Humans are not great at farming, that's why we have entire industries producing tools to help them do better. It's silly to think that riding around in a tractor all day is a better…

Agriculture used to be the dominant industry in my part of Canada, and I have relatives/many friends who either farmed or currently farm. Consequently, I was once extremely interested in agtech.

I ran into a couple of problems. One big problem is that farming is not a particularly good business to get into right now. Equipment costs are very high, inputs are constant, and the global market is only kind to those producers who produce at massive scale. The days of taking over your Dad's quarter section and feeding your family ended before I was born. Now, if you want to take over the family farm, you more likely than not have a full-time job in the nearest community...

Because of the economic crunch, it has created a demographic issue. Many of the farmers I spoke to are in their 70s and 80s. They are mainly retired, but keep working the land to keep it away from corporate farms. Farming is more of a hobby at this point, and they choose to do it the way they always did.

The young farmers who would be early adopters hesitate because they more often than not rely upon their parents and grandparents during seeding and harvest. And, they can never rely upon a profit big enough to even pay the cost of automation.

Edit - It occurs to me that the phrase 'quarter section' has little meaning to anyone outside of agrarian communities. A section is usually one square mile. In Canada, in the late 1800s/early 1900s, the government granted one quarter section to any family that showed they could work the land. The Dominion Land Grant fuelled immigration. Many families still own their original quarter section and are fiercely protective of it.

Re: Ask HN: What's happening in agricultural technology?

#97

Post by sebleon » Tue, Jan 24, 2017, 3:13 PM UTC

lambdadmitry wrote: post #63

sebleon wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This comment is spot on. There's good reason to believe that the low-hanging fruits in improving agriculture are non-tech changes in farming. For example, a province in India was able to improve rice yields by 45% by transplanting seedlings earlier in a grid pattern [1]. I doubt that eliminating human labor costs would move the needle, automating farms seems like a low ROI move. If you follow the money, it's easy to…

> If you follow the money, it's easy to see why the US has focused its research on high-tech petrochemical fertilizer farming and GMOs. You can sell proprietary fertilizers, herbicides, insecticides, and seeds, but it's much harder to monetize new farming techniques. I believe this means that you are not aware of the work of Norman Borlaug [1] [2]. Basically the very fact that we don't have famines now in places like…

Right, I've heard the Western narrative on Norman Borlaug and the "Green Revolution".

I'd highly encourage you to read through the work of Vandana Shiva. [1] She'll provide a well-researched, critical view as an actual stakeholder in India's food system.

I look down upon petro-chemical fertilizers because of their disastrous effects on the environment and food security. Happy to elaborate, but Dr. Shiva work does it better.

[1] http://vandanashiva.com/?p=291

Re: Ask HN: What's happening in agricultural technology?

#98

Post by sampl » Tue, Jan 24, 2017, 3:16 PM UTC

whalesalad wrote: post #82

wikibob wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is there is a SF office in your future? If not, is the entire team in Des Moines and Ann Arbor, or do you have folks working remote as well?

An SF office is probably not in our future. We do have some remote folks and are working towards becoming a more remote-friendly company.

We're actively hiring remote people for many of these positions: https://farmlogs.com/jobs/#current-openings

Re: Ask HN: What's happening in agricultural technology?

#99

Post by beat » Tue, Jan 24, 2017, 3:16 PM UTC

Quarrelsome wrote: post #43

subtenante wrote: post #36

Agriculture in our age must shift from productivity first to sustainability first, because we are running out of fossil energy allowing to produce most of the fertilizers, and we have already killed our soil with it. A farm involving a lot of machines (i.e. a lot of need for energy) might not be the way to go in order to keep the agricultural system stable. The most you ask from the soil, the poorer it gets, and then…

I feel like you're not answering the question and instead subverting it to discuss your own philosophy. As legit as it is I don't see how this is helpful to the person asking the question.

Sometimes, people asking questions are actually asking the wrong questions. This is often true. So responding to the question with a better question to consider is a perfectly valid answer.

In my experience, if I don't know the answer, it's usually because I don't understand the question.

Re: Ask HN: What's happening in agricultural technology?

#100

Post by _m8fo » Tue, Jan 24, 2017, 3:31 PM UTC

hueving wrote: post #51

_m8fo wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is just a tiny part of a much broader goal, which is to create a completely self sustaining town of 100 to 1000 people within my lifetime. My intention is with 100k that could get you 10 acres. 1 acre for food, 5 for solar/energy production and 4 for housing/community. Of course, with the comments in this thread, I'd need more land, haha. As far as the economics goes: I've been doing reading but haven't formed a…

How will this town get medicine and technologies like replacement solar panels? Will people pay with USD into a general fund that would be used to buy from the outside world? What happens if people can't pay? Sorry about all the questions, but a community that small can hardly be self sustaining in a real sense without lots of imports or a massive step down in quality of life.

Indeed. Ideally (need to do more research) the community would self sustaining with a low quality of life, however, all of the usual amenities would be provided. The difficulty is setting it up so that they don't necessarily become entitled or dependent on the advanced amenities.