The cover story for the September 2020 issue of National Geographic is about robots. The author shows robots already working alongside humans in multiple different sectors. Agriculture is one of those.
Farming may seem old-fashioned, entrenched, an industry resistant to change, but it has long been a driver of human innovation. The earliest farmers in Mesopotamia, more than 10,000 years ago, began a relentless tradition of progress. Take a look at the sophisticated farm machinery used today. These tech developments are responsible for dropping the percentage of the American labor force engaged in farming from over 70% in 1820 to less than 2% in 2020. Robots are the next step in this heritage.
On farms right now, robots pick apples and milk cows. The Nat Geo article mentioned that growers are modifying lettuce to make harvesting easier for robots. Drones and data collecting rovers gather statistics to streamline operations. The presence of these machines is increasing at a breakneck pace.
Regarding the typical concern of job displacement, there is actually a pronounced labor shortage in the U.S. and elsewhere that's forcing farmers to automize faster than in a normal labor scenario. Also, repetitive labor is easily programmable but the common sense adaptability of humans cannot be replaced in the near future. I think robots can help people focus on higher level tasks instead of grunt work. Plus it seems unreasonable to expect tech to slow down for the purpose of saving jobs; it never has before, why would it now.
High-tech, sustainable agriculture is a promising flagship of our 21st century fight to keep this planet livable. Autonomous farm robots must be a large part of this movement. We imagine robots roaming the shops and streets of Tokyo, driving us to work, serving our meals. We'll see them combing our fields too, interacting not only with us but with the Earth itself.
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