Water is now seen as a commercial necessity and a commodity to be bought and sold, which leads to debates about how best to use this valuable resource. As water scarcity increases, a system will need to be developed in order to keep track of water usage and rights. Blockchain can’t yet track the flow of water. But it can increase efficiency, reduce costs, and evolve how physical commodities like water are distributed.
Beef cattle ranchers have always known that making the best steak starts with the genetic makeup of the herd. Over the past year, those genetics have taken a historic leap thanks to new, predictive DNA technology. Today, ranchers can shop for bulls or bull semen touting a very specific genetic concoction that's prime for improving their herd.
One of the amazing aspects of new technology is how it can be applied with awesome results to traditional "legacy" industries. High tech in the agricultural sector is radically transforming what we think of as a bucolic, hardly changing endeavor into a truly cutting-edge one with vast increases in productivity. Even as populations grow, food harvests are increasing at a far faster pace.
Fully robotic milkers could be the investment that might rescue Japan, which is struggling to deal with its declining population. There is a problem even with those who are still working: They are only about two-thirds as productive as Americans, on average. Agriculture is at the bottom of the heap, with the average American farmer producing 40 times as much as the average Japanese farmer.
China is seeking a lead in editing plant genes, potentially shifting the epicenter of the emerging agricultural technology toward the East. This stokes long-running worries in the US that the forefront of agricultural science could swing from the US Farm Belt to China, where the government has encouraged the development of large-scale, Western-style farming operations to boost domestic food production, and rely less on imports.
More than 80 percent of Nigeria’s farmers are smallholder farmers, and they account for the poorest 40 percent of the population. Hoping to use a range of tools to improve the livelihoods of smallholder farmers, a number of agri-tech startups have appeared in Nigeria. However, expanding digital solutions to smallholder farmers in Nigeria is often constrained by illiteracy, cultural barriers, and geography.