A roundup from the world of ag about cutting-edge technology in agriculture.
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An Ohio organic grain grower who once doubted driverless machines hosted a Fendt Harvest Tour stop where a grain cart with PTx OutRun autonomy ran beside the combine with nobody in the tractor. He now sees a place for it on big farms short of help, but says handing a costly tractor over to software takes real trust.
Earth Rover has begun shipping CLAWS, a solar-assisted field robot that uses cameras and AI to find weeds in onions, carrots and brassicas and kills them with brief pulses of concentrated light instead of chemicals. Ten units are sold, more are being built, and the company wants to adapt the design for cereals and oilseeds next.
A California Ag Tech Alliance webinar on The Mixing Bowl's 2026 crop robotics map counted more than 400 companies, up about a quarter since 2024, yet robotic fruit picking is still the hardest nut to crack. Panelists said autonomous tractors, precision sprayers and crop-care robots will reach orchards sooner, and urged growers to test machines on their own ground first.
French maker Naio has added a vegetable-transplanting tool to its small electric Oz robot, which was best known for mechanical weeding. Setting plants at exact spacing makes later weeding passes easier, and with more than 35 attachments and RTK field maps the robot can now seed, till, mow and haul produce, covering close to an acre a day on one charge.
A grape grower in Argentina's Río Negro valley describes an electric, AI-guided ground robot that travels vineyard and orchard rows applying sprays in fine droplets to cut water use. He shares rough prices of about $20,000 to $25,000 for the robots and $40,000 for a large drone, and suggests hiring custom service as a cheaper start. (Article in Spanish.)
Starting with the 2027 planting season, Sabanto's retrofit kit will let a tractor pull a planter fitted with Precision Planting's Gen 3 20|20 monitor with nobody in the cab. The 20|20 keeps handling seeding and rates row by row, and growers set how far a row can drift before the system pauses or sends an alert.
A University of Nebraska graduate researcher argues that an AI recommendation can be right and still be ignored if farmers don't trust it. Growers want proof it works on fields like theirs, a clear reason behind each suggestion and plain terms on who gets their data, so the piece calls for local on-farm testing and building tools with farmers from the start.
Researchers fed a deep-learning model with satellite readings of soybean canopies taken from different viewing angles, data that is usually smoothed away as error, plus plant fluorescence signals. Tested across 613 counties in 29 states, the approach improved county yield estimates and could help with forecasting, crop insurance and supply planning.
Agronomists from Texas A&M and Kansas State walk through where AI already helps, from soil mapping and crop management to plant breeding and self-driving equipment, and where it still falls short. Their bottom line: the models only earn their keep if they lead to better decisions in real fields, and they should be used openly and responsibly.
A look inside the University of Illinois AI institute for agriculture, where each project pairs an AI researcher with a crop or livestock scientist. Work ranges from CropWizard, a chatbot built on extension publications, to field plots scanned with lidar and hyperspectral cameras to learn how crops cope with changing conditions.
For dairy farmers, AI has long meant artificial insemination. This column traces that history in Ohio, from watching cows at the pasture gate to heat lists generated from cow activity monitors, and asks how much artificial intelligence can really add to mating decisions that already blend genomics, breeder expertise and the farmer's eye.
FarmerChat, a generative AI assistant from the nonprofit Digital Green, answers crop and livestock questions by text, voice or photo in more than 10 languages, aimed at smallholders in places like Kenya and India who rarely see an extension agent. The piece weighs its reported reach against open questions about how accurate the advice is and whether it actually improves farm results.
Venezuela is easing the restrictions that have limited farm drone use since 2025, opening the door to more spraying and crop monitoring from the air. Growers say the bigger hurdle is money: fertilizer and herbicide prices well above world levels and scarce bank credit make it hard to buy drones and the products they apply. (Article in Spanish.)
Embrapa researchers flew a drone 15 meters over Nelore steers in a Mato Grosso do Sul feedlot and used AI to compare each animal's width to its length as it filled out. Over a 112-day trial the system spotted when weight gain was leveling off about a week earlier than usual management, saving feed money without running cattle through the chute.
Estonian law now allows crop-protection products to be applied from the air under strict conditions, and farmers got hands-on drone training at a rural knowledge center open day. Spot-spraying a thistle patch instead of a whole field is one draw, but only a short list of products is approved for aerial use so far.
At a UC drone workshop at the Kearney center in California, specialists walked growers through what farm drones can do, from scanning about 2,000 acres in a day to spraying and releasing beneficial insects, and what can go wrong. They also explained the FCC limits on certain foreign drones: existing aircraft can keep flying, but parts, upgrades and new models may get harder to find.
Paraná has put 11 spray drones on the school farms of its state agricultural high schools, giving about 4,800 students hands-on training in flight planning, mapping and spot applications of crop inputs on soybeans, corn, wheat, beans and pasture. The roughly R$1.6 million purchase was funded largely by Audi do Brasil through a state incentive program. (Article in Portuguese.)
At a farm expo in General Belgrano, an Argentine drone dealer said roughly 3,000 ag drones were working the country's fields in March and the market could eventually reach 30,000. He warned that anyone can buy one and start custom spraying, so pilot training, ANAC certification and working alongside a licensed agronomist matter. (Article in Spanish.)
A university network that studies Brazil's family farms is launching a free online data portal on Nov. 3 that pulls farm census, Pronaf credit and family-farm registry figures into one easy-to-use place. Automated maps are promised within two months and interactive maps in 2027. (Article in Portuguese.)
FarmQA explains its renamed lineup: QA Advisor for agronomists and retailers, and the QA Farmer phone app for growers. The idea is to keep scouting notes, soil tests, imagery, prescriptions and application records in one place, so advice reaches the grower and each season's history informs the next. (Company post.)
Eva Live, a Las Vegas AI company with a defense-drone background, announced EvaFarmSight, web software meant to turn imagery from fixed-wing VTOL drones into crop-health findings, treatment zones and flight plans. The company release describes several features as current or planned and says it is still validating the platform with farm operators.
SAGE and broker Aon plan field-by-field crop insurance for corn and soybean growers in 15 states for the 2027 crop, pricing each field's risk from soil, weather, satellite and farm-management data. It is meant to sit on top of federal coverage, and lower-risk fields could see cheaper premiums for the extra protection.
Goiás state's animal and plant health agency has rebuilt its free Sidago Produtor Rural app for Android and iOS. Ranchers can now get an alert whenever cattle are moved on or off their place, send digital animal transport permits to truckers over WhatsApp, and report suspected violations with photos. (Article in Portuguese.)
Two hog-industry professionals in western Paraná have launched Portal do Suinocultor, a website where pig farms can list themselves, post and find jobs, buy and sell equipment, and take courses. It also offers Chico IA Agro, an AI assistant that answers questions on herd care, health, feeding and markets. (Article in Portuguese.)