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Statistics show that 811 million people around the world suffered from hunger last year. Since the pandemic hit, food sustainability has become an even bigger challenge.
The Decline of Global Agricultural
There are millions of farms worldwide responsible for food production. The problem is, only a small percentage of them get enough funding and support to grow and distribute food. Subsequently, the smaller farms struggle to produce enough food to even support their community.
Food insecurity comes from more than one agricultural problem. Common food security hindrances include:
-Poor soil quality
-Generations of unsustainable farming solutions
-Lack of agricultural technology
These issues have a large impact on small and medium-sized farms. Luckily, there are AI companies dedicated to finding solutions to bridge the gap.
How Artificial Intelligence Can Reduce World Hunger
International AI companies are taking action to increase agricultural productivity. Agronomists, policymakers, biologists, and several other field leaders formed a united front to create the most efficient technology to help the farmers solve farm production-related hindrances including:
Drastic Waste Reduction
Did you know that up to 50 percent of crops don’t even make it to your table? Tomatoes that may not look salad-ready often find themselves in the trash. With the right technology, farmers can optimize the function of the majority of their crops. The less-than-perfect tomatoes can be used in purees or ketchup.
Crop Cultivation
Researchers spend countless hours finding the best characteristic to cultivate the perfect crop. Data concerning everything from which seeds yield the most produce and nutritional value to how well they resist disease is used in the plant breeding process. From there, seeds can be planted and transformed into nutritional meals for everyone.
Proper Herbicide Use
From now on, you don’t have to spray herbicides on your crops and hope for the best. Experts are developing technology that can tell the difference between healthy crops and weeds. Their database contains thousands of premature plants and can determine which ones to spray immediately. This drops herbicide-related waste to an estimated ten percent.
Disease Detection
Depending on how large your farm is and how much help you have, you may be unaware of diseased plants. Oftentimes, farmers find out once their crops begin dying in large numbers. This can occur from the tips of the leaves and spread towards the roots and vice versa. Pathogens can also spread from one to a multitude of diseased plants. When detected early enough, you have a greater chance of saving damaged plants. Currently, technology that teaches farmers how to detect and nullify the threat so plants can thrive.
Potential Crisis Detection
It’s safe to say the environment is in crisis. A lot of the challenges various ecosystems face are the result of human decisions. Additional premature extinction variables include:
-Climate change
-Pollution
-Overharvesting
On top of the conditions caused by human error, there are naturally occurring factors that impede on plant success that are harder to influence. For instance, you may live in an area that is experiencing a series of droughts. Planting seeds that won’t cultivate healthy crops can be frustrating and very expensive.
Struggling farmers have even fewer resources to invest in failing crops. Luckily, there are farm-related technology companies working on machines that can predict the probability of future storms and conditions that damage plants. Machines combine recent data patterns with machine recognition to estimate the chances of a healthy harvest. If a crisis is highly probable, farmers can opt-out of planting seeds within that season. In one instance, almost 200 farmers using this technology decided not to plant seeds that would otherwise yield little to no healthy crops and saved significant amounts of money.
Accurate Data Analysis
There are programmers and tech geniuses around the world challenging themselves to create the perfect agricultural experience for everyone. Part of their efforts surround finding the most efficient way of gathering data via sensors. These sensors detect soil conditions as well as troubleshooting techniques for greater harvests. As this agricultural technology evolves, growing a healthy crop will become second nature, bringing the world one step closer to ending world hunger. The world is stronger when humans have regular access to nutritious meals. Using AI, the small and medium-sized farms responsible for the majority of the food will have an easier time successfully cultivating crops. With hundreds of millions of people unsure of where their next meal will come from, the agricultural advancements in technology can be the key to global food security.
