AI Adoption in Agriculture
From the Ag Information Network, I’m Bob Larson. American agriculture is using more artificial intelligence than ever before, but adoption appears to be uneven.
The Purdue University/CME Group Ag Economy Barometer asked farmers for the first time about their rate of AI adoption.
Ag economist, Michael Langemeier says they asked what they thought the benefit was from AI and data-driven tools, and 52% said no benefit …
LANGEMEIER … “If you look at the choices in terms of improving their operation or benefiting their operation, we listed reducing labor, reducing risk or uncertainty, and increasing production. Of those three, 23% said it would increase production, and that was a higher percent than reducing labor or reducing risk and uncertainty.”
Langemeier takes that to mean they aren’t sure yet what the specific benefits of AI might be …
LANGEMEIER … “AI gets a lot of press these days, and a lot of times they're focusing on that labor, and so, we'd like to point out that only 14 percent thought that AI or data-driven tools was going to reduce labor. We're going to ask this question down the road again, periodically, to see if these answers change in the future, and I think they will. I think there'll be a higher percent that believe these tools are going to benefit their operation.”
Langemeier says there's going to be a learning curve with these data-driven tools.
