Agritech is experiencing significant growth in the Asia Pacific area, which is home to more than half of the world’s population but just one-fifth of its agricultural land. Only 9% of farmers in Asia currently utilize or intend to employ agritech products, nevertheless.
This expansion is being fueled by factors like rising food production demand, a shortage of arable land, and falling water levels. Farmers like innovation because it can maximize profits and reduce financial risk. Data provides the foundation for scaling innovation across the agriculture sector, according to Microsoft, which believes that the sector is at a tipping point.
Seeds of Change
By 2050, data-driven agriculture solutions can reduce agricultural and food losses while increasing farm production by 67%. Through its collaboration with Project FarmBeats, Microsoft is creating the Azure Data Manager for Agriculture service, facilitating access to farm data to enhance farming practices.
With the use of this technology, farmers may raise yields and boost sustainability by making data-driven decisions. Due to a lack of expertise and high costs, the agritech adoption sector confronts difficulties, especially in low-to-middle-income nations like Asia. Over 80% of food consumed is produced by smallholder farmers, who bear the majority of the risk in the agricultural supply chain.
- Asia Pacific agritech growth slows, 9% of farmers use products.
- Microsoft‘s Azure Data Manager for Agriculture aims to reduce losses and boost production.
- Digital transformation reduces risk by consolidating farm data with Azure Data Manager.
The risk can be reduced by moving it from farmers to agriculture service providers thanks to digital transformation. The Azure Data Manager for Agriculture, which Microsoft has released, enables the consolidation of farm data from many sources.
To promote agriculture innovation in academia and business, Microsoft Research is developing toolkits and AI models in Microsoft Open Source. AI has the potential to revolutionize the agritech industry by enabling farmers to collect precise data and provide more accurate reports on their environmental progress.
Affordable internet-connected sensors with cloud, AI, and machine learning capabilities can help farmers collect and monitor operational data while using precision agriculture predictions to increase productivity and conserve resources.
AI can assist farmers with sustainable farming practices by increasing output and decreasing waste. Farmers may make informed choices about planting, watering, and harvesting crops by analyzing data from a variety of sources, such as weather patterns, soil characteristics, and crop yields.
As a result, items are generated more effectively during harvest and with less negative influence on the environment. An Indian agricultural business named BharatAgri uses Azure Data Manager for Agriculture to streamline operations while lowering crop losses on more than 100,000 acres of land.
