agricultural technology Archives - Manitoba Co-operator

Today’s farmers are living in the age of digital agriculture: Do you know where your data vulnerabilities are?

Farm risk management includes cybersecurity

Data breaches in agriculture and agri-food sectors require farmers to consider digital defences

By Diana Martin, Janelle Rudolph May 30, 2024

Farming involves risk. There’s all manner of weather to deal with, plus shifting markets, crop and animal diseases and unexpected production hurdles. In response, farmers cover their acres with crop insurance, buy policies to protect against livestock price volatility and work feed options into their forage and marketing plans, among other safeguards. But even with

“This technology is coming — it’s here already, and it’s moving really fast.” – Reg Dyck.

News

KAP to lobby PMRA to broaden drone-spraying regulations

Biofuels, spray drones and the Canada Grain Act — KAP sets its lobbying goals for 2024

By Don Norman February 1, 2024

Keystone Agricultural Producers (KAP) is looking to broaden Pest Management Regulatory Agency (PMRA) rules surrounding drones in research. Currently, the PMRA mandates that drones can only be used for spraying herbicides and pesticides if that usage is clearly displayed on the product label. The problem is that very few product labels have been amended and

Around four-fifths of the land used for human food production is allocated to meat and dairy...

Comment, Op/Ed

Comment: Back to nature

In a century we may need 80 per cent fewer acres to feed the world – if the technology pans out

By Chris D. Thomas, Jack Hatfield, Katie Noble December 21, 2022

Here’s the basic problem for conservation at a global level: food production, biodiversity and carbon storage in ecosystems are competing for the same land. As humans demand more food, more forests and other natural ecosystems are cleared, and farms intensify and become less hospitable to many wild animals and plants. Therefore global conservation, currently focused

The back side of a standard New Holland boom retrofitted with the WEED-IT Quadro. Retailer Croplands Equipment sells the Quadro in either a retrofit kit which allows it to be installed on most types of existing sprayer booms or as a120-foot Millennium boom.

Equipment, News, Other

Smart sprayer tech developing quickly

This technology isn’t quite a done deal yet, but it’s now more science fact than fiction

By Jeff Melchior May 29, 2020

Producers have been hearing about weed-targeting spot-spraying sensors for some time, but it’s always seemed to be the stuff of science fiction. In some cases, however, the future is now while in others it’s coming quickly — it all depends on the type of sensor tech you’re interested in. Well-known spraying expert Tom Wolf separates precision spot-spraying tech into

Farmit Manitoba, Other

VIDEO: Coding camp for kids aimed at building interest in ag tech

By Greg Berg March 2, 2020

Teresa Vallotton of FarmFemmes is aiming to pique the interest of kids for future careers in agricultural technology. Vallotten’s “AI in a Day” coding camp sessions recently held at Manitoba Ag Days in Brandon gave kids a quick introduction to artificial intelligence (AI) and allowed them to play around with aspects of the technology. Here,

Investing in increasingly larger equipment to cover ever-expanding acreages might have run its course in Prairie agriculture.

Crops, News

Scaling up precision decision-making could shrink Prairie fields

Equipment designed for large uniform fields is poorly suited to variable-rate applications to zones within a field

By Laura Rance-Unger December 17, 2019

When Terry Aberhart scans the Prairie horizon for ways precision technology can make his family’s Saskatchewan farm more profitable, he sees something big and cumbersome blocking his view. “One of the biggest challenges we have is the size of our equipment,” the award-winning agronomy coach and founder of the consulting firm Sure Growth Technologies said.

Opinion, Other

Opinion: The long, sustainable view

High inputs (and high costs) have passed most of the value of farm production back to input companies

By Alan Guebert April 24, 2018

Who knew that the best view of 21st-century agriculture would be from Darrin Qualman’s farm office near Dundurn, Saskatchewan? And yet, there it is, charted by Qualman, a data bloodhound who thinks graphically but writes plainly. The longtime researcher for Canada’s National Farmers Union appeared on my radar in Feb. 2017 with a blog post

Editorial, Opinion

Editorial: Eliminating sex from agriculture

By Laura Rance-Unger October 13, 2016

There’s no denying that a talk called “Eliminating sex from agriculture to feed the world” is a sexy subject at a writers’ convention. So Tim Sharbel, the research chair in seed biology at the Global Institute for Food Security in Saskatoon, had his audience’s full attention at the recent Canadian Farm Writers Federation annual meeting.

Crops

Monsanto, Microsoft to invest in ag technology in Brazil

By GFM Network News, Reuters July 5, 2016

Sao Paulo | Reuters — U.S. biotech company Monsanto and U.S. software and tech firm Microsoft announced on Monday a partnership to invest in agricultural technology startups in Brazil. Monsanto will join a Brazilian investment fund with up to 300 million reais (C$118 million), managed by Microsoft, evaluating ideas for new digital tools to be

News

Agricultural technology investment soars

Market turbulence or not, North American investors are plowing into farm technology

By Carey Gillam, Rod Nickel October 7, 2015

North American investors are pouring money into agriculture technology despite turbulent financial and commodity markets, as cutting-edge advances that enhance farm production bring opportunities for profits. Investment in this technology, which spans plant and soil technology to drones, amounted to $2.06 billion in the first half of 2015, on pace to smash last year’s record

Daily Network News

China lifts Brazilian poultry imports ban over bird flu

U.S. livestock: Cattle futures slow descent

U.S. grains: Soybeans, wheat plummet from highs on limited Chinese demand

Tag Archives agricultural technology