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Shining Light on Farm & Food Policy for 20 Years.
Saturday, March 01, 2025
A House bill introduced Thursday would address one of the top farm bill goals for specialty crop growers by setting up a grant program to ease the cost of adopting automation in their operations.
Specialty crop growers anticipate labor costs, which already represent more than 50% of their production costs, to grow 10-30% over the next three to five years. They’re increasingly turning to automation as a solution, according to a new specialty crop automation report released by the Western Growers.
Sunshine State growers are looking to the upcoming farm bill to get help with automation, an issue they raised several times Monday at a House Ag Committee listening session in Newberry, Florida.
Specialty crop producers are looking to the next farm bill to expand crop insurance options and provide increased funding to address a number of challenges facing the sector, including needs for automation and development of new, safer pesticides.
Farm equipment manufacturer John Deere announced the creation of a fully autonomous tractor that it plans to make available to farmers later this year at the Consumer Technology Association conference in Las Vegas on Tuesday.
John Deere announced Thursday that it bought Silicon Valley startup Bear Flag Robotics for $250 million, the company’s latest attempt to further develop its autonomous technology.
The intersection of increasing labor shortages, higher pay for agricultural workers, and new attention to employee safety is highlighting efforts to bring labor-saving technologies to specialty crop fields.
Editor's note: This is the third in our seven-part in-depth editorial series where we look ahead at “Farm & Food 2040.” Part three looks at how the failure to pass meaningful immigration reform is fueling adoption of the newest technologies in automation—primarily robotics—to stem the need for immigrant farmworkers. And we also feature new research identifying the "Farmer of the Future."
WASHINGTON, Feb. 22, 2017 - In a display of both pop music talent and robotics advancement, Lady GaGa opened her flashy Super Bowl half-time show last month singing God Bless America while a computer choreographed 300 drones with red, white and blue LED lights in the sky to form a U.S. flag.
