Government announced funding for development of robots and automated systems that can plant, tend and harvest crops
New farming minister Stephen Morgan has announced £20m for the development of robots and other systems to help the country’s farmers, especially at busy times of year.
Photo by ThisisEngineering / Unsplash
It’s hoped that the extra money made available to the government’s farming innovation programme will help to fast-track the development of tech that can handle a range of tasks from planting seeds to picking fruit, easing pressure on farms that struggle to find enough seasonal workers at harvest time.
As we’ve discussed before, the automation of these kinds of task are extremely challenging. Take apple-picking, for example. Human apple-pickers need good ‘dual manual dexterity’ and hand/eye co-ordination, so they pick only the ripe fruit, at speed, without bruising it.
‘I need pickers who can pick with both hands [at the same time], pick 10 or 15 apples a minute and grade them [while doing so],’ Ali Capper from Stocks Farm in Worcester told a House of Lords select committee in 2023. ‘You do not just pick anything in front of you.’
Any automated system also needs to be able to do this on uneven ground in changing weather conditions and light levels, and for perhaps no more than two weeks per year on any given site.
Even so, innovative agri-businesses are rising to the challenge. For example, Fieldwork Robotics has developed a raspberry-picking robot and, with the help of government funding, is now making it tougher and more reliable so that it can be rolled out commercially.
The £20m earmarked for robot and automated tech is part of an additional £53m in the farming innovation programme, bringing the total funding available this year to £123. The programme is delivered in partnership with Innovate UK.
Applications are now open through the government’s innovation funding service.
Stephen Morgan MP, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, says: ‘Farmers work incredibly hard to put food on our tables, often battling to find enough seasonal workers when the pressure is on. This funding will help put cutting-edge robots and technology into their hands, easing that burden while boosting yields and profits.
‘It’s a vote of confidence in British ingenuity, and a big step towards the kind of modern, resilient farming we set out in our farming Roadmap.’
Chris Danks, Head of Agrifood at Innovate UK, adds: ‘Robotics and automation are becoming increasingly important tools to help farmers improve productivity and build more resilient businesses. Working in partnership with Defra, we’re supporting businesses, researchers and farmers to work together to develop technologies that address real-world challenges across agriculture.
‘This competition will help accelerate innovations from concept to on-farm application, supporting solutions that can improve productivity, sustainability and resilience across the sector.’
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