Autonomous Tractors and Farmer-Free Farming

John Deere, one of the companies that has long been associated with the mechanization of farming and the world's second largest manufacturer of agricultural equipment, has now unveiled its latest game-changing farming technology with the revealing of its 8R autonomous tractor.

 

Here is the announcement from the John Deere website:

 

According to John Deere, the 8R is the first fully autonomous tractor.  The tractor has been in trial since 2018 and will now be released to farmers who will be able to rent the 8R until the company allows farmers to retrofit their existing sub-autonomous 8R tractors.    It is equipped with six pairs of stereo cameras which enable the tractor to detect obstacles over a. 360 degree horizon.  The images that are captured by the stereo cameras are passed through a deep neural network, the standard tool for solving computer vision issues using artificial intelligence techniques.  Each pixel that is captured by the cameras is classified in approximately 100 milliseconds and determines whether the tractor continues to move or stop if an obstacle is detected.  The 8R also checks its position relative to a geofence to ensure that it is operating where it is supposed to with an accuracy of less than one inch.

 

To use the 8R, farmers will transport the tractor to a field and, using John Deere Operations Center Mobile app, will be able to control and monitor the tractor using their mobile device. The app will also let the farmer control the tractor's speed, depth adjustments and other critical operations from the comfort of their couch or while they are busy with other tasks.  The first autonomous system will allow the farmer to till fields and additional tasks that could be undertaken without an onboard operator are currently under consideration.

  

Here is a video showing the 8R in operation:

 

According to John Deere, autonomous tractors have the potential to save farmers money by automating work that is now done by humans, an issue that is becoming increasingly problematic given the shortage of agricultural labourers.  That said, as car manufacturers like Tesla are finding, autonomous vehicles are not always functioning properly and John Deere's Chief Technology Officer, Jahmy Hindman has admitted that the 8R could have difficultly navigating on its own in snow and rain.  As well, the price of these tractors has not yet been released, however, with prices for its other farm equipment being stratospheric, it is likely that only the biggest farming operations (i.e. corporate farms) will be able to afford this technology.  With the list price of a base model 8R 410 (non-autonomous version) running at $517,548 (U.S. dollars), you can be assured that not every farmer in America and around the world will be purchasing the latest in John Deere's technological inventory.  To upgrade to the autonomous version, consumers will add the three camera equipment pods to the front and rear of the tractor and an Nvidia GPU to the 8R 410.  Hindman estimates that the cost for the automous version could add as much as 10 percent to the total cost of the 8R 410.

  

Nonetheless, this development is playing right into the hands of the largest owner of American farmland.  Not only is Bill Gates a self-proclaimed expert on vaccines and epidemics, he is also a "farmer".  John Deere's 8R autonomous tractor is, most definitely, Farmer Bill Gates' wet dream come true.  No need for farmers on a farm when you have a robot to do all of the dirty work for you!  Farmer-free farming here we come.