GPS World: Agriculture Robots Market Projected to Reach US$5.7 Billion by 2024

Need to feed a growing global population, along with urban migration and less land dedicated to agriculture, is pushing development of robots for the agriculture industry. Companies in Asia, North America and Europe are developing the robots for precision farming, and these “include UAVs, driverless tractors, automated harvesting machines and more,” reports GPS World, based on a Transparency Market Report. So far, the robots are not multi-taskers: “This results in the requirement of multiple robot types in a single farm in order to completely automate the process, which is a serious financial burden to consider. The scope of utility in the global agriculture robots market is thus limiting the overall customer pool, which is already thinned out by the heavy investments required in installation and maintenance of single function robots.” The machines rely on intricate sensors to assess plants, apply needed chemicals and move equipment around fields. – YaleGlobal.