The agricultural sector is going through enormous challenges these days. Such challenges will have important social and economic effects in the years to come, as the population grows in the scale of billions, and the world looks for new solutions to feed itself.
One way to address these issues could be using agricultural technologies (AgriTech) tools for making food production ‘smarter’ and creating data-driven food chains, intending to improve yield, efficiency and profitability of agriculture in general. AgriTech tools can be products, services or applications derived from agriculture that improve various input/output processes concerning the food chain. Thanks to Artificial Intelligence, drones, 5G, blockchain, the Internet of Things (IoT) and big data analytics, this is already happening in many parts of the world, as the concept of industry 4.0 spreads, although the scale of this disruption will be much bigger in the future.
The current status of AgriTech development was discussed at StrategEast.Live panel discussion “AgriTech and Smart Farming in Eurasia”.
Marat Beksultanov, Director, AgriTech Hub Kazakhstan told about factors that influence effective farming. “First comes the efficiency of irrigation system, so that farmers are supplying enough water to different plants, not underwatering or overwatering them. Second, yields productivity. There are areas that consume much water and produce low yields. So the question to policymakers is: do we keep subsidizing these poor farmer practices? Or the subsidize policy should be revised, and more effective farmers should be encouraged? International financial institutions should look into farmers’ performance to make decisions on subsidies.”
Yuriy Petruk, Head of the Board, AgTech Ukraine shared his experience in precision agriculture: “I’ve been in the industry since 2008 and can say that it has undergone some evolution since then. During the last 5 years, we were pushing this growth forward and now we have some results. The drivers of precision agriculture in Ukraine are either big agro holdings or medium-sized companies with sufficient financing for technologies adoption. Most popular technologies are those that pay off within 2-3 years like GPS tracking and control of fuel consumption.”
“For 17 years, our company has been operating as the country’s largest agro-oriented online platform, says Zikrillo Akhror-Murod, Head of Marketing, RealSoft LLC, Uzbekistan. “If earlier we worked only for the state, now we are gradually moving to a private, market-oriented company, transforming our Smart Agro platform from local to global. We enter foreign markets – Estonia, Belarus, other countries of Eurasia.”
“Compared to other actors present here, Moldova is a very small country,“ says Mary Nemciuc, Ecosystem Builder, Tekwill | Startup Moldova. “Our agricultural company is built on small farmers; therefore, technological solutions that are suitable for small entrepreneurs are important for us. Moldovan startups are also looking for such solutions. It is important to note international partners, primarily USAID regularly support the development of our startups. With their help, during the pandemic, we launched the Digital Impact program, which offered many interesting solutions.”
The panel discussion was moderated by Kateryna Poberezhna, Agribusiness Project Manager at EBRD.