Automated harvests and six-legged livestock on the horizon?

SMALL robots could be used for precision delivery of pesticides and harvesting of crops to make farming more efficient in the future, experts have said.

Technology could cut down on use of chemicals and selectively harvest food such as lettuces only when they are ready, to prevent crops being wasted in the fields. It could even replace cheap labour which might be lost in the UK post-Brexit.

With the model of using broadspectrum toxic pesticides – which have an impact on non-target species – “already broken”, there is a need to find resilient new crop varieties and biological ways of controlling pests, the scientists suggested.

But artificial meat may still not be making the grade decades from now, as livestock are more resource-efficient and can be reared on land that cannot be used for agricultural crops. However, “insect protein” could be on the rise.

Researchers are also using data to enhance genetic traits in animals to tackle issues such as the environmental footprint of meat and dairy production by improving the health of livestock and how much they need to eat to produce the yield.

The panel of scientists were discussing how big data, new technologies and advanced methods could drive a step-change in how food is produced sustainably while still feeding the world.

Professor Simon Blackmore, head of agricultural robotics at Harper Adams University in Shropshire and director of the National Centre for Precision Farming, said he wanted to see motorbike-sized robots in the fields as early as 2020.

The robots, which could retail at around £20,000, would farm crops efficiently, reducing the use of chemicals, boosting yields and allowing more cost-effective production in smaller fields.

Toby Bruce, professor of insect chemical ecology at Keele University in Staffordshire, said many chemical pesticides farmers relied on in recent decades were no longer available because insects and weeds had become resistant to them, or because they had been banned because of their environmental impact.

In some cases, resistant varieties of crop could be found, such as wheat, where 60% of the UK’s crop is now resistant to orange wheat blossom midge, the pesticide for which has recently been withdrawn.

Scientists are developing other measures such as sensitive pheromone traps to see if pests are present, reducing unnecessary spraying, and biological measures including creating strips of habitat along field edges to encourage the natural enemies of pests.