IMPACT OF FOURTH INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION IN AGRICULTURE

• By Admin
• 4th March, 2020

The fourth industrial revolution is the current and developing environment in which
disruptive technologies and trends such as the Internet of Things (IoT), robotics, virtual
reality (VR) and artificial intelligence (AI) are changing the way we live and work.
The third industrial revolution, sometimes called the digital revolution, involved the
development of computers and IT (Information Technology) since the middle of the 20th
century. The fourth industrial revolution is growing out of the third but is considered a
new era rather than a continuation because of the explosiveness of its development and
the disruptiveness of its technologies. According to Professor Klaus Schwab, Founder
and Executive Chairman of the World Economic Forum and author of The Fourth
Industrial Revolution, the new age is differentiated by the speed of technological
breakthroughs, the pervasiveness of scope and the tremendous impact of new systems.
The first industrial revolution, in the 18th and 19th centuries, involved a change from
mostly agrarian societies to greater industrialization as a consequence of the steam
engine and other technological developments. The next technological age, the second
industrial revolution, was driven by electricity and involved expansion of industries and
mass production as well as technological advances, labor was considered to be power,
as information in the third industrial.
The question will be, how will this industrial revolution affect farmers? The revolution will
spark new technological innovations in six areas: artificial intelligence, robotics, Internet
of things (IoT), unmanned vehicles, three-dimensional printing, and nanotechnology.
The 4IR will include a variety of new technologies that use big data to incorporate the
physical, biological, and digital worlds in a way that will affect all sectors of life.
The 4IR will become a new innovative division of life that will replace human intelligence
and wisdom, combining artificial intelligence with robotic technology as a substitute for
labor. Imagine your field being monitored by someone who knows when it will rain and
at which scale and at the same time knowing which seed will survive that environment.
It about profitability, yes profitability. Agriculture will not remain behind in this era. We
will see precision farming taking place. In Lesotho Marakeng System is developed as
the means to introduce farmers into 4IR and Block chain (Smart Contracts).
Accepting this reality, developed countries such as the USA and Japan are trying to
solve agricultural issues through mechanization, automation, and modernization. The
4IR will serve as the opportune time to accelerate the scale and commercialization of
agriculture.

In response to this trend, future agriculture is expected to evolve into high-tech
industries where systems are coupled with artificial intelligence and big data. The
systems will converge into a single unit in which farm machinery, seeding the soil, farm
management, production forecasting, and irrigation are combined. Using the core
technology of the 4IR, robots, big data, and AI will combine with agriculture to create a
new era of superfusion. The era will evolve multifaceted economic, social, and ethical
values fused with various industries and expressed in business models.
Visit www.marakeng.co.ls to have full article on the impact of 4IR.concluding this
article, farmers should know that 4IR technologies will have a significant impact on
weather-related problems. Agriculture is heavily affected by the weather, and currently
science has no means by which to accurately predict and control it. Hence, we say that
we are fellow farmers with God. For this reason, farming is highly dependent on
intelligence and wisdom, including human experience, and thus it is difficult to
standardize. 4IR technology can make decisions that surpass human wisdom and
experience. It will solve certain problems that cannot be solved with current technology,
such as livestock odors, the cost of too much processing, and the likelihood of pest
occurrence due to climate change. So, the 4IR can be seen as an “agro-friendly”
revolution, unlike the third revolution. At the same time, it will lead to greater
technological innovations and far-reaching changes throughout the economy, society,
and life.