In the heart of California, where Hollywood’s glamour and Silicon Valley’s tech prowess often steal the spotlight, a quieter revolution is taking root. The Golden State’s vast farmlands, particularly in the Central Valley, are embracing technology to transform the agricultural landscape. This week, we delve into “Agtech Valley,” exploring how innovation is reshaping the way we grow our food.
The Central Valley, often dubbed the “food basket of America,” is a powerhouse of agricultural production, yielding a significant portion of the country’s fruits, nuts, and vegetables. At HMC Farms in Fresno, farm manager Drew Ketelsen is at the forefront of this technological shift. His orchards of Lady Erin yellow peach trees are a testament to this change, trained to grow in narrow, upright pillars to optimize sunlight and facilitate labor efficiency.
Ketelsen’s approach is not just about efficiency and cost-saving; it’s about sustainability and adapting to the future. He’s testing semi-automated platforms that navigate through orchard rows, aiding in fruit thinning and harvesting. These platforms, with workers harnessed onto them, are designed to make jobs easier and better, not to replace human workers. “The hardest part for technology is to see the fruit,” Ketelsen explains. “People are so good at what they do, and we’re just trying to make these jobs easier and better for them.”
This blend of human expertise and technological innovation is creating new, better-paying jobs, attracting a new generation to revolutionize agriculture. Ketelsen envisions a future where technology and human labor coexist, with drones assisting in harvest and non-invasive sensors predicting harvest timing with precision.
In his fabrication shop, Ketelsen showcases an old tractor retrofitted with smart cameras, reminiscent of the beloved robot Johnny Five from the movie “Short Circuit.” These cameras collect field data, feeding machine learning algorithms to help farmers plan for the future. This future is uncertain, with climate change and labor challenges looming large. However, technology like artificial intelligence can help farmers navigate these uncertainties.
The push for innovation is not just coming from individual farms. The nonprofit F3, or Farms Food Future, is working to make California’s Central Valley a hub for agricultural technology. With a federal grant of $65 million from the 2021 American Rescue Plan, F3 is building infrastructure and partnerships to advance global agtech and food production. Priscilla Koepke, CEO of F3, believes that this is just the beginning. “I think we’re only just at a point now of having even more fuel to keep going, and to do it at another scale, truly,” she says.
As we continue our series on California’s Agtech Valley, we’ll explore how farmworkers fit into this innovative future. The implications are clear: technology is not just changing the way we farm; it’s ensuring that we can continue to farm in a sustainable, efficient, and labor-friendly way. As Ketelsen puts it, “It’s not just about replacing jobs. It’s about making jobs better, and it’s about allowing us to keep these jobs that have a lot of labor needs in business.”