Listen to this article
The Augmenta Field Analyzer on CNH’s sprayers uses CVML and AI to translate camera images into agronomic insights to fine-tune formulations and deliver variable-rate spraying in real time. Weed identification capabilities are also in development. | Source: Brianna Wessling
According to the Agriculture Bureau, one American farm alone can feed an average of 166 people per year, both domestic and international. Every day, we eat fruits and vegetables that are grown on a farm somewhere in the world.
According to the USDA’s 2022 Agriculture Census, there are 1.9 million farms nationwide, 95% of which are operated by individuals, family partnerships or family-owned businesses. Despite our clear reliance on these farms, they are facing a labor shortage.
In Kansas alone, a study by Kansas State University and the Kansas Farm Bureau found that between 5,627 and 15,873 jobs were unfilled across 72 agriculture and agriculture-related sectors.
Farmers are no stranger to technology, but this labor shortage is forcing them to automate more of their operations. CNH has over 180 years of experience working with farmers and now provides automated equipment to make farms more efficient and improve farmers’ lives. The company makes equipment for all crops in all climates.
“CNH and [agriculture] “We’re one of the few companies that actually serves almost every type of agricultural region around the world,” Mark Karmish, CNH’s chief digital and information officer, told Robot Report.
The company invited Robot Report to its Raven Innovation Center in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, to get an up-close look at some of this equipment. Located in the heart of the Great Plains, the facility is a space where the team can test the equipment and show it off to customers.
“As we develop advanced robotics here, we’re always asking ourselves, ‘How can we make the technology cheaper, more affordable and more marketable in different countries?'” Karmish said.
Register now and start saving.
What is preventing automation in agriculture?
Although more automation is badly needed in agriculture, there are still several challenges that impede its adoption. For one, Karmish points out that farmers operate on slim margins and are constantly striving to make more with each crop cycle. Farmers place a lot of trust in robotics developers to introduce new equipment into their operations, because one lost harvest can put the entire operation at risk.
“Another challenge is that in most parts of the world, people only grow crops once a year, so think about testing an autonomous tractor,” Karmish says. “To test any advanced technology, computer vision or machine learning, you have to wait until the crop is harvested, and then the cycle repeats, so it may take two growing seasons to fully validate. So the cycle of change and technology for farmers is a little longer than other applications in other industries.”
“So one of the ways we manage our validation testing cycle is we have 200 acres here, and this is all a test farm where we grow crops,” he said. “Even when we’re not growing crops, we’re running simulations on-site.”
At its Raven Innovation Center, CNH showed off three technologies that automate different parts of the crop cycle.
CNH helps farmers prepare for a successful crop cycle
“Every agricultural cycle generally involves preparing the soil, then planting the soil, and then watching the crop grow,” Carmish explains. “Then you harvest, and then you usually prepare the land for winter after the harvest. Some farmers plant winter crops that improve the soil health, while others do tillage or apply fertilizer and other organic matter to keep the land healthy.”
While a typical North American crop cycle may seem to begin in the spring, with farmers typically planting up to 10,000 acres of crops over a two- to three-week period, meticulous planning for the growing season actually begins much earlier.
“In the winter, [the farmers] “We take all the data that comes from the tractors and partner with agronomists,” Karmish says. “They ask, ‘What did you plant last year? How much moisture did you get from the field or the environment to grow your crops? What were the pests? What were the weeds that affected growth and yield? What was the yield at harvest?'”
Planting variations include seed spacing and depth, fertilizer needed for each plant, soil moisture levels, etc. CNH offers Soil Command, which allows farmers to decide how much soil to turn and at what depth to the tenth of an inch, automating the field preparation process and better managing soil variations across a field.
In winter, after the harvest, farmers typically till their fields in preparation for the next year’s crop. Turning the soil loosens it and makes it easier to plant new seeds. For this task, CNH showed me their automated tilling system.
The first thing that impressed me about the system was the ease of the interface, and this is true of all of the CNH technology I’ve seen: With just a few clicks, the CNH team can input the parameters of the field to be tilled and the direction in which the equipment should move.
Once the tillage specifications have been entered, the automatic tiller will sound a horn before setting off, letting everyone in the field know the machine is about to move. Although there is usually no one in the field while the tiller is moving, the system is constantly monitoring its path for obstacles. If a person approaches the system, it will slow down, and if they get too close it will stop completely.
Cultivators are large, sturdy machines, but they are also very sensitive. Cost savings for farmers also include reduced maintenance costs, which decrease if the system breaks down less frequently. To ensure this, the system can detect when it hits something that is too big for it to handle, such as a rock on the ground. When it detects something like this, it stops and alerts the user to the problem.
Carmish said CNH’s tillage products will have a limited launch next year, with a full launch planned for 2026. The company is currently conducting tests with customers to ensure the technology is ready for commercial launch.
“So we’re looking at doing between 5,000 and 10,000 hours of tillage on our customers’ land this year,” Carmish said.
After planting, the focus shifts to protecting the crop.
Once planting is complete, North American farmers spend the summer protecting their crops from pests and allowing them to grow. At this stage in the cycle, CNH showed us the Augmenta field analyzer and automated sprayer.
“We have a new technology called AugMenta that determines the health of plants,” Karmish says, “which helps us determine what, where and how much we need to spray.”
The technology helps farmers ensure that each plant receives only the amount of fertilizer it needs. At the beginning of the season, before crops have even sprouted, Augmenta searches the soil around the plants for weeds — essentially anything green hiding in the brown soil, Karmish said.
The system isn’t fully operational yet, but eventually it will be able to continue to identify weeds as the crop grows, in a process called “green-on-green identification,” he said.
In the field, CNH’s precision spraying technology uses Augmenta to treat each crop. The sprayer can travel at 20 miles (32 km) per hour and the boom can be up to 120 feet (36.5 m) wide. The boom is equipped with cameras, sensors and adjustable spray nozzles that allow the sprayer to see the ground, get information and decide how much to spray.
“It’s vision-based, so it can identify the row, ensure it’s spraying within the row and minimize the impact of spraying,” Carmicic said. “It also has variable-flow nozzle control that determines the amount of spray applied.”
Identifying weeds varies greatly depending on where a farm is located. In North America, there are about a dozen different weed species. But in Brazil, the number is closer to 300, Carmish says.
“So these algorithms need to be built specifically based on region,” he said.
CNH automates the hard parts of harvesting
Harvesting is a crucial time for farmers. Like sowing, farmers have a very short window in which to harvest their crops, and determining the best time can be a challenge in itself.
Karmish said many Midwest farmers need to wait as long as possible for their crops to dry out so they don’t spoil during processing.
“Drying plants in the sun makes them more efficient to process,” he says. “This is especially true for corn, wheat and soybeans, but it’s obviously different for fruit.”
The challenge continues when the actual harvest begins. Row crops like corn and wheat are harvested using a combine harvester, which cuts the crops. To harvest as much as possible, it’s important to keep the combine running all day, which means the combine needs a separate area to put the harvested crops.
To run a combine, farmers typically drive a cart next to it to receive the produce the combine will process. Without automation, this process involves two workers: one in the combine and one in the cart, communicating via radio and doing their best to perfectly align the equipment.
If the cart goes too fast or too slow, it won’t catch all the produce, and if the cart goes off track and hits a combine, farmers could face expensive repair bills and a total shutdown of operations.
CNH simplifies this difficult process by automating carts and using technology to ensure equipment is always in the correct position.
