Chapter 7: Precision agriculture

It’s not just water demands that are increasing: some projections suggest that a 70 percent increase in food production will be required to feed a global population of 10 billion. And yet increasing food production will put further strain on our limited water resources.

“Water” and “agriculture” have been used as high-level categories that suggest two separate industries and sectors but this picture no longer bears much relation to reality. With agriculture accounting for 70 percent of water consumption, it’s clear that changes must be made in our crop fields.

The market for precision agriculture is growing, with industry leaders using sensors, data-driven software modelling and imaging to manage their crops. We are seeing the emergence of enterprise software for farm management, and the market for software alone is projected by some analysts to grow to $1.77 billion USD by 2020.

Systemic innovation, ecosystem design and engineering, may in fact feed our world.