Waikato Times letter of the week #45

From the 7 January edition of the Waikato Times:

Drones future of farming

The future of modern farming holds more weather-control possibilities: low-flying or high-flying for fertiliser application or drought anticipation. Whatever the future holds, it will involve a new technique, the “Farming Drone”, to improve crop yield.For the first time in history, there is a real chance of greater weather control, from emptying rain-filled clouds before they are over the cold sea, either to download a cloud when there is too  much water on the ground causing floods, eg Bangladesh annually, or the dry Middle East. One are has too much water; the other, not enough. The potential of the farming drone will be in boosting food crops in countries where they are much-needed. Impossible thinking but they could be practical for the space programmes of tomorrow, such as Mars and Venus etc. 

New Zealand is a world leader in crop dusting and this complements modern farming techniques and has enormous potential because it is the best labour-saving machinery since the tractor. 

A new farming tool in waiting. 

KEN WELDON

Hamilton

I asked a friend who works at AgResearch if they had ever considered using drones to control the weather and stuff like that. She said, “No.”

Monitor: Joshua Drummond