Food and Agriculture Sector in China Undergoing Tech Revolution

The rapid adoption of digitalization and robotics is making serious waves to amplify China’s status in the food and agtech sectors claims a leading regional investment expert.

FREMONT, CA: A major regional investment expert remarked on the rapid adoption of digitalization and robotics as it is generating serious waves in the food and agtech industries, enhancing China's standing. China is largely reliant on drones to monitor and even undertake plant activities such as spraying fertilizers and pesticides. The annual Future Food Asia Awards are organized by ID Capital, an investment and advising organization, and have served as a springboard for agrifood tech pioneers. Despite having thousands of years of food traditions, the emergence of food tech and agtech in China just began four to five years ago. Western-style foodservice and commerce fueled the renaissance, which saw the adoption of supply chain and machine processing techniques. For instance, the robots developed by Chinese companies prepare food at the push of a button.

The ample use of technology in agriculture is demonstrated by farmers deploying drones built for agriculture armed with visual recognition technology. Drones are employed in Yunnan as it proves to be an ideal location to cultivate lettuce and fruits. Temperatures range from 25 to 30 degrees Celsius (77 to 86 degrees Fahrenheit), and agriculture is located at high altitudes, ranging from 100 to 2,000 meters above sea level, which is ideal for plant development. Another implementation is the spraying of pesticides on tall apple trees. It can also be used on the soil, trunk, and branches in addition to crowns. China’s land-use policy had developed as well. The size of each smallholder farm varies from five to ten 'mu' (a Chinese unit of measurement equaling 666 sqm or 0.06ha). A few years ago, the chances of achieving the economies of scale required to deploy agtech were very limited.