Assistive Robots in Agriculture

Agriculture is one of the most critical aspects of the development of the human race. It is essential to meet the growing demand for food, which can be attained with the help of technology. Robotics is rapidly evolving to support agricultural practices on and off the farm. This chapter provides an overview of how robots assist in agriculture. It surveys the research landscape and studies different agriculture levels at which robots help humans. The introduction discusses the types of robots with their sensor systems and how they assist. It also presents the motivation and challenges of using robotics in agriculture. Robots are helpful in crop monitoring and management, especially using remote sensing. Moreover, it may support ground-level agriculture processes like seeding, planting, health monitoring, and nutrient measurements. Section 5.2 covers the type and specifications of such robots. The robots have also been found to be extremely useful in harvesting operations like fruit picking with autonomous driving ability, and they are also valuable for packaging and managing the warehouse during storage. These aspects are covered in Sections 5.3 and 5.4. This chapter also examines the impact of robotics from economic, social, and environmental perspectives. It concludes by discussing the future and emerging technologies that may further help penetrate robotics in agriculture in Section 5.5 .