Abu Dhabi: The deputy chairman of the Presidential Court for Development and Fallen Heroes’ Affairs, Sheikh Theyab bin Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, has attended the most recent Majlis Mohamed bin Zayed lecture on “Sustainable Agriculture at Scale.”
The speaker at the Majlis event in the Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque in Abu Dhabi was Sebastien Boyer, the chairman and co-founder of FarmWise, an agritech company.
Throughout his session, Boyer talked about the difficulties that modern farmers face and how technological advancement will be essential to the agricultural sector’s evolution and sustainability to feed the world’s expanding population.
Boyer described how the availability and usage of four essential resources—land, water, labor, and artificially created fertilizers—are critical to agriculture. His company, which specializes in building precise farming technology, uses robots and artificial intelligence to boost production and profitability.
Then, he talked about the efforts of several firms using cutting-edge technology to lessen dependency on these resources; these included businesses making lab-grown chicken flesh and self-driving electric tractors.
Speaking about the adoption of the newest agricultural technology, Boyer clarified that farmers are frequently hesitant to abandon their traditional practices because many of these advances are still unaffordable or need more work to become economically viable.
To increase food security and ensure a resilient and sustainable future, the UAE continues to prioritize efforts to modernize its agricultural sector. As a result, an increasing number of agritech companies are based in the nation, utilizing cutting-edge technology to produce food that is grown locally.
Laila Abdullatif, Director-General, Emirates Nature-WWF, moderated the talk, which included pre-recorded remarks from Sky Kurtz, Co-founder and CEO of Pure Harvest Smart Farms, Khaled Al Blooshi, Plant Development Lead Engineer, Abu Dhabi Agriculture and Food Safety Authority, and Maitha Al Hameli, Section Head, Marine Assessment and Conservation, Environment Agency-Abu Dhabi.