Changing climate is influencing agricultural production global. This in turn is resulting in food shortges, as well as higher prices. That in turn will provide the impetus for food producers to invest in more inputs including seed, fertiliser, machinery and precision farming technologies.
These technologies will increasingly be space-based, including both Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS) but also increased use of remote sensing technologies that link high-resolution satellite imagery into farm vegetation management, leading to higher levels of sustainable food production, and overall planning strategies.
If 2010 is any indication of the future potential for further changing events, the years ahead will depend more on these management technologies as water management, disease, floods and a host of other food production risks arise. As fertiliser prices increase, the challenge to optimise their effectiveness and utilisation will also increase. It will take skill, investment -and luck – to reap the rewards of more intensive landscape management going forward.
