Farming smarter with technology
The National Fieldays is an annual fixture in the farming calendar: it draws in thousands of farmers, contractors, and industry professionals from across the country.
John Deere's X Series Combine Harvesters received a CES Innovation Award to recognise their ‘outstanding product design and engineering in consumer technology’.
The X Series combine harvesters use ActiveVision camera technology that helps farmers see inside the grain tank. It also assists with observation of tailings to allow farmers to monitor the condition of harvested grain.
This technology, complemented by proprietary algorithms, is said to provide farmers with information to make critical decisions in the moment, while also gathering data to help them inform future decisions.
John Deere chief technology officer Jahmy Hindman says the award recognises the company’s efforts to build smart machines, systems and solutions.
“These help unlock customer economic value through enhanced precision, automation, speed and efficiency.”
While not yet available in Australia and New Zealand, two new X Series combine harvesters, the X9 1000 and X91100, will be added to John Deere’s harvesting line-up technology in late 2021.
JD claims the X Series uses the latest technology to deliver informed decisions and self-driving functions. For example, the harvester can automatically adjust itself to adapt to changing conditions to run at peak levels. This allows service technicians to manage things remotely, thereby minimising downtime and supporting profitability.
Federated Farmers president Wayne Langford says the 2025 Fieldays has been one of more positive he has attended.
A fundraiser dinner held in conjunction with Fieldays raised over $300,000 for the Rural Support Trust.
Recent results from its 2024 financial year has seen global farm machinery player John Deere record a significant slump in the profits of its agricultural division over the last year, with a 64% drop in the last quarter of the year, compared to that of 2023.
An agribusiness, helping to turn a long-standing animal welfare and waste issue into a high-value protein stream for the dairy and red meat sector, has picked up a top innovation award at Fieldays.
The Fieldays Innovation Award winners have been announced with Auckland’s Ruminant Biotech taking out the Prototype Award.
Following twelve years of litigation, a conclusion could be in sight of Waikato’s controversial Plan Change 1 (PC1).
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