Why Every Farmer Should be Using AI
With the rising popularity of artificial intelligence (AI) tools like ChatGPT over the past couple of years, it feels like everyone has been discussing how AI is poised to change the world. While AI can trace its roots back to the 1960s, the concept of AI has historically been relegated mostly to science fiction movies and topics of discussion for the more IT-savvy among us. Now, even my mother-in-law is asking me how to use ChatGPT, so it’s clear AI is now mainstream. I attribute this largely to the rise of large language models (LLMs), such as ChatGPT, which enable anyone to leverage the power of AI conversationally. Just type out a question and AI tools will write an answer right back to you, as if you were chatting with a human.
While there’s a lot of debate about whether or not the rise of AI tools are good for society, what’s not up for debate is that the AI train has left the station. Even if you’re not using it in your business or on your farm, others like you are using it every day to push their businesses forward. While we don’t fully understand AI’s impact on the future of work, in its current form, AI tools offer significant advantages that complement jobs in agriculture rather than replace them. As such, farmers should take advantage of the many ways in which AI can make their lives easier. If there’s one thing I know, farmers never have enough time in the day, so I want to provide a few practical ways AI can make their lives easier.
One of the most practical uses of AI is for writing assistance. In daily use, it is great for checking your grammar, improving your writing, or helping you write basic emails, but I find it most compelling when I need help with more complex writing tasks. For example, perhaps I have an upcoming audit and I need to create a standard operating procedure (SOP) for a new process on my farm but I don’t know where to start because I’ve never written an SOP before. All I have to do is ask AI to create an SOP based on the necessary parameters, and it will generate an excellent first draft. Now I don’t have to figure out how to create an SOP from scratch and I can make whatever minor changes are necessary.
AI is also a valuable brainstorming and troubleshooting tool. Perhaps, you have a problem in your business that you can’t quite wrap your head around. Describe your problem to AI and ask it to give you some potential ideas or solutions to a problem. This is a great starting point for figuring out a solution. You can even continue to go back and forth with the AI to help develop a solution.
It can also be particularly helpful for troubleshooting maintenance issues. Maybe you hear a strange clicking noise coming from a piece of equipment and you’re not quite sure what it may be. If you describe the noise and the piece of equipment, AI can suggest potential causes that help you figure out the issue. Once you’ve identified the issue, you can also ask AI to give you the steps to fix the problem.
Finally, consider using AI for data analysis on your farm. As humans, we’re limited in our ability to make sense of large quantities of data without spending significant time manipulating it. However, AI can quickly provide actionable insights based on large datasets. For example, on an egg farm, you could input production data over 6 months and ask AI to identify which barns were most efficient and if there were any issues.
These are just a few of the near endless ways that farmers can utilize AI to enhance both their efficiency and effectiveness. In order to stay competitive, I would encourage everyone in agriculture to be experimenting with AI and considering the ways in which you can use it to be better at your job.
*This article was originally published in the June 2025 edition of the Sonoma County Farm Bureau Farm News*