Drones raise farming efficiency, quality in China

(Photo/People's Daily App)

A drone flies over rice fields at 8 meters per second, sowing rice seeds in the afternoon in Liantang village, Huangpu district, Guangzhou, south China's Guangdong Province.

In just 30 minutes, 300 mu (20 hectares) of rice fields are sown. Across the farmland, Internet of Things (IoT) devices, including soil sensors, weather stations, and smart cameras, send data back to the "farm brain" every 15 minutes.

"One drone can manage 500 mu of farmland, enabling fully unmanned cultivation," said Gong Jiaqin, co-founder and senior vice president of XAG, an agritech robot maker.

(Photo/People's Daily App)

Around 3,000 kilometers away in Yuli county, northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, XAG's 3,000-mu smart cotton farm is just as still and silent. There are no workers, only drones autonomously patrolling overhead, while unmanned vehicles move along preset routes, delivering precisely measured water and fertilizer directly to each cotton plant's roots.

This is China's first unmanned cotton farm project. When it was launched in 2021, local cotton farmers thought it was impossible for two people to manage 3,000 mu of land. By 2024, however, the farm achieved an average yield of 529 kilograms of seed cotton per mu, with premium cotton accounting for over 96 percent.

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"In the past, farming was experience-driven and now it is driven by data. The entire industrial chain can be precisely managed," Gong said, pointing to the data on the screen.

The system has reduced water and electricity costs per mu of rice fields by 47 percent, cut pesticide use by 30 percent and improved fertilizer efficiency by 40 percent.

With this technological empowerment, many young people and returning graduates have come back to rural areas to start smart farms and take up drone-based cultivation. XAG has trained more than 140,000 professionals in smart agriculture across China.

(Photo/People's Daily App)

Today, the company's agricultural robots are deployed in nearly 70 countries and regions, and it ranks second globally in agricultural drone and robotics sales.