On his farm, in the scorching Ghanaian heat, Mr John Akaribo spends hours, bent in the field, swinging his cutlass in an all-too-familiar battle against tall grass to prepare his farmland for planting. With his old age, the muscles in his fingers are a sign of the tedious task.
As this labour-intensive activity wears him down, a locally made robot effortlessly moves between rows of crops on a nearby maize farm, planting seeds and pulling weeds with precision, replacing hours of manual labour.
Agriculture in the country is labour-intensive, which has defined farming activities for decades. However, labour is increasingly becoming scarce and expensive.
Farmers are facing challenges of finding enough farmhands to weed, plant and harvest crops on time in a sector considered as one of the major backbones of Ghana’s economy.
In response, a homegrown startup has developed a Field Autonomous Machine for Agriculture (FAMA) to automate farming.
Ghana’s food security is under threat, exacerbated by climate change, environmental degradation such as illegal small-scale mining, conflicts, limited infrastructure and reliance on rain-fed farming, most of which have resulted in unpredictable yields.
Additionally, farmers grapple with the growing challenge of rising labour costs and high rural-urban drift as young people search for office jobs. This has significantly reduced workforce availability.
The Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of 3Farmate, developers of FAMA, Mr Clinton Anani, speaking to The Africa Feature Network, corroborated these challenges and prescribed the need to automate farming practices.
“When you look at our growing population … a lot of people are staying away from agriculture because it is not exactly a comfortable job to do, and lots of mundane, repetitive, and sometimes dangerous tasks are being performed. And so it makes sense that people wouldn’t want to keep being in that industry,” he observed.
Despite these challenges, Mr Anani further noted, more food needs to be produced using fewer resources while protecting the environment.
FAMA, Ghana’s first purpose-built autonomous farming robot, started as a fun side project for Mr Anani and his Co-founder, Mr Elijah Ocupualor. They both quickly became serious after getting into direct contact with real farming, which convinced them that automation was necessary.
The robot is powered by solar energy and Artificial Intelligence (AI) for farm automation, with a broader goal to address labour loss and low precision. The machine is equipped with an AI-driven computer system with soil and atmospheric sensors to analyse weather patterns, soil conditions and crop history to forecast yields or disease outbreaks. This will enable farmers to plan ahead of a crisis.
Designed to operate independently of the Global Positioning System (GPS), which offers only two-metre accuracy, the machine is still able to deliver services with precision. They include fertiliser application, mechanical weeding, spot spraying, and a four-row software-controlled planter for crops such as maize, millet, soybeans, okra, cabbage, bell pepper, lettuce and carrots. The accuracy level needed for planting is a centimetre or millimetre precision. This is to avoid crop nutrient competition.
Mr Anani explained that these precision farming activities help farmers avoid guesswork and to start measuring everything, adding that the machine can determine where crops need water, fertiliser and pesticides.
The technology, he revealed, pays special attention to every section of the farmland, ensuring that there is less wastage by strictly spraying the needed chemical for better yields.
It also reduces labour costs due to its high-precision depth cameras, which provide daytime and night vision. These cameras help the AI understand the farm layout and driving paths.
The robot is also enhanced with radar sensors to provide data on distance and obstacles.
This innovation attracted the attention of the Deputy Minister of Food and Agriculture, Mr John Dumelo, who was impressed with the product, describing it as a foolproof avenue for agricultural efficiency. He pledged the government’s support for the mass production of the robots, amid other future engagements with the young engineers.
The startup has so far onboarded over 65 farmers onto its project.
Mr Anani disclosed that early interest from farmers in 3Farmate’s services has been overall positive. He, however, explained that this has resulted in a demand that currently surpasses the company’s production capacity. He said, “This indicates a strong market enthusiasm. The current operation season will, however, be concentrated in the Greater Accra Region for now, with planned expansion into surrounding regions in the near future”.
While specific pricing for direct sales is not yet public, the company is targeting significant affordability for future offerings, with over 70 per cent of its production handled internally.
Mr Anani said while 3Farmate explores avenues to increase in-house production of the machines, it is ensuring that its agriculture robot services are economically viable, particularly for smallholder farmers.
He disclosed that the company’s goal of serving large-scale farming is in full swing while actively exploring partnerships with farm aggregation entities and agribusinesses to broaden its reach. He further disclosed that discussions are underway with agribusinesses to establish financing mechanisms and to further integrate the robotic service into existing agricultural support frameworks.
He described the move as a testament to the eager willingness within the farming community to embrace new technology in agricultural services.
This service model enables smaller farmers to access the technology without the expense of outright purchase, by paying solely for the acres serviced.
The innovative machine, however, is not without limitations. The company acknowledges that the battery technology is not operating at full capacity, which affects the robot’s operating range and overall efficiency. Mr Anani explained that the current battery capacity restricts the robot to servicing about 26 to 37 acres of farmland daily. He, however, stated that significant efforts are concentrated on advancing battery technology to achieve its daily servicing capacity of 100 to 200 acres, in a bid to boost productivity and deliver greater value to farmers.
He said other farm conditions tested for reliability were slopes and muddy terrain. The machine has also been tested for its drive mechanism, electrical systems, and planting.
Farmers have expressed concerns about the availability of the robotic service and the broader challenges facing the agricultural industry.
Mr Akaribo, who also serves as a key figure of the Peasant Farmers’ Association of Ghana, has spent years advocating for smallholder farmers. He described the invention by the two young engineers as a welcome development but suggested the need to address the accessibility concerns, especially for women farmers.
“The machine is welcome news. It is good, but accessibility is going to be an issue. We are tired of the manual work. It is expensive, so this machine will help us a lot. We want to go into tomato production this year, and it could be good for us,” said Mr Akaribo.
He indicated that the Ghanaian government should leverage agricultural mechanisation centres across the country to expand farmers’ access to these machines.
Mr Anani, on his part, said effective policies and supportive frameworks are crucial for fostering the advancement and widespread integration of agricultural technologies.
He called for improved access to low-interest capital to improve agricultural innovation, as well as reduced import duties on essential robot components that are not yet manufactured in-house, such as batteries, to accelerate technological progress.
He further called for deeper collaboration with governmental bodies to enact policies that facilitate scaling and enhance global competitiveness.
Mr Anani envisaged that the innovative robots could industrialise Ghana’s agricultural sector.
