WHAT IS AGRICULTURAL ENGINEERING Providing a secure food supply to everyone on the planet is one of the greatest challenges facing the world Climate change and an increasing population mean that in some areas people struggle to grow enough food to survive Agricultural engineers and farmers are leading the effort to meet these challenges Agriculture is not concerned only with food It also involves the cultivation of or methods of growing living things for food fuel or materials The practice of agricultural methods is called farming Agricultural engineering aims to develop sustainable methods of farming which means methods that will not damage the environment Engineers develop mechanical and electronic technologies to make agriculture more efficient that is to produce more while using fewer resources Other types of engineering are often involved including mechanical electrical computer chemical food and genetic engineering Agricultural engineers have to take many issues into account including plant and animal health and climate change They must also consider ethical issues whether actions are morally right or wrong It means weighing different points of view in matters such as how we treat animals or affect the environment Agricultural engineers work to design farm machinery develop processes for treating crops and help to protect the soil 4
EIGHT STEPS TO SUCCESS Agricultural engineers follow an eight-step process to perfect their designs see right It covers designing building testing and improving technologies Steps in the design process Define the problem Identify criteria and constraints Brainstorm ideas Select a solution Build a prototype Improve the design Test the prototype Communicate the solution Engineering and science Science and engineering are closely linked Scientists investigate the world trying to discover the rules by which natural processes work Engineers apply the findings of science to make useful technologies An agricultural scientist might investigate how a plant takes nutrients from the soil An agricultural engineer would use that information to develop ways of delivering nutrients to plants Agricultural engineering works with many types of science including computing robotics chemistry environmental science botany zoology ecology and nutrition GEORGE WASHINGTON CARVER Agricultural engineering technologies include processes George Washington Carver was an inventor and botanist born a slave in Diamond Grove Missouri around 1864 After slavery was abolished he became a farmer for a while He went on to study botany at college and later became head of the agriculture department of the Tuskegee Institute in Alabama He encouraged and taught farmers to rotate crops growing cotton one year then switching to sweet potatoes or peanuts the next year Both these crops replace nitrogen taken from the soil by growing cotton This makes the soil fertile enough to grow cotton again George Washington Carver was a pioneer in soil management 5
WHAT IS A BIOSYSTEM Agricultural engineering is often called agricultural and biosystems engineering A biosystem is a complex network of living organisms plants animals and microbes that interact with each other Organisms live together feed off each other and affect each other in this network which is called a system A biosystem is the living part of an ecosystem in which organisms interact with the physical environment Agricultural engineers need a full understanding of how biosystems and ecosystems work so that they don’t accidentally or dangerously disrupt them Pests and diseases are a major problem for farming Pests such as insects attack crops and some microbes cause disease in animals and plants For much of the 20th century farmers used chemical pesticides and medicines to tackle pests and diseases when they struck or even before to prevent them Using harsh chemicals can disrupt biosystems and harm the soil water and farming products Cattle and the grass they eat are part of a biosystem Microbes in the cows guts and insects in the soil are also part of this biosystem 6
IPM Modern agriculture relies on Integrated Pest Management IPM systems to try to prevent problems Instead of relying on chemical interventions farmers choose plants that have been bred to resist disease They monitor conditions in the field and act early if anything goes wrong They make use of natural relationships between organisms to control conditions For example predators can be introduced to reduce insect pests They use mechanical or robotic hoes to remove weeds instead of using chemicals and use herbicides and pesticides only where they are needed A robot designed to weed paddy fields where rice is grown is tested in Japan COMPANION PLANTING Some plants produce chemicals that certain pests don’t like Planting these among crops can deter pests For example growing carrots and leeks together protects carrots from carrot fly and leeks from leek moth The insects don’t like the smell of the other vegetable THE FOUR PESTS CAMPAIGN A program introduced in China in 1958 aimed to kill four pests rats flies mosquitoes and sparrows birds that ate crops Killing birds backfired disastrously It led to a plague of insects that did even more damage than the birds Killing the birds left no predators to eat the insects The result of failing to understand the biosystem led to widespread starvation The result was the Great Chinese Famine which caused 20 million deaths 7 Colorado potato beetles can ruin potato crops if not controlled Farmers can spread a fungus that kills the beetles without using chemicals
