Glitz. Glamour. Bright lights.
Before Germany’s Agritechnica 2025 trade show, those aren’t words I would have associated with farm machinery. Every two years, European farmers enter the sprawling Hannover showgrounds expecting to be wowed by cutting-edge, futuristic machines.
Farm equipment brands didn’t disappoint. Take German startup AI.Land’s humanoid robotic torso that can pick specialty crops, the Chinese brand Zoomlion’s 12-motor electric combine and CNH Industrial’s autonomous R4 robot. I was blown away by what ag tech might someday become.
“This is the vision,” said Andrew Dunne of New Holland about the brand’s tech research focus. “We're all about automation and sustainable propulsion. I think that’s the direction that we all need to go in.”
With innovation advancing at a breakneck pace, it’s easy to get excited about ag technology’s future. But at the end of the day, a machine is only as valuable as farmers’ buy-in. And for that, its return on investment must be proven on farm fields by early adopters willing to take on risk for the betterment of all.
Innovation vs. practicality
I returned to the United States contemplating tech adoption’s risk. Where does innovation meet practicality? Every farmer draws a different line.
In my travels far and wide across America’s agricultural landscape, I’ve been privileged to meet farmer-innovators like Nebraskan Daryl Hunnicutt, who has been at the forefront for decades. He remembers when irrigating with gravity systems required mostly “guess work,” saying, “You dug a little bit in the ground to see if it was wet.”
For more than 30 years, Hunnicut has earned a reputation for embracing new technologies. Early on, he worked with groundwater districts — before Nebraska’s Natural Resources Districts even existed — to adopt gypsum blocks, which paved the way for evapotranspiration charts and, eventually, modern soil probes. He also transitioned his farm to center pivots and was among the first to install drop nozzles.
Now, he monitors center pivots in real-time using remote management platforms and relies on predictive irrigation scheduling. Experimental tech from Israeli-made Autonomous Pivot and California biotech company InnerPlant are running pilots on his farm. Remote-controlled Grain Weevil machines crawl around in his bins.
“We have tended to be an early adopter,” Hunnicut said, highlighting several lessons he’s learned along the way. “The biggest key in irrigating is when to start and then when to finish."
This perspective, rooted in crop management fundamentals, connects futuristic innovations — like those showcased at this year’s Agritechnica — with practical, real-world application. It’s a valuable lens for identifying technologies that could one day streamline farming, saving both time and money. After all, innovation only matters when it’s anchored in productivity.
As the calendar turns to a new year, modern ag tech is stepping into the spotlight, shining bright with innovation and promise. Some advancements such as electric combines and humanoid robots might seem farfetched for good reason. But didn’t autonomous crop spraying drones once elicit similar skepticism?