The team of a hands free farm are celebrating six years of looking to the future of farming through the use of autonomous vehicles.
On the 35ha robotic farm at Harper Adams University, researchers, sponsors and VIP guests celebrated the research, learning and teaching opportunities offered by the world’s first autonomous agriculture project.
The event which took place on Tuesday, September 20, came shortly after the Hands Free Far, completed its 2022 harvest earlier this month.
The celebrations
A group of around 50 industry representatives and VIP guests were invited to mark six years since the launch of the Hands Free Hectare.
The Hands Free Farm is the first project of its kind in the world to grow, tend and harvest a crop without operators in the driving seats or agronomists on the ground.
A special presentation at the Agri-EPI Centre on the Harper Adams campus was held before the party moved out to the 35ha farm itself to see its autonomous tractors and combine harvester in operation while networking over a barbecue lunch.
The presentation was opened by Harper Adams vice-chancellor, Professor Ken Sloan, who told attendees that the global reach of the project had helped capture his interest in Harper Adams and its work.
Sloan said: “We are really keen to talk about the project – and not just what is happening now, but some of the next steps as well.”
“As Kit (Franklin) has reminded me, this is not something the University could have done in isolation – and I look forward to collaborating in the future.”
The project has been run in partnership between Harper Adams and Precision Decisions along with the UK division of Australian precision agriculture specialist, Farmscan AG.
Hands Free Farm principal investigator, Kit Franklin; Farmscan AG director, Callum Chalmers; Precision Decisions operations director, Martin Abell and Professor James Lowenburg-DeBoer went on to set out how the farm had developed practically, technologically and in research terms over the past six years.
Among the organisations who have visited or worked with the farm are British Standards Institute, NFU Mutual, OFCOM and the Health and Safety Executive.
The project has drawn a wide range of guests, including Harper Adams University chancellor, Her Royal Highness The Princess Royal, and the then environment secretaries Michael Gove and Andrea Leadsom.
New project
Hands Free Farm event day – industry reps at Agri-EPi and Hands Free Farm
The Hands Free Farm has won numerous awards and received significant media interest from across the globe.
Despite this, Franklin told attendees that its true value had been in helping to drive forward commercial research, policy development and learning for Harper Adams students across a variety of courses.
“Going forward, the project as is comes to an end in six weeks – but we have a unique opportunity to keep learning, and to learn more,” he said.
“When we look at the range of equipment we have here at the Hands Free Farm, we have some fairly unconventional equipment, but with this sort of equipment and this sort of land, it opens the farm – right here, right now – to starting an autonomous strip crop field here on the Harper Adams site.”
As the new project develops, academics from across Harper Adams and beyond will work with the Hands Free team to examine everything from soil quality to insect life and biodiversity on the site, which will be prepared for spring crops to be harvested in early 2023.
Following the presentation, attendees got the chance to see some of the Hands Free Farm machines and discuss them with team members – before making their way out to the Hands Free Farm site to watch its autonomous vehicles in operation.
