Tech radar

Your own drone pays off from ≈400 ha treated a year; on smaller areas a service is cheaper. In Russia, flights happen in the 18 regions of the experimental legal regime, with a flight plan via ERA-GLONASS; DJI is not sold officially, and there are Russian models certified by Rosaviatsia. In Vietnam: registration, a tag and a pilot license.

In the USA, autosteer runs on more than half of corn and soybean acreage, but only one in ten of the smallest farms has it. A kit fits older machinery too; Russia has its own systems.

AgXeed has about a hundred robots at work, Deere promises full autonomy by 2030, and Monarch Tractor shut down in 2025. Buy only with local service and spare parts.

Sentinel-2 images — 13 bands, down to 10 m per pixel — are open and free. Precision farming starts here: zones, soil samples, application rates.

Technology website ↗

Sensor-driven irrigation is an answer to drought and salt. In Vietnam only 9% of farms have such technology, and water is the main constraint. For a garden, a moisture sensor and a timer are enough.

≈90% of the water reaches the roots, versus ≈60% with furrow irrigation (FAO). But if the “saved” water irrigates new fields, the region saves nothing — you need a meter.

Free soft water and a reserve for droughts. On islands like Phu Quoc, where one reservoir serves everyone, it’s part of a farm’s resilience.

That’s how Almeria works — more than 31,000 ha — and Vietnam, with 112,000 ha of greenhouses and net houses. In the tropics, netting; in Southern Russia, film.

The Netherlands harvests ≈48 kg of tomatoes per square meter a year. Russia has 3,460 ha of winter greenhouses, and the sector’s profitability in 2025 was 2%: what pays off is whatever saves energy and labor.

Dutch growers who swap sodium lamps for LEDs buy less electricity. On a windowsill, a grow light keeps seedlings short and sturdy.

The basis of modern greenhouses. At home: anything from a wick pot to a rack of greens; on a farm: salad greens and herbs, if there is a sales contract.

AeroFarms, Infarm, Bowery and Plenty lost hundreds of millions of dollars in 2023–2025. A niche works: microgreens and salad greens with a sales contract, as at Japan’s Spread.

A laser robot saves up to ≈€800 per hectare a year compared with hand weeding (cases in the USA). It pays off only on high-value vegetables; sanctions make it hard to get Western models into Russia.

Lely has installed its 50,000th Astronaut robot: ≈3 million cows in 50 countries. The technology is proven; for Russia, it comes down to the manufacturer’s sanctions policy and local service.

48% of the farmers surveyed use biostimulants and 41% use biocontrol (2026). In Almeria, beneficial insects work on 28,600 ha of greenhouses. Always leave a check strip: not every product has a proven effect.

In Russia, domestic seeds make up 67.6%, against a target of 75% by 2030; for sugar beet, 24%. Only varieties in the State Register of plant varieties may be sold (Federal Law 454-FZ); the law does not regulate swaps for your own gardens.

In Japan a high-GABA tomato has been on sale since 2021; in England the rules have applied since 13.11.2025, and in the EU they apply from 17.07.2028. Some countries treat such varieties like conventional ones, some don’t: check the country’s rules before you sow.

Organic matter goes back into the soil, not to landfill: the soil holds more water and nutrients. On a farm it’s feed too: larvae raised on waste for your own hens.

Worldwide there are more than 14 GW of such plants (2021), up from 2.9 GW in 2018. In hot weather, partial shade can save water and the crop; the rules for siting them on farmland depend on the country.