If I were now in the position of a schoolboy/student deciding which high school or university to choose, it would probably be significantly more difficult than it used to be. Various studies and analyzes predict which job positions will disappear or be partially replaced by AI and robots, so that the future graduate will enter a much reduced and completely unknown job market in a few years.
The old job positions will disappear and new ones will appear, which today do not even have a name. Today, schools are no longer able to keep up with technological developments and changes in the labor market, so relying on the traditional education system would probably be very ineffective. And in addition, I prefer the freedom of decision-making, the implementation of my own ideas and projects over employment in someone else’s company, so I would need a school or schools where I would acquire multiple skills from diverse areas. First of all, I would probably choose a technical school that would also allow interdisciplinary studies, and I would supplement my other knowledge and skills individually and continuously through courses, professional internships or personal education and experimentation.
The world we live in today will change significantly in 5-10 years, many activities will be automated and somewhere there won’t be much room for innovation, but a few will still remain. People will always need to eat, and the way food is grown, cared for, harvested and processed still has a lot of room for improvement. I like to eat too , but I care about what and in what quality I put into myself. What is sold on the shelves today and travels to us across half the globe is one big unknown. I like nature and I think that the current state of food production is both inefficient, long-term unsustainable and not very friendly to nature. Challenges also come into play in the form of increasingly extreme manifestations of climate change, which directly call for a need to reassess what is grown where and how. When I imagine the possibilities of robotics and artificial intelligence, initiatives to build and use clean renewable energy sources, the need to create a completely new approach to food production seems completely logical to me.
I like the concept of a small autonomous, energy and food self-sufficient eco-bio-high-tech farm that will not only provide for me, my family and a close circle of people, but will also produce food for sale or exchange for other commodities.
The cultivation and harvesting of crops would be handled by autonomous, electric-powered robotic tractors that would be able to replace mechanized working tools on their own as needed. Rotating vertical photovoltaic panels lining the crop beds would be responsible for the production of electricity. They would be able to tilt according to the position of the sun and in case of very strong sunlight, they would tilt to a horizontal position to create a protective shadow over the plants. If there was a threat of hail, the panels would be flipped 180 degrees with the resistant side up to protect both the PV cells and the plants. And at the moment when a tractor should pass over the beds, they would again flip over to a vertical position so as not to get in the way.
The correct dosage of water, light and heat would be taken care of by a sensor network controlled by AI, which would trigger other processes in real time so that the plants are optimally cared for. The correct dosage of fertilizers and other additives will also be taken care of, so that on the one hand the plants thrive, but at the same time they do not contain substances unhealthy for humans, such as e.g. nitrates or chlorine, and vice versa, they contained those that people need. It should be noted that today’s “varied and balanced diet”, to which many health recommendations refer, no longer provides the same nutritional values as it did in the past. For example, avocado grown in the 1980s had 8 times higher nutritional values than the current one.
Autonomous drones would oversee everything from above, which would simultaneously scare away pests and guard the outer perimeter against unwanted intruders. Robots would also take care of the harvesting, storage or further processing of crops according to economic advantage. I would just keep an eye on everything, follow current technological developments, consult with AI about what to grow and on what acreage, and decide what to invest in. And I would also repair the robots in the event of a malfunction. I would enjoy that… 
For this I would need a school that would allow me to study something different each semester to master the basics of biology, chemistry, geology, food science, agriculture, genetics, engineering, cybernetics, robotics, artificial intelligence, economics, marketing and management. That is probably quite unrealistic so far, so I would probably choose the mentioned technical directions and finish the rest.
What I really wanted to say to everyone is that we are entering a new era where it will no longer be enough to rely on the traditional education system and what we know now. We need to think about what our superpowers are, what makes us unique, what robots and AI won’t replace us so easily, and complement our abilities and skills to increase our value either on the job market or on the startup own projects. Let’s not rely on the employer or the state to take care of us. Try starting your own project and it doesn’t have to be a high-tech farm right away. It could be just a small side project that will help you secure extra income right now in addition to school or work. It is enough to think carefully, look at what is of interest, what should be improved. And there is really a lot of it here. The main thing is to start.
Photo by Megan Thomas on Unsplash
Source: www.nextech.sk
