What if you were told that AI could improve agriculture, reduce climate change, and potentially solve global food insecurity? In this episode of Impact AI, I am joined by Ranveer Chandra from Microsoft Research to discuss his work in the world of agriculture. Tuning in, you’ll hear all about Ranveer’s career, how he got his agriculture idea picked up by Microsoft, data-driven agriculture, and more! We then delve into the data needed to achieve their goals before Ranveer discusses all the challenges they face when it comes to multimodal AI. Ranveer is very hopeful that machine learning can drastically improve agriculture. He tells me what new AI technologies he is most excited about, their potential impact on agriculture, and even shares advice for other leaders in AI. Finally, my guest warns us against the potential divide society can create if AI is not made accessible to all people. You don’t want to miss out on this informative and incredibly interesting episode so press play now!

Key Points:

Introducing today’s guest, Ranveer Chandra.
A bit about Ranveer’s background and how he landed up at Microsoft Research.
How Microsoft got involved in agriculture.
Ranveer tells us about data-driven agriculture, what it means, and how he plans to achieve it.
The kinds of data they collect from farms in order to achieve these goals.
Challenges associated with multimodal AI.
How these technologies have been deployed so far.
What new technology Ranveer is excited about in the world of machine learning.
Ranveer shares some advice for other leaders of AI-based products.
The potential impact of data-driven and AI technologies for agriculture in the future.
Ranveer warns us about the dangers of creating an AI-divide and what that would mean.

Quotes:

“Technology could have a deep impact on agriculture. It could address the world's food problem; it could help improve livelihoods of a lot of smallholder farmers.” — Ranveer Chandra

“The key question is, how do you sustainably nourish the planet? How do you sustainably nourish the people in this world?” — Ranveer Chandra

“Microsoft is not an agriculture company. So we are not sending anything to farmers, but we are providing the tools on top of which you could build solutions for farmers, or partners, or customers build solutions and take the solutions to farmers.” — Ranveer Chandra

“We need to make data consumable, and generative AI has the suitability to make that data more consumable.” — Ranveer Chandra

“There are over 500 million smallholder farmers worldwide whose lives would benefit with artificial intelligence.” — Ranveer Chandra

Links:

Ranveer Chandra on LinkedIn

Ranveer Chandra on X

Ranveer Chandra on Instagram

Microsoft Research – Ranveer Chandra

Resources for Computer Vision Teams:

LinkedIn – Connect with Heather.

Computer Vision Insights Newsletter – A biweekly newsletter to help bring the latest machine learning and computer vision research to applications in people and planetary health.

Computer Vision Strategy Session – Not sure how to advance your computer vision project? Get unstuck with a clear set of next steps. Schedule a 1 hour strategy session now to advance your project.

Custom Vision Model Assessment – Foundation models are popping up everywhere – do you need one for your proprietary image dataset? Get a clear perspective on whether you can benefit from a domain-specific foundation model.

S5: Episode 37 - Gregory Shupak