General News
6 March, 2026
Harnessing AI to transform agriculture
FOR many farmers, AI has traditionally referred to artificial insemination, but the new form of AI - artificial intelligence – has the potential to transform agriculture.
Co-founder of Audacious Agriculture Stuart Austin believes AI could be a game changer for farmers who will have easier and quicker access to data and new imaging opportunities.
Mr Austin will present `From Vision to Innovation: Harnessing AI to Transform Agriculture’ at the GA 2026 ‘Today, Tomorrow and Beyond’ conference hosted by Genetics Australia in Geelong on March 17-18.
While the presentation discusses the risks and challenges of using AI, Mr Austin encouraged farmers to take along an open and curious mind to the subject.
“It’s the next generation of ag tech – it’s putting ag tech on steroids,” he said.
“There will be some jobs at risk but there are plenty that aren’t, and there is so much opportunity, particularly in the ability to quickly analyse and interpret data.
“That will be a game changer for farmers. We can capture an enormous amount of data on farm. The bottleneck is analysing that data and turning it into something meaningful and AI will solve that.”
Farmers will also benefit from AI’s ability for taking and processing images, including still photos and videos, to measure different attributes of an animal.
“That is quite exciting and will offer benefits, but it might mean that some existing hardware technology gets superseded,” Mr Austin said.
Robotics are likely to be introduced in abattoirs and in feedlots.
“There is the issue of job displacement but abattoirs are notoriously looking for workers and so is agriculture. I’m not convinced it will displace many jobs, but it will help us to fill jobs in some instances.
“Robots can work in any competitive and repetitive environment (we’ve been using robots for decades) these are just smarter robots.”
Mr Austin’s talk at the GA 2026 conference will show how people already use AI in their everyday lives.
“It’s in facial recognition on our phone and using ChatGPT for every day tasks; too me it’s the next iteration of google,” he said.
“You ask Google a question now, and the first response is AI. It’s really helpful and saves a lot of time. That will drive productivity gains and efficiencies in our day-to-day lives.
“Companies that incorporate AI into technology will stay ahead of the curve.”
Mr Austin is the co-founder of Audacious Ag, specialising in asset management, advisory, coaching, and livestock operations.
He has worked extensively across the northern Australian pastoral industry, spent three years grain farming in Canada, and has spent time in his younger years in a southern QLD feedlot.
International speakers from Europe, USA and South Africa will also feature on the GA 2026 ‘Today, Tomorrow and Beyond’ conference program along with farmers from around Australia who will showcase their business innovations, herd improvements and their thoughts on the future of farming
The conference will be held at GMHBA Stadium in South Geelong.
