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Telus in the past year has acquired seven companies from the United States, United Kingdom and Canada that when combined cover the entire food system, it said, including real-time data for 170 million acres of farmland that will help build “AI and machine learning-based insights” for farmers.
“A farmer, as an example, will come to us and look at our software solutions in order to increase their ability to apply water, pesticides, nutrients in exact quantities,” Gratton said.
By connecting data across each level of the food chain, Telus said it could help trace the origin of foods to the field level, helping retailers deal with foodborne illness outbreaks without having to indiscriminately throw out tonnes of product.
“Our solution is going to be able to identify, eventually down at the plant level, the origin of the food and the safety of the food,” Gratton said. “If there’s an issue that arises in one supermarket, we can clearly identify where it came from and reduce enormous tons of waste.”
Evan Fraser, director of the Arrell Food Institute at the University of Guelph, said agriculture has lagged behind other sectors, including health care, when it comes adopting to big data analytic tools.
“The agricultural revolution is coming. It’s happening,” he said. “Canada could play a massive leadership role in shaping it.”
Telus’ latest acquisitions include AFS Technologies Inc., a Florida-based software company focused on the consumer goods manufacturing sector, and Agrian Inc., a California software company that helps with crop management.
