Artificial Intelligence May Soon Give Florida Farmers Access to Crop Damage Data During a Hurricane

By Jessica Meszaros

The prototype will soon be tested at select farms within Immokalee in Collier County and Ona in Hardee County.

In January, University of Florida researchers presented a report to the Florida Senate Agriculture Committee estimating that three hurricanes caused up to $975.8 million in ag production losses for 2024.

After a hurricane passes, data on how the storm affected local crops can be slow to come out.

Now, researchers at UF’s Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences want to give farmers an artificial intelligence tool to get near-real-time results.

Nikos Tziolas, assistant professor and lead scientist on this for UF/IFAS, said it's a simple chat-based interface, which uses satellite imagery to answer questions conversationally.