Will AI replace Agricultural Equipment Operators?
Estimated risk score: 13 out of 100
Very low replacement risk
Estimate from published task research, not reviewed by a person · how we estimate
Within about 19 points for 4 in 5 of the jobs we checked (0 to 32).
For the occupation as a whole, from ratings of its 17 O*NET tasks published in 2023 and calibrated to our hand scores. A specialty inside it can sit higher or lower.
O*NET-SOC 45-2091.00 · Farming, Fishing, and Forestry
Tasks rated in 2023 as ones AI could do or speed up
Tasks a GPT-4-class model could do, or do in half the time or less: 1 of its 17 rated tasks. In O*NET’s words.
- Weigh crop-filled containers, and record weights and other identifying information.
Tasks rated in 2023 as not sped up by AI
Tasks such a model was rated as not speeding up or taking over: 16 of its 17 rated tasks; the first 6 are shown. In O*NET’s words.
- Adjust, repair, and service farm machinery and notify supervisors when machinery malfunctions.
- Attach farm implements such as plows, discs, sprayers, or harvesters to tractors, using bolts and hand tools.
- Load and unload crops or containers of materials, manually or using conveyors, handtrucks, forklifts, or transfer augers.
- Manipulate controls to set, activate, and adjust mechanisms on machinery.
- Mix specified materials or chemicals, and dump solutions, powders, or seeds into planter or sprayer machinery.
- Spray fertilizer or pesticide solutions to control insects, fungus and weed growth, and diseases, using hand sprayers.
What the job is
Drive and control equipment to support agricultural activities such as tilling soil; planting, cultivating, and harvesting crops; feeding and herding livestock; or removing animal waste. May perform tasks such as crop baling or hay bucking. May operate stationary equipment to perform post-harvest tasks such as husking, shelling, threshing, and ginning.
Also called: Rake Operator, Farm Equipment Operator, Hay Baler, Cane Piler, Cultivator, Hay Chopper, Straw Baler, Gin Operator.
Source. This site includes information from the O*NET 30.1 Database by the U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration (USDOL/ETA). Used under the CC BY 4.0 license. O*NET® is a trademark of USDOL/ETA. USDOL/ETA has not approved, endorsed, or tested these modifications. (O*NET, CC BY 4.0.) Task ratings: Eloundou, Manning, Mishkin and Rock (2023), “GPTs are GPTs: An Early Look at the Labor Market Impact Potential of Large Language Models”, data used under the MIT licence (licence texts). Our change: we averaged the ratings over this occupation’s tasks and calibrated them to our 0–100 scale. It is not a prediction about any one person and not career advice. Disagree? Write to hello@yourstopwashit.com. How we estimate