From horse to GPS: agriculture's technical development
How machines, electricity, chemistry and computers transformed field work in just a hundred years
A good hundred years ago a Danish farm looked very different from today. The working horse pulled the plough the combine harvester did not exist and a large part of the farm's people were occupied with work now done by a single machine. In just a century agriculture has been transformed by engines electricity chemistry and computers. Here is the story of technological development — and how it changed both the work and the landscape.
§How the kitchen is structured for health and safety
In the early 1900s most Danish farms were small family farms where work relied on manpower and working horses. The field was ploughed with horse-drawn ploughs sown by hand or with simple horse-drawn seed drills and grain was harvested with scythes and later with horse-drawn mowers. Threshing — separating the grain from the straw — was heavy winter work originally done with flails and later with threshers. Many hands were needed and a large part of the population worked in agriculture.
The livestock were cared for by hand: milking was manual, feed and manure were carried and transported by wheelbarrow and horse wagon, and light in the barn came from oil lamps. It was a labor-intensive life where the muscular strength of animals and humans was the most important energy source on the farm.
§Mechanisation accelerates
The actual mechanization accelerated around 1900, with the USA as the leading country, and new energy sources gradually replaced horse power — first steam power, then combustion engines and electricity. In Denmark, the first tractors and machines began to appear between the wars, but the real breakthrough came after World War II. The tractor took over the horse's work, and together with the combine harvester, which harvests and threshes grain in one operation, it gave a sharp decline in both the number of horses and the number of people on farms.
§Electricity and chemistry in agriculture
Electrification reached the farms during the 20th century and especially changed barn work. Electric light, milking machines, feeding systems, ventilation and cooling eased daily work and made larger herds possible. At the same time, chemistry made its entrance: artificial fertilizers made it possible to add precise nutrients to the field and significantly increased yields, and chemical plant protection agents made it easier to keep weeds, fungi and pests down.
Higher yields did come with a price. Artificial fertilizer requires large amounts of energy to produce so agriculture became dependent on imported fossil energy. And as people eventually discovered that nitrogen and pesticides could seep into waterways lakes and groundwater the foundation was laid for the environmental regulation that today takes up so much in the trade.
§Timeline of agricultural development
| Period | What happened |
|---|---|
| Antiquity | Agriculture reaches the Nordic region; the land is worked with a plough, harvested with a scythe, threshing with a flail. |
| The Middle Ages | Plow, three-field system and village community; the earth is turned and the field rests in turns in fallow. |
| Slut 1700-tal | The agrarian reforms: the peasant tie is abolished (1788), redistribution and self-ownership create the free family farm. |
| Slut 1800-tal | The cooperative movement begins with the world's first cooperative dairy in Hjedding (1882); joint processing and export. |
| Tidligt 1900-tal | Still manpower and working horses; the first tractors and machines appear. |
| After 2nd World War. | Tractor and combine breaker break through; horses and labor displaced; mechanization accelerates |
| Second half of the 1900s | Electrification of the barn, artificial fertilizer and chemical means; yields rise; the first environmental regulations emerge. |
| Today | GPS and precision agriculture, computer control, stricter environmental requirements, growing organic farming and fewer but larger farms. |
§Digital and regulated agriculture today
Modern agriculture is fully digitalized. GPS controls tractors and machines with a few centimeters accuracy and precision agriculture means fertilizer and plant protection are dosed according to the individual spot in the field — it saves both money and environment. Sensors computers and data help control everything from feeding and milking to sowing and harvest. Many tasks that once required a good eye and many years of experience are now supported by technology and measurements.
At the same time agriculture is driven within a tight network of environmental and animal welfare regulations that must protect aquatic environments nature and animals — a development that really began when people discovered the downside of artificial fertiliser and pesticides. Structural development has continued: over the past decades the number of holdings has fallen sharply while those remaining have become larger and more specialised. Alongside conventional agriculture organic farming has grown from a niche to a significant part of both the land area and production.
The story is far from over. Climate, environment, animal welfare and new technology such as robots and artificial intelligence continuously shape the trade further. But as thousands of years ago, it's still about the same basic thing: cultivating the land and caring for the animals so they provide a good and sustainable yield.