Rosselkhozcenter is launching a program to implement agrodrones for agriculture by 2026.

The organization that is subordinate to the Ministry of Agriculture - Rosselkhoztsentr, has announced its intention to develop a program for introducing agricultural drones. The implementation period of this program is planned for the period from 2024 to 2026. The main goal of the program will be to create a Competence Center for the use of unmanned aerial vehicles in crop production. The program will provide its services to the entire agricultural industry. Branches of Rosselkhoztsentr in Tatarstan, Kaluga and Volgograd regions will serve as reference points for the application of agricultural drones. Another branch located in the Altai Territory and the Altai Republic will also become a reference point and will be responsible for training drone pilots.

The management of Rosselkhoztsentr notes that their branches are already using drones to spray entomophages in the fields. However, these drones can also be applied in other areas of agriculture. There are many potential areas for using drones in agriculture. For example, it is possible to conduct phytosanitary monitoring of the territory at a more advanced level, increase the use of bio-preparations and entomophages, combat pests such as Sosnowsky's hogweed and locusts, and this can be done in areas that cannot be reached by ground equipment. Drones can also provide missing micronutrients and fertilizers, adjust the development of plants and geographical points of sowing. Moreover, they can assess the consequences of emergencies in crop production, search for unused land plots, evaluate their fire safety condition, and much more.

The government notes that the greatest potential for the use of unmanned aerial vehicles is in agriculture, construction supervision, creation and updating of geospatial databases, as well as delivery of goods to hard-to-reach areas. The Cabinet of Ministers in the summer of 2023 approved the Development Strategy of unmanned aviation until 2030 to expand their use. However, in 2022-2023, most Russian regions banned the use of drones. In September 2023, the Ministry of Economic Development announced the introduction of an experimental legal regime for the operation of agricultural UAVs in Tatarstan, Altai and Stavropol Territories, as well as in the Novosibirsk, Nizhny Novgorod, Voronezh, Saratov, Volgograd, Astrakhan, Lipetsk, Tambov, and Ulyanovsk regions. At the end of February, the Ministry of Defense again banned the use of agricultural drones in the temporary air closure zone in the South and Central Russia. This ban will affect the Krasnodar and Stavropol Territories, Astrakhan, Volgograd, Voronezh, Lipetsk, and Tambov regions.

At the All-Russian Agronomic Conference, which took place at the end of January, the Minister of Agriculture Dmitry Patrushev stated that the agro-industrial complex could purchase unmanned aerial vehicles for approximately 360 million rubles in the next three years, and agricultural drones are included in the preferential lending program.