How Canadian farms are using digital technology

What the census asked

Every five years, Statistics Canada counts every farm in the country through the Census of Agriculture. The 2021 edition asked operators whether they had used each of eight technologies on the operation during the 2020 calendar year. The list mixed satellite guidance and mapping tools with robotics and a few agronomic practices. The result is published as the table Technologies used on the operation, Census of Agriculture, 2021 (table 32-10-0379-01), and Statistics Canada summarized it in its Canadian Agriculture at a Glance series.

The headline figure is that 95,713 farms reported at least one of the eight technologies in 2020. That is 50.4% of all farms in Canada. Half of Canadian farms reporting a technology on a yes-or-no question does not mean half of Canadian farms are highly automated or digitally integrated. It means half ticked at least one box. The rest of this article looks at which boxes, and where.

The national picture

Of the items that are clearly digital or mechanical, automated guidance steering systems, usually called auto-steer, were the most widely reported. Statistics Canada describes them as Global Positioning System-based tractor systems for vehicle navigation and control. Just over one-quarter of farms (26.8%) reported auto-steer in 2020, up from 20.5% in 2015. Soil sample testing, a long-established practice that the census also counted, was reported by 32.0% of farms.

Variable-rate technology was reported by 16.1% of farms and geographic information system (GIS) mapping by 13.2%, up from 8.2% in 2015. The newer tools were much rarer. Drones were reported by 3.6% of farms, fully robotic milkers by 1.2% and robotic greenhouse equipment by 0.2%. The figures for robotics are low partly because they are shares of all farms, and only dairy and greenhouse operations could use those tools. Quebec, for example, had 902 farms reporting robotic milkers in 2020, the most of any province.

Auto-steer was concentrated by farm type. Statistics Canada reports that 50,917 farms in Canada used auto-steer equipment in 2020, and that 73.2% of them were oilseed and grain farms. Guidance technology is part of everyday field work on large grain operations, and that is where most of it is found.

The Prairie provinces lead on guidance and mapping

Because so many oilseed and grain farms are on the Prairies, the three Prairie provinces sit above the national rate for most field technologies. Saskatchewan had the highest auto-steer rate of any province or territory: 47.6% of its farms in 2020, up from 41.5% in 2015. Manitoba followed at 41.4%, a figure Statistics Canada describes as higher than all but one province. Alberta reported 31.1%, up from 25.7% in 2015.

The order is the same for drones, at much lower levels: 5.2% of farms in Saskatchewan, 4.9% in Manitoba and 4.2% in Alberta, against 3.6% nationally. For mapping and variable-rate technology, Statistics Canada's provincial articles give figures for Saskatchewan and Manitoba. Saskatchewan reported 17.7% for GIS mapping, tied with Ontario for the highest rate, and 21.9% for variable-rate technology. Manitoba reported 16.1% for GIS mapping, up from 10.0% in 2015, and 16.4% for variable-rate technology, almost the same as the national 16.1%.

A separate Statistics Canada source points the same way. The Farm Management Survey, which samples farms rather than counting all of them, found that over nine in ten field crop farms in Manitoba (94%) and Saskatchewan (92%), and nine in ten in Alberta (90%), used GPS equipment in 2021. The survey and the census ask different questions of different groups of farms, so their percentages should not be compared directly.

What these numbers do not show

The census counts farms, not acres, machines or hours of use. A farm that used auto-steer on one tractor for one week counts the same as a farm that runs guidance on every pass across many thousands of acres. The census also does not say how well a technology worked, whether the data it produced was ever used to make a decision, or whether the farm kept using it after 2020.

Finally, the 2021 list did not ask about many tools that now come up in conversations about digital agriculture, such as farm management software, satellite imagery services, connected sensors or data-sharing platforms. For those, census-quality figures are not yet available.

What federal programs say about digital agriculture

Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada treats digital agriculture partly as a question of shared infrastructure. Among the objectives of its Canadian Agricultural Strategic Priorities Program, the department lists creating new frameworks for digital agriculture interoperability, data standardization projects and cyber security. The program accepts applications until it ends on March 31, 2029, or until its funding is committed.

Remote sensing has also become part of federal research funding. On July 9, 2026, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada announced up to $1.65 million through the AgriScience Program, under the Sustainable Canadian Agricultural Partnership, for a three-year project at A.U.G. Signals Ltd. The project will develop tools for crop health monitoring and yield forecasting that combine satellite, drone and field data, and departmental scientists will help collect field data and validate the models. The minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food, Heath MacDonald, said that "Artificial intelligence and remote sensing will help the agriculture sector adapt to climate change". The Sustainable Canadian Agricultural Partnership itself is a $3.5-billion, five-year federal, provincial and territorial agreement covering 2023 to 2028.

The 2026 Census of Agriculture

The next count has already taken place. Statistics Canada announced on May 4, 2026 that collection for the 2026 Census of Population and the 2026 Census of Agriculture had begun, with farm operators invited to respond online. The census questionnaire was published in July 2025. Until its first results are released, the 2021 figures above are the most complete national picture of technology on Canadian farms.

When the 2026 results are released, they will show whether guidance and mapping kept spreading beyond the grain belt, and whether drones moved out of the low single digits. Any comparison should check first that each question was worded the same way in both years.

Questions a farm can ask before adopting a digital tool

The census shows what farms used, not how they decided. The questions below are the ones many operations work through, in some form, when they look at a new digital tool. They are listed neutrally, and the answers depend on the operation.

• Time: how many hours would setting the tool up, learning it and keeping it current take, and in which months of the year?
• Who would use it: will the person who reads its output have time to act on it, and how is it passed on to anyone else involved?
• Data ownership: who owns the field data the tool collects or produces, and does the agreement say so in plain words?
• Data access: can the farm export its own records in a common format, and what happens to them if the subscription ends?
• Sharing: who else, such as the provider, its partners or an adviser, can see the data, and can the farm change that?
• Connectivity: does the tool need a mobile or internet connection in the field or the yard, and what does it do when there is none?
• Compatibility: does it work with the equipment, displays and software the farm already has, and with other brands it might buy later?
• Support: who answers questions during busy weeks, how quickly, and is help available in the farm's preferred language?
• Evidence: what kind of evidence stands behind the provider's claims (published research, independent trials, company reports or examples), and does it come from conditions like the farm's own?
• Exit: how hard would it be to stop using the tool after one season, and what would be lost?