Trustworthy AI for Insect Farming

Food safety and security are among the biggest challenges for the near future. The efforts to find new food sources and innovate the agricultural sector are more crucial than ever. However, the use of AI & robotics for the performance of tasks in farms, such as identifying and sorting insects for food and animal feed, calls for careful considerations regarding the legal, ethical and societal challenges involved in the automation of insect farms. Let’s discuss the potential implications of the use of AI & robotics in insect farms in the area of health and safety, data protection and human autonomy, and highlight how the CoRoSect project addresses them.

An effective way to tackle the legal, ethical and societal issues involved in the use of AI & robotics in insect farms is to identify the potential impacts of the technology on individuals, animals and society, and to implement any relevant organisational solutions early on in the process. For this reason, CoRoSect integrates the concept known as “by-design” to incorporate legal and ethical values to the technology throughout a system’s lifecycle—from research and development phases to its use.

About the author:

Burcu Yasar – Burcu is a legal researcher at the KU Leuven Centre for IT & IP Law. She conducts research in relation to artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, privacy and data protection in the framework of the EU funded research projects (H2020) CoRoSect and CyberSANE. She previously conducted research on the legal and ethical implications of the use of artificial intelligence in the justice sector at the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime in Vienna, Austria.

Prior to joining the CITIP, Burcu worked as an in-house lawyer in an international bank in Vienna. She holds an LL.B. degree from Galatasaray University and an LL.M. degree in Transnational Law from King’s College London.