We’ve all been told that AI is coming for our jobs if we’re not careful, but artificial intelligence putting rat-catchers out of a living sure wasn’t on our bingo card for 2025.
Hong Kong’s Food and Environmental Hygiene Department (FEHD) has revealed the impressive results of a rather ingenious approach to tackling the city’s rodent problem: thermal imaging cameras coupled with AI technology.
New AI-enabled surveillance put into place last year has successfully led to a 40-percent increase in live rats captured across the city by pest control authorities compared to 2023, with approximately 89,600 live rodents snatched off the streets in 2024.
By deploying tech-driven rodent surveillance from 7pm to 7am over the course of three consecutive days in key areas across the city, health inspectors were able to lean on AI findings and examine heat signatures from thermal images to identify rodent behaviour, movement, and presence to come up with more effective pest control solutions.
In addition to surveillance tech and AI, the FEHD has also introduced new waste disposal systems and pressure-washing surface cleaners to uphold public cleanliness, and a harder stance on improper or illegal waste dumping or cluttering in back alleys.
Previously, the FEHD has carried out rodent prevention and pest control measures through the use of glue traps, leaving out poisonous bait, improving waste handling in public areas, and installing rodent guards to prevent rats from climbing up pipes and exterior walls. Rodent activity was monitored through the rather manual method of using sweet potatoes as bait and subsequently checking the tubers for gnaw marks. Will we be seeing any robotic rat-catchers on the streets soon? Only time will tell.
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