Touch is a 2D field of 3D vectors. Easily stored and transmitted as images, and easily processed by neural nets. You could add temperature and pain/damage channels if you want, though they don't seem essential for most manipulation tasks. (Actually I don't believe touch is as essential as he argues anyway. Of course someone who learned a task with touch will struggle without it, but they can still do it and would quickly change strategies and improve.)
The problem with touch is making sensors that are cheap and durable and light and thin and repairable and sensitive and shape-conforming. Representation is trivial in comparison.
This, it's a transduction problem (it's difficult to sense and even more difficult to output), not a representation problem.
A person who can't feel anything would struggle to reach around an obstacle, find a bolt they can't actually see, and thread a nut onto it.
I've done that and similar things many times. Touch is important. It may not be essential for all tasks but it is for some. Maybe even many.