"Smart Technology Series" : APPLICATION OF IoT IN AGRICULTURE (SMART FARMING)
Hi everyone, it’s with great pleasure that I welcome you to my blog. I once again would like to appreciate your continued support and contributions.
Today, I’m back with the Smart Technology Series. I believe you followed the first series where I introduced the concept of IoT to us. There, I focused on the Smart Home technology that has been enhancing life for us in the home.
In this post, I’ll be talking about the concept of Smart farming as related to our lives. Stay with me.
As a preamble, I would like to note that, hunger or simply say inadequate or more critically, unavailability of food is one of the major problem facing humanity especially down here in the African continent.
A Report has it that by 2050, the world population will rise to about 9.6 billion and this phenomenon has a great implication on the ability of agriculture to cater for this population. This pushes us all to start devising means of maximizing the productivity of agriculture in other to salvage this impending situation. Hence, the intervention of scientist in employing the growing technology of IoT in the field of Agriculture called Smart Farming.
THE CONCEPT OF IOT AND SMART FARMING
As explained in the earlier series, IoT (Internet of Things) involves the integration of sensors, actuators and control systems in “things” which could be home appliances, equipment or machine in a connected network that allows communication and exchange of data between these things possible.
Smart farming hence is the application of this hi-tech in agricultural procedures to make it more productive and sustainable. So, we can define Smart Farming to be;
An efficient, capital-intensive, highly-precise farming method that employs the modern information and communications Technology in Agriculture. It helps to improve the area of Agriculture that limits its productivity and efficiency such as Climate Change calamities, agricultural wastage, limited arable land, cost and availability of fossil fuels and so on.
AREAS OF APPLICATION OF SMART FARMING IN AGRICULTURE
The concept of Smart farming goes beyond targeting the conventional, large farming process but it looks to cut across every field of agriculture to enhance productivity and serve as a lever to uplift the trends in Agriculture. There are numerous fields of application of Smart Farming in existence already. I’ll be listing few very important ones in this post below
PRECISION FARMING
Precision farming or Precision Agriculture is one the most significant area where IoT is being applied in agriculture. It involves the use of sensors, control systems, robotics, autonomous vehicles, Variable Rate (VR) technology and so on in agriculture. This approach majorly ensures that farming is done more accurately and in a controlled manner.
Popular in Precision Agriculture is the establishment of CropMetrics - a precision agriculture organization that is focused on the management of Precision Irrigation through the use of ultra-modern agronomic solutions. This organization aims at improving the profitability of irrigated crops through the management of topology, soil variability, and water use efficiency.
Some of the products and services of this organization include Variable Rate Irrigation (VRI) optimization, the invention of soil moisture probes, use of the virtual optimizer PRO and so on.
VRI optimization involves the controlled management and maximization of the activities involving irrigation towards achieving a precise style of irrigation and increasing profitability. The Virtual optimizer PRO is an interface that uses a combined technology for water management on a centralized, cloud-based system. The Soil moisture probe a local agronomy support and recommendations for optimizing efficient water usage.
Precision farming hence focuses on three major aspects of Agriculture; Crop Science, Environmental Protection and Agricultural economics and can help the farmers in the following ways;
- Build up a standard and updated record of the farm
- Enhances quality farm products
- Enhances environmental conscious farming
- Improves traceability of any arising issues
- Helps improve product marketing
- Improve decision making
LIVESTOCK MONITORING
Another big area of application of IoT in agriculture is in the automated monitoring of livestock. In Nigeria for example, Livestock management is known to be done by the Fulanis who controlled a herd of cattle with their stick, wandering about to find land for the cows to graze.
The advent of IoT makes this easier as sensors can be used to locate and identify the position of cattle and more interestingly, health state data of these cattle can be generated by these sensors making it easy to separate sick cows from other and hence, reduces spread of diseases.
This phenomenon helps to lower the labor of this herdsman and cut down costs incurred in hiring their services. An organization known as JMB North America is known to specialize in Cows Monitoring Services.
SMART GREENHOUSE
As we all know, one of the greatest force contributing to the productivity of Agricultural sector especially crop production is Climate. Several crops have its own favoring climatic condition and hence limits the control of the farmer over such factor. We most times see a big drop in crop production especially in the dry season and some other bad weather condition. But with Smart Greenhouse, this problem is solved.
The Smart Greenhouse is an IoT based innovation that employs control systems and sensors in modeling the favorable climatic conditions as required by a particular crop. This makes it possible to grow any kind of crop at any season as it provides the necessary weather condition that favors the crop.
In a Greenhouse, IoT sensors make it possible to control light levels, pressure, humidity, and temperature. They also send information to actuators that enable it to control certain actions like opening a window, turning on lights, a heater, or a fan, all controlled through a Wi-Fi signal.
The Smart Greenhouse Technology is by far a groundbreaking invention and has contributed a great percentage of the food supply to the world population as compared to the previous days of just natural climatic conditions of farming
The Illuminum Greenhouses is a known Agri-Tech greenhouse organization. They use solar-powered IoT sensors to provide affordable greenhouses services where the farmers receive SMS alert through an online portal.
AGRICULTURAL DRONES
Another eye-catching area of IoT application in Agriculture Is the use of Drones in farm operations. For large farming lands containing millions of seeds and plants, monitoring the crop health condition and other field analysis wouldn’t be easy to do manually or simply say will take time and reduces productivity. Thus, the advent of Agricultural Drones courtesy of IoT is a great intervention towards Agricultural improvement and effectiveness.
Agricultural Drones could be easily used for filed analysis, crop spraying, seed planting, irrigation and crop monitoring. The image processing ability of drones also makes it possible to get image data of the crop health state, real-time data collection, and process, and help, yield and productivity are improved.
The drones also collect multispectral, visual imagery and thermal data of plants. These plus other data will make it possible to construct plant distribution data, plant health data and so on. Plant height measurement, weed pressure mapping, field water ponsing mapping and many others can also be generated with the aid of Agricultural Drone.
MANAGEMENT INFORMATION SYSTEM
This is another important application of IoT in Agriculture. With the availability of automated communication systems, farmers are afforded an easier way to get information about their farms and farming operations.
A Planned system for collecting, processing, storing, and disseminating data is then possible and farmers would be able to carry farm’s operations and functions more easily. The farm equipment and tools are automated in a way that operating data are being generated as it is being used.
Along with other data from other connected tools, these are compiled in a processed form by some controlled interface where the data can be analyzed and controlled for better operation the equipment and tools. This field has contributed greatly to the improvement and production level achieved in Smart Farming
FACTORS LIMITING THE GROWTH OF SMART FARMING
As lovely as this idea of smart farming is, it has many limiting factors as per its implementation by farmers, ranchers, and land-owners around the world
The most prominent problems that limit the application of Smart Family is its high cost. To fully implement smart farming, the initial cost as well as the maintenance cost is very high and would prove very hard for small farmers to afford.
Another limiting factor is the issue of communicating with farmers. To convince them about the invaluable improvement that implementing IoT practices in farming will bring. Many of them do not understand the technicality of things and will find it difficult to accept it
Amongst its limitation is the lack of investment in the field of technology. Being a new and growing technology, it hasn’t seen a lot of investment that will make it stand firm and gets implemented worldwide. This, in fact, affects its popularity in the Agriculture world and limits its growth.
CONCLUSION
The growing population of the world calls for a more efficient, fast and smart way of carrying out Agricultural operations so as to cater for this rising numbers. So, farmers, ranchers, and land-owners need to start looking at the great benefits that come with implementing Smart Farming. They should see the gap that it would bridge as related to food production through the use of the Greenhouse Technology and also the impact it could have on Livestock farming.
Smart technology is the future and hence, it is important to start integrating it into the Agricultural sector so as to improve hunger level and a lot the rising rate of malnourished individual around the world.
Thanks for your time. Hoping to see you soon.
REFERENCES
Being A SteemStem Member
Did you come across much in your research about farmers developing their own IoT apps and hardware? I know IoT is a big deal for Makers in other fields. Related to that, do you think there's much concern about proprietary hardware/software lock-in, such as with some tractors?
The first time I read about this technique in agriculture, if it is used more widely we will eliminate famine, why it is not so widespread yet? Is this because of its cost? Or technical difficulties?
thank you for sharing this interresting informations with us :)
As noted its cost to a great extent limits its implementation. We can say it's technicality in case of local farmers also contributes to its growth.
Thanks for stopping by
Well written article. In addition, I think everyone can practice agriculture. Whether in the rural or urban area. Those in the urban that has limited space for planting, can implore the hydroponics method (water working agriculture) while those in the rural areas have no excuse to practice agriculture. Since there is surplus of lands for agricultural production. If everyone go into agriculture, there will never be fear of lack or want in the future . Even though the world's population becomes 20 billion people. Well done @mrbreeziewrites
Well, the number of people going into farming may increase production. But, it can't be enough to cater for that much number. Hence, the need for technology esp a smart one that help automate the operations for faster execution and accuracy.
Thanks for your comments. I appreciate.
Throwing some love here and there
The future is really bright with technology.
You would agree with me that the success of the 21st century world is tied to the advanced technology available.
Brighter than the stars actually. We can undoubtedly say that we thrive on the advents of technology.
Thanks for the comments
Agriculture is by far the most important sector in any country. I hope that in time the limitations of IoT are minimized so that it can reach the poor. 'cos I see that those limitations are for the poor.
Thanks for the tech update sire.
Exactly... The cost makes it less affordable by the minors.
Thanks for stopping by
You combined two of the amazing things I love in this world, Technology and Agriculture.
IoT has introduced effective and efficient ways to boost production and resource management in the Agric. industry over the years.
This is quite enlightening. Thanks for sharing!
Good knowing you found it interesting. Agriculture is our way out.. Then, technology could help us make it easier.
You're welcomed sire
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Fantastic developments happening in this area!
Thanks to @addempsea, this post was resteemed and highlighted in today's edition of The Daily Sneak.
Thank you for your efforts to create quality content!
Thanks so much for the kind gesture. I appreciate alot @sneakyninja
I appreciate your support @addempsea
My apologies for linking the wrong edition. Your article was featured in this one:
https://steemd.com/curation/@sneakyninja/the-daily-sneak-16-march-2018-with-guest-curator-addempsea
Now this is interesting, smart technology is definitely the future and if it can be integrated into our agricultural sector here in Nigeria, the future will be brighter.
Thank you for sharing.
Yeah, it is... It is quite costly though... I hope our govt would see the possible benefits rather than the initial cost.
Thanks for stopping by
I hope so too. You're welcome!!
#hugs