We haven’t anticipated a world crisis, more dangerous than a pandemic, a bigger problem than fuel extinction yet, and it’s as basic as low agricultural productivity. Looks so small? Let’s assume that your food on the globe will be over by 2050. Population increase, limited natural and nonrenewable resources, the impact of a pandemic on the workforce, financial crisis, unpredictable weather conditions, climate change, and other global concerns are putting more pressure on the agriculture industry than ever before!
Farmers today face water scarcity/floods, land scarcity, and volatile costs as they work ceaselessly to feed the world. Food production becomes complex and expensive for impoverished farmers who lack good farming and agricultural education due to harsh conditions, eroding soil value, drylands, and declining ecosystems. To make matters worse, we’re not getting any fewer. By 2050, it is expected that the world’s population will have swelled to more than 9 billion people. That’s a lot of people to feed! IoT in agriculture could be a game-changer for humanity and the planet’s sustainability.
In agriculture, the Internet of Things is currently assisting many farmers in closing the ever-widening demand-supply gap. How? Smart IoT farming ensures great yields, profits, and environmental protection. Using IoT-enabled smart agriculture monitoring systems, farmers can achieve optimum resource application and high quality and quantity crop output, lowering operational expenses while still earning a profit. This is what precision agriculture is all about. IoT in agriculture is quickly expanding, thanks to specialized equipment such as wireless internet hands, powerful software, and IT services.
Implementation of IoT in Agriculture – Needs and Applications
In agriculture, IoT can be used to increase production and yield. Here are the top four IoT applications in the agricultural industry.
Robotics
Man is guilty of abusing and depending on automation to perform all of our tasks. However, with each passing year, technology is only growing better in executing complex and intricate jobs and increasing productivity. With rising demand and human resources limitations worldwide, farmers have turned to agriculture robots, also known as agribots, for crop production assistance. With agricultural yields declining, farmers couldn’t afford to invest in these agritech systems.
Robotic Weeding
Weeding robots are intelligent agribots that scan through photographs of weeds in their database, detecting crop and weed similarities and spraying them directly with their robotic arms. Pesticide resistance increases among plants, which is good for the environment and farmers. Farmers required an estimated 13000kg of pesticide per year to spray throughout their farmland, costing roughly 1725 crores! What huge cost savings these weeding robots would provide.
Navigation by Machine
Field tractors and heavy plowing equipment can be operated automatically from the comfort of a farmer’s house, similar to how remote-controlled toy cars function with a controller. These intelligently integrated auto machines are extremely accurate since they self-adjust to topographical changes, greatly simplifying labor-intensive jobs. You can follow machine movements, see impediments, and view work progress with only a few clicks and taps on your smartphone.
Robotics Harvesting
Agribots aren’t simply utilized to perform field jobs and harvest crops; they’re also used to address the labor shortage. These automated machines can handle the delicate task of picking fruits and vegetables, and they can do so 24 hours a day, seven days a week. These harvesting robots use a combination of robotic arms and visual processing to locate ripe fruits to pluck, ensuring quality control. These bots can be employed in greenhouse harvesting for high-value crops such as apples, tomatoes, and strawberries, where they must precisely calculate the best harvest time.
Handling of Materials
Smart agriculture monitoring systems based on the Internet of Things can automate manual labor operations. They might be physically taken out to work in the field with the employees. They can effortlessly move large objects and execute difficult tasks such as precise plant spacing, land area optimization, and plant quality. This one step alone can save a lot of money on production.
Drones
Aside from aerial photography, agriculture is a big business that employs drones today. Farmers use drones’ sensors and cameras for field imaging, mapping, and land surveys. Both on the ground and in the air, drones are also employed for Smart Farming Solution. Ground drones are wheeled robots that examine the terrain in the field.
Aerial drones, also known as unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) or unmanned aircraft systems (UASes), are flying robots that fly above a field, reading, mapping, photographing, and navigating the land for agricultural yield data. Both drones are piloted by remote control or fly autonomously, utilizing software-controlled flight plans in their embedded systems. Sensors and GPS are used in these. These may be recharged, maintained, and stored close to farms, and field surveys can be booked as a service. The data obtained provide information on crop health, irrigation, spraying, planting, soil and field, plant counting, and yield forecast, among other things.
Remote Sensing
IoT applications include remote sensing in agriculture, which collects data using sensors installed across the land. This information is subsequently sent to analytical tools for interpretation and analysis. Sensors are devices that detect irregularities with extreme sensitivity. Farmers employ sensors and monitors in Smart Farming Solution to monitor crops and take appropriate measures depending on the results on the analytical dashboard.
Crops, weather, and soil quality are all monitored using a variety of sensors. It provides farmers with consistent data on farm and field health. Any anomaly or change in light, humidity, temperature, crop shape, size, or other factors is quickly sent to the farmers. This is how remote sensing can help avoid disease spread in crops and track growth and productivity. Soil analysis also identifies the nutrient value of the soil and the farm’s drier land sections. This data is crucial because it informs the farmer about the soil drainage capacity or acidity, allowing them to modify the irrigation facility to the field and save a lot of money.
Computer Imaging
Sensor cameras are used in farm computer imaging applications. These are mounted on drones with cameras or in various field corners to produce photos using computer algorithms. These image processing programs look at photographs in different spectral intensities, such as infrared. Image processing combined with machine learning compares and sorts crops that differ in size, shape, color, and growth using photographs from the database. This aids in quality control, making it easier for farmers to keep yields consistent.
Conclusion
Farmers have learned that Smart Farming Solution and IoT in agriculture are cost-effective ways to increase crop productivity. Furthermore, IoT in agriculture solutions makes farming much easier for farmers, focusing on their core business: securing the world’s food supply!