Smart Agriculture using IoT
Introduction:
Smart Agriculture using IoT is all about saving water, increasing efficiency and reducing the environmental impacts of ornamental plant production practices!
Smart agriculture also called Climate-smart agriculture or Smart Farming.
As per (Lipper et al. 2014), “Climate-smart agriculture (CSA) may be defined as an approach for transforming and reorienting agricultural development under the new realities of climate change.”
A few years ago everything in agriculture did manually that include cattle monitoring, soil nutrition measuring, water supply to crop, quality of the crop, etc
Now Smartphone revolution reaches to corner of India. Today farmer uses his mobile not only for calling but also for monitor and controlling his agriculture.
Smart agriculture or smart farming is a process of handling and monitoring agriculture activity using wireless technology and sensors. Using sensors and wireless technology farmer gets real-time information from the field to his remote location.
Smart agriculture uses wireless sensor networks and environmental modelling to more accurately predict and apply irrigation water in nursery and greenhouse operations, and monitor green roofs for stormwater mitigation.
Agriculture with following feature called ‘smart’:
- crop health monitoring
- Monitor condition of the soil,
- Nutrition in the soil for crop growth
- Water supply in the field
- Field equipment monitoring
- Controlling greenhouse gases emission, etc.
Benefits of Smart agriculture :
- Real-time information of farm.
- Customized knowledge.
- Reduce Information Asymmetry
- Increased productivity and better access to the market.
- Better return on investment.
- Less manpower requirement on fields and no need for round the clock monitoring.
- Limit the emission of Greenhouse gases
See also: IoT: A leading factor of Food Industry | IoT Food Industry
Success stories of Farmers due to Smart Agriculture:
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Bringing back the Sahel’s ‘underground forest’
Firewood is an increasingly scarce and valuable commodity in the Sahel. Farmers who allow trees to regenerate on their land have a ready source of fuel for their own use and for sale, and are able to leave crop residues in the field, building up organic matter in the fragile soil.
Over 5 million ha of degraded land in the Sahel have been restored through a practice known as ‘farmer-managed natural regeneration’, increasing the food security of millions of people and enhancing their resilience in the face of climate change.
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Sustainable intensification of rice production in Vietnam
More than 1 million smallholder farmers in Vietnam are benefiting from a package of rice production practices that boost yields, reduce water demand, enhance the environment and mitigate climate change.
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Herbicide-tolerant crops contribute to climate change resilience and mitigation
Adoption of reduced and zerotillage for canola has led to the buildup of organic matter in the soil, resulting in around 1 million tonnes of carbon being sequestered or no longer released into the atmosphere each year
See also: 4 Smart Farming Applications That Are Revolutionizing The Agriculture Industry
Smart agriculture Eco-system in India :
Using Mobile Telephony to Provide Agricultural Services and Advice to Smallholders in Rural India
In March 2008, the Indian Farmers Fertilizer Cooperative Limited (IFFCO) launched a project to leverage communication technology, in particular mobile telephony, to disseminate expert agricultural knowledge to small-scale farmers in rural India. The newly created business, IFFCO Kisan Sanchar Limited (IKSL), is a joint venture between one of India’s largest retailer of agri-inputs (IFFCO) and Bharti’ Airtel, India’s largest integrated and first private telecom services provider.
More details at Farmingfirst
Improving Harvests through Integrated Pest Management :
- Chilli farmers in Andra Pradesh used to lose up to 40 per cent of their harvest to pest infestations. With poor quality crops, farmers failed to secure high prices in the market. In addition, excessive use of crop protection products resulted in high pesticide residue levels in produce, compromising food safety and risking rejection for export.
- To solve the problem, CropLife India joined with the Department of Agriculture to implement Integrated Pest Management (IPM) programs throughout the state. These training sessions are designed to help farmers identify plant diseases and insect infestations and decide on the type and quantity of pesticides to use according to instructions on the labels. IPM helps farmers cut costs, improve crop quality and add value to their harvest. The partners have trained some 1,400 farmers on IPM in villages across Guntur in the form of seminars, field training and field demonstrations.
More details at Farmingfirst
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Success stories source: Book “Climate-smart agriculture ‘Success Stories’ From farming community around world” Written by Paul Neate
