Why precision farming is here to stay
There was a very eye-opening blog in The Farmers Weekly website this week regarding technologies and the wonders thereof in farming that is unknown to the average man on the street.
To quote the Blog by BightBytes: A Business take on new farming technologies:
“To date, I’ve written about many technological marvels that are changing the agricultural landscape bit by bit – from drones, to cloud computing and renewable energy, from water optimisation to virtual fencing.
Many of these innovations are viewed as single-standing technologies, but tech-savvy farmers are likely to use a selection on their farms.
How are we going to integrate these technologies and still keep it simple? Enter precision farming.
Precision farming is not just an idea – it’s an industry. There are already many service providers that offer integrated solutions to get the most from your farm.
According to London Free Press, precision farming is expected to become a US$4 billion (about R64 billion) global industry within the next few years.
Just imagine having a drone monitoring your land, sending soil data to your office, where it’s combined with information obtained from sensors in the soil. Your precision farming system will enable you to calculate the exact amount of water and fertiliser your land requires. You will improve your profits and yields, while reducing the negative impact of over-application of chemicals (as explained by NASA in this interesting article).
Precision farming methods are already being applied successfully by local farmers, such as Farmer of the Year Brad O’Neil, who told Farmer’s Weekly it will play a crucial role in the sugarcane farming sector in the near future. But it’s not just going to be limited to this sector. In livestock farming, for instance, farmers will apply information technology to assess the animals and resources involved in the business.
A lot of the technology involved in precision farming sounds like rocket science to me, but it’s the integration that excites me. As we see more of this coming to the fore in agriculture, let’s hold thumbs for simple and easy-to-use interfaces!”
I took a piece out of the “interesting article” by NASA just to give you an idea on what is and can be done not to mention what precision farming is to become.
“Imagine you are a farmer riding along in your 50,000-acre wheat field early in the growing season. You push a button on your tractor to turn on its Global Positioning System (GPS) monitor, which pinpoints your exact location to within one meter. Touching another button, you display a series of Geographical Information System (GIS) maps that show where the soil in your field is moist, where the soil eroded over the winter, and where there are factors within the soil that limit crop growth. Next, you upload remote sensing data, collected just yesterday, that shows where your budding new crop is already thriving and areas where it isn’t. You hit SEND to upload these data into an onboard machine that automatically regulates the application of fertilizer and pesticides—just the right amount and exactly where the chemicals are needed. You sit back and enjoy the ride, saving money as the machines do most of the work. Congratulations, you are among a new generation of growers called “precision farmers.”
Does this sound like a science fiction scenario? It’s not. Even as you read this, there are already dozens of farmers around the United States and Canada who use satellite and aircraft remote sensing data to more effectively and efficiently manage their croplands.
“Precision crop management is still in the experimental phase,” states Susan Moran, a research hydrologist with the U.S. Department of Agriculture and member of the NASA Landsat 7 Science Team, based in Tucson, Arizona. “But there are a significant number of farmers who use high technology and remote sensing data for precision crop management.”
The U.S. Department of Agriculture, NASA, and NOAA are among key agencies contributing to this revolution in large-scale agriculture. The goal is to improve farmers’ profits and harvest yields while reducing the negative impacts of farming on the environment that come from over-application of chemicals.”
If I look as how technology has developed over the past decades, I can only imagine that the technology of the future will be mind-blowing. This is generating a technological movement globally; no wonder 3year olds are able to use Smartphones. I am very excited to see how the technology in farming unfolds and the benefits it will bring.