The Internet of Things (IoT) in Agriculture: IoT Solutions for Smart Farming
What Is Smart Agriculture?
Smart agriculture is a broad term that collects ag and food production practices powered by Internet of Things, big data and advanced analytics technology. The most common IoT applications in smart agriculture are:
Sensor-based systems for monitoring crops, soil, fields, livestock, storage facilities, or basically any important factor that influences the production.
Smart agriculture vehicles, drones, autonomous robots and actuators.
Connected agriculture spaces such as smart greenhouses or hydroponics.
Data analytics, visualization and management systems.
Sensor data analytics drives transparency into agricultural processes, as farmers get precious insights on the performance of their fields, greenhouses, etc. However, this is not the only data farmers work with. As in any other industry, ag professionals have to deal with certain paperwork, which is usually a timely manual process. Smart systems for document workflow analytics and management help automate this process and provide better efficiency. Learn more about the automated document management system in agriculture .
Benefits of Using IoT in Agriculture
As in other industries, application of Internet of Things in agriculture promises previously unavailable efficiency, reduction of resources and cost, automation and data-driven processes. In agriculture, however, these benefits don’t act as improvements, but rather the solutions for the whole industry confronting a range of dangerous problems.
Excelled efficiency. Today’s agriculture is in a race. Farmers have to grow more product in deteriorating soil, declining land availability and increasing weather fluctuation. IoT-enabled agriculture allows farmers to monitor their product and conditions in real-time. They get insights fast, can predict issues before they happen and make informed decisions on how to avoid them. Additionally, IoT solutions in agriculture introduce automation, for example, demand-based irrigation, fertilizing and robot harvesting.
Expansion. By the time we have 9 billion people on the planet, 70% of them will live in urban areas. IoT-based greenhouses and hydroponic systems enable short food supply chain and should be able to feed these people with fresh fruits and veggies. Smart closed-cycle agricultural systems allow growing food basically everywhere—in supermarkets, on skyscrapers’ walls and rooftops, in shipping containers and, of course, in the comfort of everyone’s home.
Reduced resources. Plenty of ag IoT solutions are focused on optimizing the use of resources—water, energy, land. Solutions for precision farming rely on the data collected from diverse sensors in the field which helps farmers accurately allocate just enough resources to within one plant.
Cleaner process. The same is relevant to pesticides and fertilizers. Not only do IoT-based systems for precision farming help producers save water and energy and, thus, make farming greener, but also significantly scale down on the use of pesticides and fertilizer. This approach allows getting a cleaner and more organic final product compared to traditional agricultural methods.
Agility. One of the benefits of using IoT in agriculture is the increased agility of the processes. Thanks to real-time monitoring and prediction systems, farmers can quickly respond to any significant change in weather, humidity, air quality as well as the health of each crop or soil in the field. In the conditions of extreme weather changes, new capabilities help agriculture professionals save the crops.
Improved product quality. Data-driven agriculture helps both grow more and better products. Using soil and crop sensors, aerial drone monitoring and farm mapping, farmers better understand detailed dependencies between the conditions and the quality of the crops. Using connected systems, they can recreate the best conditions and increase the nutritional value of the products.
