Точне землеробство: особливості і складності впровадження | Agrilab
Precision farming: the peculiarities and complexity of the implementation

Today, profits from Ukrainian producers are decreasing. This trend will continue due to a significant increase in the cost structure of production for energy, fertilizers, seeds, CCP, land rent, wages, taxes, etc. However, the agrarian sector faces an even greater problem associated with the uncertain climate change impact on future production.

Factors such as climate change, cost growth stimulate the industry to find innovative approaches to protecting and improving crop yields.

Innovations and, in particular, precision farming, create a new economic sector that has the potential for a complete change in agribusiness, dramatically increasing the productivity of the agricultural system by reducing the environmental, material and social costs of the current practice of agricultural production.

Today, the actual growth and distribution of precise agriculture is becoming sustainable. But this sector faces a number of key challenges:

Control zones

Traditionally, agronomists of small and large companies have considered all their fields as a single farm. Now many technologists continue to use the unified application of fertilizers and other resources for the whole economy or a large array of fields, which leads to a sub optimal result. Such an approach is far from the effectiveness of the application of elements of precision agriculture in agriculture. Agronomists / technologists have to divide their lands / fields into several smaller “control zones” – and there is a lot of confusion about the “correct” understanding of these zones. The zones should be separated according to a system analysis of data: soil sampling requirements (different zones have different soil and potential), field characteristics, topographical data, moisture content and requirements for the use of fertilizers, seeds, etc. “Area of ​​management” is a part of the field that reflects a relatively homogeneous combination of factors limiting profitability for a specific culture or crop rotation.

The spatial information that is most useful in determining the zones of management should be quantitative (numerical), tightly or continuously selected, stable over time and directly related to yield.

Data collection

In recent years, data collection technologies have been developed and introduced in the market – soil analysis, unmanned aerial vehicles, satellite images, EC mapping and yields, weather stations, various sensors and sensors for measuring properties in soils and plants, etc. These technologies are capable of collecting a large amount of data that can be further analyzed and used for better decision-making. Also, many companies are developing separate software applications for information gathering and decision support. There are complexities in collecting data, since companies, especially small and medium-sized enterprises, lack the technological infrastructure and sufficient expertise to consolidate and analyze data.

Different standards

More and more developers are releasing new tools, individual software applications and platforms, and interoperability quickly becomes an issue. Various available tools and technology often do not meet the same technological standards, which requires clarification in the final analysis of end-users. Precision agriculture, although rapidly developing, is still, to a large extent, fragmented. The challenge is to transform intelligent stand-alone devices and gateways into holistic, farm-based platforms.

Internet in the fields

Many remote rural areas and fields do not have a reliable Internet connection. This, in turn, prevents attempts to use high-quality precision farming systems. If network performance and bandwidth rates are not significantly improved, implementation of digital farming will remain problematic. Moreover, reception of GPS signals becomes a big problem in agricultural lands with high, dense trees and / or wavy terrain with significant elevation variations.

Understanding of large data

Digital agriculture is becoming an increasingly global approach to data usage, but this technology is useful only when users can “understand” the available information and use it.

Progressive farmers using modern tools for data collection have hundreds of thousands of data points in the fields. However, it is impossible to monitor and manage each data point and view it daily / weekly throughout the entire growing season. The problem is particularly acute in large, long-term agricultural surveys, when there is a need for monitoring over several years of crop cultivation. The importance for an agronomist is to find out what data “layers” they can afford to ignore, and what they need to be monitored regularly and how to make decisions based on these data. Applications that simply provide information on non-homogeneous zones or the general state of plant development in the fields are not very useful – there is a need for more systematic analysis and forecasting tools that can anticipate and help agronomists avoid losses. An analysis of historical data such as yields, weather, soil trends, inputs, etc., together with an analysis of real-time factual data, can provide agronomic powerful tools for sound decision-making and risk management.

Teaching

Precision farming involves the introduction of cutting-edge technologies and tools to improve the efficiency of crop production. For engineers and agronomists, especially in small agricultural companies, the configuration and use of the necessary software, the network of sensors for its fields, special equipment and other precision farming systems can be very complicated. It should be borne in mind that the tolerance for errors in the technical high-rise “smart economy” is minimal – poor management can be catastrophic. For example, if incorrectly started the technology of locally-ribbon fertilization with the subsequent sowing of corn seeds in the corresponding lines with a significant deviation from the exact line (coordinates of the line for RTK pre-fertilization) introduction will result in a negative (negative) result. A deep acquaintance of agrarians with the concept of “smart agriculture” and the tools / devices involved in it is an extremely important prerequisite for its implementation. Lack of knowledge and high-quality support along the way can be dangerous.

Loss of jobs

As innovations in agriculture become more and more, and individual processes become automated, the need for manual, mechanical and unskilled agricultural work will gradually disappear. At the same time, there is a need for new specialties, specialists who can work and serve systems of precise / intelligent agriculture.

Lack of economic analysis from technologists and agronomists

An in-depth economic analysis should complement the use of tools or precision farming elements to ensure yields with optimal use of resources and high levels of profitability on the field. Precisely agriculture is the optimization of cultivation technology within the field and culture with the maximum possible use of available input materials and natural resources to increase the production of quality products with low cost.

Yaroslav Boyko, CEO of AgriLab, official representative of the International Organization for the Exploitation of Agriculture (ISPA) in Ukraine.

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