The Courier & Advertiser (Fife Edition)
The Smart money’s on massive growth
With apps for crops, livestock and farm equipment, the forecast is that the agricultural industry will be using 40 million devices by 2025
The agricultural industry will be using 40 million Smart Farming devices by 2025, according to French Internet of Things (IOT) consultant Samuel Ropert.
Forecasting strong worldwide growth in the usage of apps for crops, livestock and farm equipment, he sees the European industry playing a major part in the increased uptake of innovative farming technologies over the next 25 years.
While predicting a big future ahead for Smart Farming solutions, however, with Asia-Pacific producers and farm businesses set to become the IOT market leaders, the French consultant added that current adoption levels by farmers remain quite low.
“This can be attributed, in particular, to financial barriers,” he said, adding that many current solutions remain unaffordable for the average farmer.
M . Ropert’s Smart Farming forecasts are based on internal company research which highlights the potential of new technologies to offer multiple benefits to farmers.
“Data is the major enabler for Smart Farming, where the ability to interpret data can enable farmers to optimise and better monitor the health of their livestock,” he said.
Climate change considerations for farmers are also seen as another major source of momentum for future Smart Farming growth.
M. Ropert said current IBM Research estimates show 90% of yield losses being due to weather conditions. By combining weather forecasting models and precision agriculture techniques these losses could be cut by 25%.
“Another bonus attached to the use of smart solutions is that it helps to reduce paperwork considerably,” he said. “For instance, trackers on farming equipment eliminates the need to keep a manual log of operators’ work hours. They also reduce the ability to commit fraud.
“Ultimately, however, the main driving force for the sector is farmers’ desire to improve productivity as these solutions can enable them to optimise crop and livestock yields, reduce costs considerably and could potentially generate new revenue streams.”
To make full use of emerging Smart Farming solutions, producers in Scotland will need to be well- connected, a challenge which the farm co-operative body SAOS is already addressing by trialling rural connectivity through its SmartRural offshoot.
Based in Stonehaven and the surrounding area, the SmartRural trial embraces arable pastures and deep valleys, alongside a town of 10,000 people, many of whom can access 4G. That’s a level of connectively which remains a rural distant dream.
“We’re currently testing the effectiveness of a Long Range Wide Area Network (LoRaWAN), which is a form of low power wireless communication developed to support IOT and which we’ve established as a contained network covering the trial area,” said Bob Yuill, SAOS deputy chief executive.
“We’re also testing the software packages. Once the network is proven, in tune with the necessary software, the way will be clear for such networks to be rolled out across Scotland, giving more and more farmers the opportunity to use Smart Farming devices across a whole range of crop and livestock tasks.”