Smart Farming Technology: Benefits for Modern Agriculture

Global transformations like climate change and growing population create an increasing strain on the agriculture market. We’ll need better technologies in the form of agriculture software solutions to obtain improved crop yields in the upcoming years. 

We want to discuss a technology that will play a major role in the transformation of agricultural facilities in the upcoming years. This innovation comes in the form of smart farming technologies. In this article, we’ll outline the essence of this innovation and discuss the benefits of smart farming technology. 

What Does Smart Farming Stand For?

Smart farming technology involves the usage of modern computer-based innovations for improving traditional farming methods and implementing new approaches to farming. Smart farming solutions encompass a large number of technologies. These are drones, sensors, robots, smart devices, and the relevant software for collecting data from all these solutions. Together, this smart farming technology achieves several vital goals. Firstly, it allows the collection of tremendous amounts of information about farms, turning decision-making in them towards more advanced forms. Secondly, this technology is vital for automation: it’s now possible to transfer the workers to more complex tasks. Thirdly, those technologies reduce danger to workers by making many of the processes autonomous. The agriculture sector needs technology of this type because it enables the promotion of innovations like precision agriculture.

Key Smart Farming Technologies

Smart farming technology is crucial for reducing labor costs in modern farms. Let’s review the core technologies that enable those positive reductions:

Agricultural drones

A major challenge encountered by many agricultural businesses is the problem of overviewing their facilities. In many cases, the territories covered by those organizations are simply too large to analyze in person. Consequently, the analysis of factors such as soil conditions becomes extremely difficult. One of the best ways to make informed decisions in this regard is to use agricultural drone technology. Using drones, you can quickly review information on a tremendous number of territories. More importantly, many drones have in-built tools for analysis. Thus, you’ll not only have visual confirmation but other sources of data, too. Agricultural drones are undoubtedly the future of the modern agriculture industry.

Sensor-based tools

Unexpected events such as water pipe leakages are a common occurrence in many facilities. The core problem is that detecting those incidents is extremely difficult. Advanced technologies in the form of sensor-based tools finally offer a solution to this issue. This smart farming technology allows you to collect information on various aspects of agriculture in a more or less automatic mode. What are the types of information you can collect with the help of this technology? There are many options in this respect. You can collect data on soil conditions, irrigation levels, atmospheric characteristics, and various maintenance-related aspects like water pipe conditions. The core goal of this technology is to help you collect information without the usage of the human workforce. 

Agricultural robots

Robots are also a part of modern agriculture-based smart technology. Robotic tools can work in a myriad of ways. Some robots can monitor your crops by going through the facilities. Essentially, these are land-based drones. It’s also possible to use robots for doing some of the most complex and difficult tasks. For instance, modern communication technologies enable users to control tractor-based robots. As a result, it’s possible to do the most demanding work from a distance. Smart farming technology is crucial in this case because it allows controlling the relevant robots. Ultimately, control is possible both in manual mode through mobile applications or even via artificial intelligence. 

Internet of Things (IoT) integration

The Internet of Things is one more technology that is bound to transform the relevant field. What is it capable of doing? IoT is the integration of the Internet and mobile operating systems like Android into diverging tools. Integration is possible across multiple dimensions. You can try integrating these innovations into sensors and robots to control advanced greenhouse technologies or make accurate weather predictions. It’s also possible to use this IoT to turn traditional agricultural tools into instruments that are more cost-effective. For example, a drill with IoT integration will be able to showcase when it needs a change of some parts. 

Software for managing farms

The final element of any smart farm is the software for managing them. In this respect, there’s a large number of solutions to consider as of today. Firstly, you can try investing in tools for monitoring sensors and drones. Secondly, smart farming technology is crucial for promoting automation. A central hub for AI and manual control of robots requires some sort of user interface. Software for managing farms offers these user interfaces. The agriculture market has many solutions of this kind today. More importantly, it’s possible to develop new solutions that will target some unique aspects of agriculture not available in other types of software.

Smart Farming Benefits

There are multiple major benefits that smart farming technology offers these days. Here are the top 5 improvements that an average agriculture business can expect with this technology:

Decreased operational costs

The first reason to invest in this technology is the decrease in operational costs. In one way or another, modern smart farming technology can greatly decrease your expenditures. Firstly, it allows one to channel investments into the workforce towards more productive goals. Secondly, agricultural software is also essential because it decreases the overall need for the workers. Modern sensors, for instance, allow monitoring as much as possible in an automatic mode. Lastly, there’s an opportunity to transition the workers from the more dangerous tasks to the safer ones, reducing the potential for workplace trauma.

Improved yields

Improved control over the majority of the production factors becomes essential for improving yields. Crop monitoring can warn you about a large number of negative factors, such as crop diseases. Consequently, investments in crop insights are among the best ways to improve crop yields. Crop management software assists with finding problems before they become too significant. In this light, it’s possible to greatly boost the overall production values in your business. 

Improved Accuracy of Financial Forecasting

The improvements in the accuracy of financial forecasting are one more significant benefit of agricultural technology these days. Smart farming technology allows the managers to track all agricultural activities. As a result, it’s possible to know where every dollar of investment was spent on your farm. This knowledge is crucial for improving financial monitoring. The agricultural sector has a large proportion of small farms that need to accurately monitor the usage of their funds. In this light, real-time data is essential because it allows one to clearly understand where particular sums of money went.

Upgraded sustainability

Real-time insights are essential when you need to upgrade sustainability in your business. Why are they so essential? Real-time insights allow businesses to understand where they’re inefficient in terms of using resources. Further upgrades can then help with making the relevant farms sustainable. Smart farming technology is notable for its ability to gradually transform processes. By marking inefficiencies in one field or another, it promotes small-scale everyday improvements even without the usage of any other advanced tools.

Better reporting

Lastly, major improvements stemming from agricultural technology also come in the form of better reporting. In this case, real-time monitoring is essential because it allows creating a very clear picture of your agriculture business. This is essential for improving reports on long-term agricultural production and promoting other positive practices in your agriculture business. For example, it becomes easier to track the usage of natural resources with the help of smart farming technology. Using this technology, you can now create a more or less complete timeline of your business activities by reviewing the core data from agricultural sensors.

Core Aspects to Consider While Installing Smart Farming Technology

There are multiple core factors to consider while installing smart farming technology. In our opinion, you should look at the following aspects to get maximum smart farming benefits:

Analyzing costs

The first aspect to consider is the analysis of implementation costs. You should clearly understand how much the investments in smart farming tools will cost. There are many major differences between various markets. In some cases, the equipment is highly expensive. In others, it may have an acceptable price. We recommend addressing smart farming professionals with knowledge of the agricultural industry while making this analysis.

Analyzing privacy requirements

Privacy requirements are one more aspect that you should actively consider in the smart agriculture sector. The benefits of using smart farming technologies are outweighed by their ability to monitor too much information. Consequently, your goal is to ensure maximum privacy for all individuals. For instance, drones shouldn’t be able to interfere with the private lives of other individuals in your workspace. AI technologies and employee training may be essential to guarantee maximum privacy in this scenario.

Preparing technical knowledge

Preparing high-quality technical knowledge is one more aspect that is essential for the implementation of new technologies. Smart farming technologies are relatively difficult to use. They require the knowledge of computers and smartphones. One should also have an understanding of the software utilized for controlling the relevant smart farming tools. For this goal, you should actively think about the preparation of technical knowledge. In this regard, your core goal is to invest in employee training. Showcase your workers how to use new technologies to maximize positive impacts for everyone.  

Upgrading connectivity

Lastly, you must actively think about connectivity tools while working with all forms of smart farming technology. Smart farming requires the active usage of the Internet to function well. As a result, we recommend making large-scale investments into all types of connectivity technology in your farm before considering the full-scale implementation of smart farming technology. Without connectivity, the attempts to invest in this technology will likely fail and lead to long-term economic losses for your farm. They simply can’t work without this factor.

How Can Keenethics Help Agricultural Businesses with Smart Farming Technology?

Keenethics can help agricultural businesses with smart farming technology in two ways. Firstly, we may offer a consultation on the implementation of these technologies in your business. Our team has significant expertise with the relevant technologies and can highlight the sectors that are the most worthy of your attention. Secondly, being a software development company, Keenethics can also assist your business with developing a full-scale software solution for controlling various types of smart farming software. We can integrate support for sensors, drones, and robots. Our team also knows how to create many other types of custom software for the relevant decision-makers.

Conclusion

To summarize, the presented information clearly shows that investments in agricultural technologies like smart farming are worth it. Why is this the case? Firstly, you can automate many aspects of your farming. Secondly, this technology offers an opportunity to greatly improve reporting in the majority of cases. If you need help with implementing this technology, Keenethics is here to help. Our experts know how to deliver high-quality agricultural solutions: they can come up with an advanced smart farming custom solution for your business, too.

Do you want to invest in a smart farming solution?

Keenethics can help you develop advanced tools for controlling it!

Daria Hlavcheva

Head of Partner Engagement

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