What is Digital Agriculture & How Can It Help Farmers?
Agriculture is the oldest and the most widely practiced culture. Even in this modern age of the digital world still we rely on the oldest practice for sustaining. Recent technologies are more focused on developing the age-old custom into a modern practice for the enrichment and nutritious production and one such method of application to farming is digital agriculture.
Digital agriculture often referred to as e-agriculture or digital farming is a method in which electronically collected data and another electrical mechanism is used in farming. Digital agriculture not only deals with the cultivation of crops but also includes livestock management and other process involved in farming.
It is often considered a new method of increasing production, decrease in expenditure, and good sums of profit. With the application of artificial intelligence, it is used as a tool for collecting data, analyzing the data, and producing results based on the available data.
The Role of Technology in Enhancing Crop Management Practices
Digital agriculture made it easy for product management and checking and managing animal behavior adding to the increase in agricultural production. Digital technologies include sensors, communication networks, unmanned aerial vehicles, robotic machines other advanced machinery and technologies. The best example we find is the usage of pedometers for cows in dairy farms.
The practice has been widespread in countries like the USA, with many researchers and scientists appreciating its efforts in the improvement of agricultural products. The purpose of digital agriculture is to provide a suitable environment with electronic facilities and also provide e-commerce platforms, yield mapping, and other GPS services.
Today farmers are using these platforms to know about the combination and the number of fertilizers and other chemicals to be used.
Digital farming tools were initially designed to make it easier for farmers in providing basic services like-GPS guidance, and herd monitoring sensors, and to help them to organize their farming practices in environmentally friendly locations by connecting them to weather stations, and crop models used to optimize input usage. They have also helped in strengthening the ties with the consumer, who gets quality food and also has access to trace their origins. As the years flow it evolved into one of the most promising forms in the agriculture industry.
How Digital Agriculture Can Optimize Yields While Reducing Costs
Digital agriculture which played a pivotal part in the agriculture industry in the western world is now introduced in India. At a time when it is considered expensive one is now brought down to fair prices which are even accessible by normal farmers. The new technology Digital Agri Mission in India launched by Union Agriculture Minister Narendra Singh Tomar tells about the advancements made in the science and technology in agriculture improving the digital equipment available for sophisticated use.
“India also has the ability to achieve a position in today’s competitive world, but to reach there and be able to go ahead, we should know the scientific importance of even the smallest thing. Only then we will be able to go ahead in the world competition,” quoted the minister.
The usage of modern machinery along with advanced applications such as machine learning, artificial intelligence, and big data are used in collecting and analyzing the data.
The applications such as drones are actively used in digital farming
Not only in crop cultivation but also in cattle management like pedometers are used for cow’s devices working on checking the poultry were also in process. The main objective of the mission is to work on scientific research in order to develop the devices and provide them to farmers helping them in developing themselves.
It is a known secret that the agriculture industry is the largest sector in the Indian economy, which needs to be focused and advancements have to be done for making it competitive for modern changes. The features like a weather analyzing system help farmers give information about planning the other day’s activities. This helps in planning ahead and the chances of losing the crops decrease.
The introduction of sensors also plays a vital role in sensing the changes in the environment and is assisted by the robotic machines developing solution which is highly accurate in helping the farmers. It helps the current generation of farmers by decreasing their workload and also providing a surplus amount of crops with high nutritious values in a limited time. Studies have proven that the advancements in the agriculture industry are about to turn into some of the biggest financial poles.
The drones which are highly used in fields like cotton helps in providing high-rated images of the crops and also sensing the insets and pests giving information about the usage of pesticides when required. These drones can cover and analyze large tracks of land with minimal human effort and provide highly significant information. They bring a lot of options at the time of harvesting, irrigation, and pest control.
Organizing and analyzing the data and interpreting the results in a shorter time helped in finding solutions for various problems for both crops and livestock. With the introduction of the new technology of digital agriculture in India, it finds a huge growth in developing quality and quantity in production. It can save millions of waste that happens during cultivation by properly assigning the right materials and chemicals at the needed time.
Conclusion: Embrace the Future of Farming with Digital Agriculture Solutions Today!
“Digital agriculture is already changing the landscape of agricultural research by allowing many more sources of data to be brought together for interpretation. This enables the development of apps with specific functions, real-time decision making, and expanding the field of predictive agriculture,” said Karen Plaut, the Glenn W. Sample Dean of the College of Agriculture.
“There is an increasing amount of data that is generated and farmers want to make decisions with that data, farms get larger and we continue to improve milk production per cow, farms need to rely on individual cow data that is gathered from technology to continue to improve,” told Boerman.
These words are evident that digital agriculture is the practice of the future where we can meet the demand of the population at low cost and high quality and also risk-free.
Also Read: Digital Agriculture: क्या है ये डिजिटल एग्रीकल्चर मिशन, जिससे किसानों को मिल रहा है सीधा फायदा
