At the risk of sounding out of touch, it’s true that technology sometimes doesn’t improve upon the “old-fashioned way” of doing something. Dennis Buckmaster, representing Purdue University, presented “Digital Tech in Agriculture: Boon, Bane, Barrier or Blessing?” at the recent New York Ag Society Forum. Buckmaster is a professor of agricultural and biological engineering at Purdue.
He offered as an example “Luna Dairy,” a fictitious 300-cow, 400-acre robotic dairy farm in central Pennsylvania, which markets its milk to a processor and regularly promotes agricultural education in the community. The farm uses historic data and weather forecasts for the week to determine things like when to plant what so that the farm operates with optimal efficiency and to achieve the optimal harvest among all the commodities grown.
Using technology to create digital models for livestock can also help farmers raise animals with greater efficiency and the least impact on their land.
“In order for that to happen, what data have to come together?” Buckmaster said. “How long until It happens? The ability to pull it together is not too far away, I feel.”
He proposed the fictitious farm as an example of where he feels agriculture is headed: to a highly data-driven model that’s precise and profitable. This management style includes numerous sensors, advanced machinery, models with data, artificial intelligence (AI) and practicality.
“One thing we have to do is get those data to flow,” Buckmaster said. That’s where sensors come in.
Sensors can help farmers detect in real time facilities’ temperature and humidity, fluid or bin levels, fluid flow, energy usage and as a control for turning equipment on or off and for opening and closing vents and doors.
In fields and orchards, sensors can detect soil moisture and chemistry, light intensity, crop pests and the location of vehicles and workers as well as control irrigation.
Dennis Buckmaster, representing Purdue University, spoke about digital tech at the recent New York Ag Society Forum. Photo by Deborah J. Sergeant
Of course, much of this functionality relies upon local infrastructure such as the ability to use smart phones, set up high speed internet and use these technologies on the farm. According to a report by the FCC in early 2024, 24 million Americans – 7% of the population – lack access to high-speed internet, meaning that it is unavailable, not that they cannot afford it. Most of those affected are in rural areas.
Farms with high-speed internet also need the right equipment to boost the signal so that the internet is useful.
LoRaWAN (low-power, wide-area network) technology can connect battery-operated equipment to the internet in regional, national or global networks. It is suitable for transmitting information like sensor data over long distances, even six miles in rural areas.
“These are extremely cost-effective for sensor data – not streaming video continuously,” Buckmaster said.
Advanced machinery represents another area in which technology is changing agriculture. Buckmaster said equipment such as tractors, sprayers, drones and autonomous machinery are already automating farm work, performing monotonous work, managing and predicting livestock needs and building in precision to every task assigned to them.
“Tractors can run macros, and we can teach them,” he said. “There are always sensor data flowing.”
One way in which data are useful is in creating “digital twins” for the real world. Computers base models on historic data to predict how things will go in the real world. For example, historic data on weather combined with current short-term forecasts and soil health tests can help farmers know when to apply nitrogen, and how much of it, on what crop.
“These are equations that explain how the world works,” Buckmaster said.
This kind of data management can help farmers maximize yields, lower their use and cost of inputs and improve soil health and environmental impact. The same type of technology can help farmers make operational decisions on many levels rather than merely guessing.
Buckmaster said using AI can help counsel humans regarding operations, solve interoperability problems, find anomalies, create biophysical models regarding inputs, share knowledge of farming and distribute likely scenarios.
But to share knowledge, farmers need to both open up about their experiences and take the time to share them.
Developing spreadsheets and other forms of digital recordkeeping and sharing information in apps represent two ways that farmers’ experiences can benefit themselves and others.
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