Harvesting Sustainability : Transforming Agriculture Using Smart Technology
Cultivating Success: The Rise of the Smart Farmer
Agriculture is one of the world's largest industries, but it is under pressure. Climate change, fussy crops, weather extremes, market pressures, supply chain disruption and inadequate labor are putting farmers’ profitability at risk. Amidst these challenges, farmers must pioneer inventive ways to thrive. Next-gen automation holds immense potential in mitigating farming's climate impact and benefiting all stakeholders.
What is Smart Farming?
Smart farming optimizes agricultural practices by integrating the Internet of Things (IoT), artificial intelligence (AI), big data analytics and automation to enhance productivity, efficiency and sustainability.
Smart farming ensures:
*Increased operational productivity
*Reduced operational and energy costs
*Healthier plants
*Reduction in administrative work
Hitachi uses its expertise in digital technologies to implement smart farming systems to reduce the overall cost of producing and delivering food to consumers while improving environmental sustainability worldwide.
Technologies Driving Agriculture Automation
By leveraging AI, IoT and data analytics, Hitachi is revolutionizing farming, optimizing crop growth, resource management and overall agricultural efficiency.
For example, Hitachi’s digital lagoon monitoring helped a leading dairy farm to effectively manage its lagoon. The ability to take sensor data and combine it with other data sources and models enabled the farm to address environmental risks related to issues like overflowing lagoons, or animal health issues that could negatively impact the environment.
Hitachi has also worked with Australia’s Primary Industries and Regional Department to eliminate the weed problem that hinders farmers' work through a combination of image recognition, artificial intelligence, data analytics and satellite positioning to transform farming practices.
Hitachi works closely with its agriculture customers, blending solutions from its portfolio and the technology ecosystem to drive the Internet of Living Things to improve food security and environmental sustainability.
Canada’s largest provider of prepared meats and poultry is committed to both environmental sustainability and to creating efficient operations that maximize food production. Hitachi helped the company meet these goals with integrated digital technologies.
Leveraging Sustainable Digital Solutions to Automate Farming Processes: The Hitachi and Ag Automation
Hitachi and Ag Automation have collaborated to create a solution that enhances predictability in water usage for growers by leveraging data management and visualization technologies, allowing farmers to automate soil moisture data collection and remotely monitor and control irrigation systems, leading to improved crop management and increased yield.
The Hitachi – Ag Automation partnership addressed farmers’ most daunting challenges, including:
*Water scarcity
*Lack of uniformity in crop sizes
*Waste resulting from inefficient use of resources
*High labor costs.
Ag Automation Reaps the Business and Environmental Benefits of Smart Farming
Soil moisture directly affects the size, uniformity, and quality of crops. But with weather and geographic variables in play, it’s also one of the most challenging factors to control. Hitachi and Ag Automation are making it possible for farmers to remotely monitor soil moisture levels and field irrigation requirements. By using transponders to monitor moisture and Hitachi VFDs to regulate irrigation flow, growers can easily detect and respond to events such as too much or too little pressure, pipe breaks and other issues.
In the words of Matt Foster, one of the co-founders of Ag Automation,
“Before automation, we drove roughly 400 miles a day to check on fields, pumps, equipment, soil moisture and probes in the field. Now we can check everything from the mobile app and spend our time where it needs to be rather than wasting it driving around.”
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Read more on how Hitachi and Ag Automation are driving sustainability in farming: https://social-innovation.hitachi/en-us/case_studies/digital-solutions-in-agriculture-drive-sustainability-in-farming/
Discover how Hitachi is driving digital transformation in manufacturing, energy, and transportation, among others, to achieve social, economic and environmental impact: https://social-innovation.hitachi/en-us/think-ahead/
