Precision Farming
Precision Farming is a whole-farm management approach using information technology, satellite positioning (GNSS) data, remote sensing and proximal data gathering. These technologies have the goal of optimizing returns on inputs whilst potentially reducing environmental impacts. The state-of-the-art of Precision Farming on arable land, permanent crops and within dairy farming are reviewed, mainly in the European context, together with some economic aspects of the adoption of Precision Farming.
UAV technologies
Unmanned aerial systems (UAV) make an important contribution to the technological revolution in agriculture. Equipped with several sensors and microcontrollers, NIR and multispectral cameras, GPS receivers and many more, they support farmers in the efficient use of plant protection products, providing important data on the type of soil and protecting wildlife from death. The use of UAV's in agriculture has a huge potential and a wide-ranging field of applications.
The advantages of the use of UAVs in agriculture are obvious: Due to their capacity of starting and landing absolutely vertically they can interact in a very small or hard to reach space.
In addition, some information are easier to get out of the air and give the farmer a meaningful picture of the state of the plant and the soil thanks to various sensors.
Web Gis Development
For sustainable agricultural development cultivable land information plays vital role. With detailed and reliable information, it is easier to implement better agricultural practices. With the development of sophisticated hardware and software systems, web mapping is extensively used by many organizations for their spatial data requirements. Several advancements in the system architecture and network designs facilitated enormous growth in web mapping and web cartography.
Web GIS enable sharing geographical information with hundred of users via local lan. Soil Management System (So.Ma.S) Web-Gis system provides detailed information about demographic pattern of the area, spatial information, Agricultural land at various levels, road network, water Resources, soil characteristics, site characteristics and land suitability for crops at village level. This information will be very useful to the farmers, students, planners and decision makers for the integrated development of rural areas.
Soil Sensing
The spatial variation in soil characteristics can be associated with the spatial variation in crop characteristics. New soil no destructive soil mapping techniques are based on electromagnetic induction (EMI) sensors mounted on quadcopters. An EMI sensor measures the bulk electrical conductivity of the soil and by interpolation it is possible to derive several kinds of maps useful for decision makers, like texture, field capacity, plant availability water and saturation maps.