Farming is a profession of living things. The chicken barn, the milking shed, the fruit and vegetables that sustain us – all these are about turning life to our advantage.
Life isn’t precise, like a line of code or a silicon chip. It doesn’t follow exact pathways or standard sizes. But it does follow patterns. The turn of the seasons, the schedules of feeding, the growing cycles of crops and meat. And every farmer knows them.
The big change in the last few decades: on a modern farm, that knowledge isn’t just instinct and gut feel. Decisions are driven by data. The optimal time to feed, water, or harvest, how tomorrow’s rainfall will affect Autumn’s crop; what effect a new fertilizer is having on the soil … and a thousand more. Effective use of data enables outputs to be maximized, in a way far superior to guesswork.
That’s the core of farming today: data and patterns.
What gathers that data? Today, it’s sensors on the Internet of Things (IoT), an army of tiny helpers checking and tracking a huge variety of data points. And what thrives on patterns? Artificial Intelligence: software models trained on thousands of datasets. That makes AI and IoT perfect partners for smart farming.
And ICT Strypes – with years of experience helping farm businesses get the most from technology with smart farming platforms – is at the forefront of both.
Let’s look at how we integrate AI and IoT in agricultural automation … for the benefit of both your business and our planet.
IoT in agribusiness: the modern farming workforce
The breadth of information farm sensors can collect is, well, breathtaking. Yes, the heat of the day and the moisture level in the air are the common ones. But across the vast industry of integrated farm systems, you’ll see diverse metrics like these:
- In environmental monitoring: temperature of air and water, levels of solar radiation, wind speed for spray dispersal, barometric pressure for weather forecasting, even ultraviolet sensors for sun damage
- When checking soil conditions: pH levels for acidity / alkalinity, nutrient densities, levels of nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium
- For crop and plant growth: leaf wetness, chlorophyll volumes, infrared signatures, soil moistness
- In livestock health: vital signs (body temperature, pulse, breathing, blood pressure) for animal stress and disease, RFID tags for creature identification temperatures
- For operational management: equipment performance (milking robots, irrigation systems, gate and access control, vehicle energy levels, drone GPS locations) to keep infrastructure working
Individually, each sensor is often simple, cheap, and low-bandwidth, sending a single number to an application every few minutes or hours. But there can be thousands of sensors in play across a large agricultural operation – and collectively, all those sensors deliver a complete overview of the farm.
That’s where data points become a dataset – a multidimensional, multivariable landscape of information cloud applications can use for analysis and insight.
These digital eyes and ears of the farm have replaced countless hours of drudgework once done by people walking around and taking manual measurements. Saving the business effort in many areas. Time. Resources. Money. It’s a fast-moving, fast-evolving market sector – but IoT in agriculture is here to stay.
The role of AI: new technology for old problems
Every company has an AI strategy these days. But the various technologies of Artificial Intelligence (Machine and Deep Learning, Reinforcement Learning, Retrieval Augmented Learning) – fit the farm sector from the start. How so?
It’s because they’re designed to make sense of large masses of data, even unstructured and non-numerical sources like infrared photographs or weather fronts. They compare new information with examples from their training and can make decisions based on it. In aggregate, individual data points become nuanced and accurate … meaning any decisions you trust to AI will be accurate too. The key concept: with its ability to see value in patterns, AI can create order from complexity. Think of:
- Precision irrigation. Combining both the Big Picture view and on-the-ground detail, AI systems can make sure plants get precisely the right amount of water to grow – from the individual plant to an entire greenhouse at scale.
- Pest and disease detection. From pinpointing problems to predicting how much of a field or herd will be affected, AI systems can both detect issues early and suggest ways to solve them.
- Combining different datasets. If rain is on the way, perhaps irrigation pipes can close early today. If a prolonged hot spell looks damaging, AI can close shutters or warn workers. It’s about looking at all the data at once.
- Crop yield prediction. Knowing the health of a field as a whole means harvest volumes can be confirmed months in advance with surprising accuracy. With benefits to staff planning, profit projections, even hedging and futures strategies on the financial markets.
- Autonomous machinery. The bigger the farm, the more machines are needed to work it. An ever-increasing number of those machines – pesticide-spraying drones, milking robots, even tractors and harvesters – operate without a human in the driving seat.
That’s why AI is ideal for agricultural automation. Amid all the living, moving, interacting parts of a modern farm, AI brings low-level variations and diversity into a coherent whole, turning raw data into profit-producing insights. Letting you see not just your farm, but an integrated farm system.
Combining the two: the Smart Farming Platform
Individually, each technology adds value. Together, that value rises exponentially. IoT gathers data; AI makes sense of it. IoT detects issues; AI acts on them. And with each new data point or set, the AI learns further, becoming an ever more valuable part of the business as time goes on.
It works because this dynamic duo of technologies isn’t a dumb robot following a process, focused mainly on steps of a list; it’s a smart farming platform, focused on outcomes. Constantly adjusting and adapting as new data comes in.
Individual events are often unpredictable. But collect enough data, about enough of them, and the smart farming platform see the drivers and factors affecting each scenario. And when data is complete and accurate, a lot of events aren’t unpredictable at all. Consider:
- It’s morning milking time, and the forecast is scorching. Hot cows aren’t happy cows – and stress affects milk quality. AI agricultural automation technologies open windows or switch on misting nozzles to beat the heat in the milking shed. Meaning cooler cows and sweeter milk, all informed by data.
- Vines in a winery are about to burst buds, yet temperatures unexpectedly cold snap to freezing after midnight. AI switches on ground heaters while the unaware farming family sleeps – eliminating frost risk and saving thousands of bottles of future wine
- A vast greenhouse houses fragile plants, with profit dependent on steady growth. Conditions under glass – air temperature, humidity, watering schedules, UV lighting alternating with natural sunlight – are optimized by AI, creating the ideal environment for growth at the lowest possible cost.
- IoT sensors detect weed coverage in 20% of the field. Instead of spraying-and-praying the entire area, AI controls precisely where pesticides are applied and minimizing the amount needed for eradication. Saving money, reducing resources, and reducing impact on the broader environment.
You can see how IoT and AI aren’t competing technologies, but deeply complementary – and working beautifully with other tech, too. Let’s borrow a software term: it’s your technology stack, a set of interlocking hardware and software that create a complete solution.
The base of that stack is the IoT, all those connected sensors gathering data 24/7. The mid-layers are your connectivity (like BlueTooth, WiFi, or 5G) providing the means for those sensors to communicate, and the applications in the cloud that take in that data and use it. In the top layers are AI tools and endpoint equipment: not simply processing data but actively using it to make decisions and take actions across access points, operational processes, and your vehicle and buildings fleet.
That’s your tech stack – and it stacks the odds of success in your favor.
Why choose ICT Strypes for your smart farming platform?
Farming is second nature to ICT Strypes. While we work with the world’s highest-technology companies, we’ve applied our skills in rural industries for years, with many of us having agricultural expertise gained “in the field”.
Nearsurance: the best of outsource and inhouse
Core to our approach is Nearsurance – a concept that takes the best parts of outsourcing and inhousing and leaves the problematic parts behind. Working with us, you’ll have a team on-site with you, trained to understand your business challenges over time. Closer collaboration and greater understanding, because they’re right there at your side.
Executing those requirements is our team of coders and developers at our own offices: people who’ve worked with some of the world’s biggest agritech businesses and already know what you need to succeed.
We have development hubs in both the Netherland and Bulgaria and are active across the whole of Europe (and beyond). We’ve built smart farming platforms for sites growing one product on ten hectares to complete applications for multi-brand businesses spanning tens of thousands. And even more importantly, we maintain and improve that software over time, so your solution stays up-to-date and on-the-money.
ICT Strypes is a partner outstanding in your field!
Jokes aside, the sometimes-chaotic, always-messy, often-unpredictable environment of a farm is a deeply analog experience – but digital technologies can bring a great sense of order to your work year-round. As people who share your deep sense of how nature works and how the seasons change on each circuit around the sun, we believe we can be your ideal partner in today’s ultra-competitive agricultural market – no matter how specialized or generalized your outputs.
IoT and AI in farming make a great team. And we can build that team for you. Ready to build your smart farming platform? Reach out to ICT Strypes: