Raphael ThysWhy connectivity is the key to the future of farming
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Published in
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2 min read
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5 days ago
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IMAGE: Brandy Abbott — Pixabay
US tractor manufacturer John Deere has signed a deal with SpaceX’s Starlink that will see Elon Musk’s satellite company provide high-speed internet connectivity to farming equipment in remote locations around the world.
The deal reflects the fast-moving change underway in farming, which is moving from a sector usually thought of as low-tech to one based on sophisticated precision agriculture where the collection and use of data is increasingly important.
It is becoming common to see everything from increasingly sophisticated tractors — prompting debate over control of the software they use — to the use of GPS micromapping, humidity and temperature sensors, drones to monitor and treat of plants or processes of all kinds based on a much greater granularity, all of which allows for much more selective applications in order to avoid the harmful effects of overuse of fertilizers or insecticides without giving up the advantages they provide.
Nevertheless, this will be a complex transition: John Deere itself, a company traditionally understood as “heavy machinery”, sees its future as one that will obtain around 10% of its revenue from fees derived from the use of software. At the same time, chemical companies are preparing for a future in which the use of their products will be subject to much more streamlined applications, while farmers themselves are aware that the profile needed to work in agriculture these days requires a solid grounding in technology.
Connectivity is clearly a key factor in all this: many of the common uses in precision agriculture require fast, low-latency connectivity, typically unavailable in rural areas. For example, a drone monitoring the application of herbicides needs to transmit video, contrast the images obtained with an image identification system and carry out the application, which requires considerable bandwidth usage.
Before deploying IoT machinery, farmers need to ensure the availability of adequate connectivity in areas of low population density where telecommunications companies see no benefit in providing coverage. Hence, the possibility of using connections through Starlink satellites is an extremely attractive option. We will see how the deal between John Deere and Starling evolves, and which will begin to be tested in Brazil and the United States, but if it works out, we can expect to see more and more of those distinctive Starlink antennas on farms all over the world.
(En español, aquí)