6 advantages of precision agriculture with drones

The drone sector is booming in Australia, and more and more sectors are using this technology to be more competitive and save costs, among other advantages. In addition, the new regulations will expand the work area where you can work with drones from 2021, which has been quite limited until now.

However, these restrictions that have been present until today in terms of drone flights, have not prevented sectors such as agriculture from betting more and more on this service, generating the concept of precision agriculture.

That is why today, we are going to show you the advantages of working with drones in agriculture, and how this technology can increase productivity, reduce costs and improve the competitiveness of our field.

What is precision agriculture?

Before seeing the advantages of drones in agriculture, we are going to explain what precision agriculture is, what advantages it has and how we can implement it to be more competitive.

Precision agriculture was defined in 1999 as the application of technologies and principles to manage the spatial and temporal variability associated with all aspects of agricultural production for the purpose of improving crop response and environmental quality. We are therefore talking about the management of agricultural parcels using various technological tools to increase the profitability of crops, their quality, quantity and yield.

Precision agriculture aims to optimize the management of a plot from three approaches:

1. The agronomic approach is the adjustment of cultivation practices to the needs of the plant.
2. The environmental approach or the reduction of the impact linked to agricultural activity.
3. The economic approach oriented to the growth of competitiveness through greater efficiency of practices.

Therefore, we are talking about cost reduction, reduction in the use of pesticides and fertilizers, less environmental impact, higher yields with the same level of fertilizers, higher quality crops due to a better combination of requirements and inputs applied, higher value products nutrition, fuel reduction in agricultural machinery and optimized management of farms.

Until a few years ago, precision agriculture was linked to communications and satellite images or gps geographic information systems to collect, estimate, analyze, evaluate and understand crop variations. These technologies are still valid today, but new systems that are much cheaper have been implemented, such as fumigation and care of the crop with drones.

Advantages of drones in agriculture

Drones in agriculture offer many advantages and help to be more competitive, thus obtaining the highest possible profitability from production. But mainly there are 6 advantages that drones offer in the agriculture sector:

• Cost savings. The application with the drone is carried out less than one meter from the crop to be treated, that is, at the height at which a person would carry out the application if it were done with a traditional backpack sulphating machine, and therefore causing the same drift that the backpack could cause.
• Time saving. It could be thought that the plane is also fast, it must be taken into account that it needs a runway from which to take off and land. Which entails an important increase in the time spent. The vertical takeoff of the drone makes this work easier. And it is between 10 and 15 times faster than a tractor.
• Environmental impact. It is important to know that to treat the same crop dimension, with the drone's ULV system, the active principle is reduced by 30 - 40% compared to the traditional system, since in addition to not having a dropping point, there is also no take into account the perimeter losses or “to the ground”, due to the ephemeral cloud that the ULV generates, through which the broth is applied, which is also optimized for at least 200 l. to 10 liters per hectare.
• Greater security. The drone is also better than the backpack, and the main reason is that there is no personal exposure of the applicator, in addition to saving time for the farmer, since with the drone it is applied 30 to 40 times faster than in the normal way. manual, at least (one hectare of crop can be treated in just 10 minutes with a single drone).
• Efficiency level. Not only because we add less active ingredient, but also because we do not reach the dropping point by reducing the broth so much (we must be aware that 10 liters of broth are spread for an entire hectare), and possible leaks in the soil are minor or nonexistent) and a more ecological final product.
• Innovation and technology. To be able to act preventively on the crops anticipating certain adverse phenomena on them. In other words, Big Data provides agriculture with the ability to move faster, more efficiently, solve certain problems, and identify new opportunities. And what is Big Data? Big Data is the massive analysis of data. We can draw conclusions with a more solid basis and concepts that are oriented to making effective decisions based on a scientific basis.

Drones in agriculture

Both the reduction of products, as well as the reduction in water and time consumption, translate into economic savings for the farmer, who sees, if not better, the same result in less time, without much expense in labor and with less product, in addition to eliminating the personal risk of the applicators and obtaining a more ecological final product.

Although the advantages are many, these are the most notable for their importance for both the farmer and the environment and the personal exposure of the applicators, the main advantage for us.

If we take into account all the variables that can occur when carrying out an application: the dropping point of the applicator system, drift with stable wind, the environmental impact, the personal exposure of the applicator, the possible contamination of the surrounding land and the effectiveness of the system, we see how with the drone we optimize the service compared to traditional systems.

This is, in short, what would mean the entry of the drone, as an application tool, in the world of agriculture: an optimization of resources, products and results with respect to everything known until today.

Our team of professional pilots can perform any services in all types of crops, from intensive olive trees, such as corn, hops, cereals, vine, potato, among many other crops. We comply with the regulations for aerial treatments with drones set by the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food.

If you want more information or need a budget to start working with drones, you can contact us here.