Industrial Internet Consortium (IIC) approves Infosys Precision Crop Management Testbed

 

Global population is continuing to grow at a rapid pace, which is placing an increasing demand on the already inadequate food supply. Combined with the growing climate change and the shortage of arable land, the agricultural sector is faced with a challenge of exploring new ways of increasing the output, for less.

Using the Internet of Things (IoT) technologies, Infosys has built a precision crop management testbed to address this need. This testbed will improve crop productivity through the analysis of highly granular, real-time sensor data. The testbed will initially focus on improving crop yield through the analysis of real-time data, from environmental sensors located in commercial crop fields. The integration and analysis of plant data from multiple sensor types will enable the development of a digital plant model. This will enable observed fluctuations in yield to be correlated to microscopic changes in external stimuli.

Our efforts in this regard are aimed at creating an environment where technologies with a potential to impact world hunger can be developed.

This testbed will help the agricultural community in the following ways:

  • Integrating multiple sensor technologies to provide a ‘360’ view of plant environment
  • Gathering near real-time data and 24/7 transmission of data via Mesh / cellular network
  • Analyzing data and developing actionable insights

The benefits of this technology for the agricultural community are the following:

  • Improvement in crop productivity / yields through early abnormality detection and determination of optimal (and sub-optimal) crop conditions (plant stress)
  • Improved operational efficiency through optimized aerial sampling and irrigation / fertilizer distribution
  • Support data-driven / deterministic decision-making

We developed this testbed as a part of IIC and have partnered with Sakata Seeds Inc. for this endeavor.

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