Abstract
Digital technologies provide an opportunity to further increase the sustainability and productivity of grasslands and rangelands. Three resources are key to that change. These are the soil on which forage grows, the forages that grow on those soils and the animals that use the forage resource as food. This paper describes elements of technologies to measure and monitor these resources and provides some insights on combining that knowledge and controlling the animal's utilization through virtual fencing. There are many potential challenges to the application of digital technologies to pastoral farming. These often require the calibration of digital signals to define biophysical characteristics. The significant repository of historic data of pasture growth over many geo-climatic regions, for example, provides New Zealand with an opportunity to accelerate that development. Future advances in rangeland use, nutrient deposition, greenhouse gas emissions and the provision and utilization of high quality and quantity will be enabled by the application of digital technologies at scale, under the control of virtual fencing. Digital technologies may provide the means to maintain or enhance ruminant production from grassland in a sustainable operating space into the future.
Highlights
Digital technologies have the potential to change the way rangeland and grassland are managed
This paper aims to provide stimulation of thinking for the reader to facilitate the integration of digital technologies to provide sustainable, productive future landscapes, using New Zealand grassland examples
Grazing control may improve the utilization of the grassland resource, increasing both quality and quality of forage available
Summary
Digital technologies have the potential to change the way rangeland and grassland are managed. The rise of the internet-of-things and cloud storage has changed how we collect, store, and process data. Previous systems were paper-based and often transient. Users tended to internalize the knowledge gained from data collection without further storage or application. Such systems have been traditional in many cultures, where learning is passed down through generations, often using spoken histories. Written knowledge has developed significantly with formal learning approaches and records, but individual learnings at a farm or business scale have often still been assigned to experiential, with knowledge passed verbally among participants
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