Precision Farming Technologies to Increase Soil and Crop Productivity

Abstract

Excessive information, and practical experience, in crop and soil management, and new agriculture technology, have been accumulated over time. To meet the increasing need of humanity for food, a new farming concept known as Precision Farming (PF) or Precision Agriculture (PA) or Site-Specific Land Management (SSLM), is developed in recent years. This concept is a new approach leads to develop the agricultural processes for increasing soil and crop productivity, while saving efforts and costs. Precision farming includes many techniques such as Global Positioning Systems (GPS), Geographic Information Systems (GIS), Remote Sensing (RS), Yield Monitoring, Variable Rate Application (VRA), Yield Mapping, Site-Specific Management Zones (SSMZ) and Crop Modeling. SSMZ is considered as an important factor of PF application. SSMZ delineation can be improved based on the accuracy of determined of soil and crop characteristics which are used for managing and sustaining soil functions. The improvement of land management, at the field scale, will be based on better characterization of soil variability and crop properties within-field. This can be carried out through mapping soil and crop properties with high resolutions, compared with the traditional way. The goal of delineating site-specific management zones (SSMZ) is to get a better explanation of the actual variation within the field. Soil sampling by traditional methods and laboratory analysis are not cost efficient or timely enough. The Grid soil sampling and management zone are found the most important methods for precision farming to collect soil samples. The grid soil sampling is elaborated by dividing a field into a square of cells. However, recent research estimated single soil chemical and physical attribute by using various sensors order to reduce costs and improve management zone delineation. SSMZ map can be produced from a single layer of data, or combinations of different data layers including, topographic attributes map, yield map, soil maps, and soil nutrients maps. The farmer can use SSMZ map to select which production and management strategies plans are required and where they should be placed. Therefore, Implementation of this technique under the status of developing countries is necessary to increase soil and crop production, reduce costs, increase farm profitability and reduce environmental risks and desertification processes (Mohamed in Arab J Geosci 6:4647–4659, 2013 [1]).