GIS and Precision Farming

Members of the Lecale buyers group successfully applied to the Increasing Access Scheme and after consulting with CAFRE ICT staff were assigned the Geographic Information System (GIS) for a precision farming application.

Growers traditionally tend to apply the same treatment or the same crop input across an entire field as standard. This ignores  differences in soil type, depth, topography or weed infestation which may lead to a variation in yields. Precision farming aims to take account of these differences leading to better savings and improved environmental management, through applying nutrients and agro-chemicals according to field need.

The GIS is regularly used on 8 farms with a combined total of 1500 plus hectares. Much of this ground is covered 3 or 4 times a year. This reduces wastage of fertilisers and sprays and is contributing up to 5 percent in cost saving for inputs and diesel fuel.

Patrick Magee of the Lecale Group said, ”Now we can set up the equipment with just a few screen taps on the Personal Digital Assistant (PDA) when we enter a field and as a result our work rate has increased considerably. We can also record the amount of sprays and fertiliser used so that we can show what, where and when an input was applied. This will be very useful for meeting cross compliance regulations”.

As technology develops, this GPS technology is likely to become more user friendly, reducing the training overhead, and be of use in a wider range of agricultural applications.