The 19th Agriculture Technology Seminar returned with a success as more than 100 participants attended the webinar. It was organised by the Centre for Agriculture and Food Research (CAFR) and the Faculty of Science (FSc) on 12 June 2021, via ZOOM.

Kickstarting the seminar was a speech by Organising Chairperson Azida Illyani binti Anas, who thanked the speakers, participants and committee for making the webinar a success. “The webinar aims to initiate knowledge sharing and create awareness on precision agriculture in Malaysia. Many Malaysian farmers are still in doubt about adopting precision agriculture in their farms. The knowledge on precision agriculture should be spread out to reach not only the farmers but also the public. Apart from that, the webinar also aims to expose the community in UTAR and the public regarding precision agriculture. Many researches have shown that the application of precision agriculture can increase crop yield as compared to those from conventional farming. In addition, the application of precision agriculture is also in line with sustainable agriculture, hence we can save our environment for a better future,” said Azida.

Officiating the opening was Vice President for R&D and Commercialisation Prof Ts Dr Faidz bin Abd Rahman. “Agriculture is one of the most important industries in Malaysia. For instance, the oil palm industry has been contributing about 4-5% to the country’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in recent years. However, low yield and labour shortage are the two main challenges in our agriculture sector. In view of this, traditional farming needs to be transformed so that it becomes more technology-based and more sustainable. The seminar’s theme, ‘Precision Agriculture’, refers to new approaches where emerging information technologies are used in agriculture to increase its productivity and efficiency. These technologies may involve satellite imagery, geolocating, remote sensing, artificial intelligence, machine learning, big data, Internet of Things and many more. I believe that these technologies can enhance our agriculture industry to the next level, and eventually bring great benefits to the whole agri-food system in our country, from the farmers to the consumers. I am proud that this Agriculture Technology Seminar has taken initiative in bringing together experts to share their experiences in precision farming. I hope you will be enlightened by their talks,” said Prof Faidz. Also present at the virtual opening ceremony were FSc Dean Assoc Prof Dr Lim Tuck Meng and CAFR Chairperson Assoc Prof Dr Wong Wey Lim.

First to speak was PKEINPK Sdn Bhd Chairman Dato’ Dr Mohamad Hashim bin Ahmad Tajudin on the “Application of Precision Agriculture in Oil Palm Plantation”. Sharing his 43 years of experience in the plantation industry, Dato’ Mohamad Hashim explained that the development of oil palm plantation is a business venture, and it involves high capital costs and high operational costs. He explained that the investment has to generate income in order to return the investment cost and generate profits for the business owner.

“In the case of oil palm plantation, income at estate level is derived from sales of the product which is the fresh fruit bunches (FFB). It is then very important for the estate management to focus on getting the highest productivity and FFB yield from the oil palm plant. Oil palm plantation is a low-density cropping system, which is also called a plantation agriculture system. Being a low-density cropping system with a planting density of about 136 to 148 palms per hectare, it is important that every palm planted must produce bunches to its potential in order to get the best return from investment. From an estate operation point of view, the business owner or the manager has to know each palm’s productivity which means the number of bunches produced by each palm at any specific time must be recorded. For this purpose, every palm planted in the field must be numbered physically, thus each palm will have its own identity number, for ease of recording and data analysis. This process can be aided by GPS and GIS systems. All data on palm productivity will have to be captured using any computerised software on estate or plantation management system,” said Dato’ Mohamad Hashim.

He further explained the use of precision management to manage and operate the oil palm plantation. “This micro-managing mindset with precision management principle put into practice will revolutionise the oil palm plantation agriculture system. To get the highest yields from the palms planted, each palm must be managed and induced to produce FFB to its potential. Physiologically, oil palm requires optimum inputs of nutrients and moisture. These resources are within the control of the estate management. But in reality, there is a lot of uncertainties on how much of these resources are given to the palms in a precise manner. There are situations where palms are either deprived of the required amounts of the resources or given in excess of the requirement which results in wastages; these are very common practical issues when it comes to manuring and fertilizer application. The issue of moisture is of concern too, when rainfall is inadequate to provide the amount of moisture required during dry months. In the case of moisture, a water management system must be installed to provide water to every palm in order to ensure moisture is adequate all the time. All data on crop productivity, nutrient inputs and moisture availability must be kept and analysed for decision making process at the management level. Therefore, the oil palm plantation must now adopt precision management system by managing the plantation on palm basis and assisted by precision agriculture gadgets and tools and software systems. This is the science and art of improving crop yields, and optimising costs and profitability of oil palm plantation business,” said Dato’ Mohamad Hashim.

Second speaker, Faculty of Information and Communication Technology (FICT) Deputy Dean for R&D and Postgraduate Programmes, and certified Internet of Things (IoT) specialist (CIOTS) Ts Dr Goh Hock Guan, spoke on “Smart Agriculture Using IoT”. He explained that Smart Agriculture is an emerging concept that refers to managing farms using advanced technologies in order to achieve better productivity and resources optimisation. The type of advanced technologies that can be used, as listed by Dr Goh includes Embedded Control, IoT, and Cloud Services. He then spoke on ways Smart Agriculture can be implemented for outdoor and indoor farming, by digitising a farm, in order to make it “smart”. He emphasised the application of IoT as one of the key fundamental elements in the digitising process. Participants learnt that digitising a farm would require various sensors and actuators, with an embedded platform, to be used to sense and react to things respectively. Dr Goh further explained that the data collected will then be centralised in a sink node, and connected to a gateway reaching the internet, and through remote access, the farming community can monitor and control their farms without the need to be physically present at their farms.

Speaking on “Precision Agriculture as The Way Forward in Sustainable Oil Palm Plantation Management”, with insights from her research, was Universiti Putra Malaysia academic Assoc Prof Ts Dr Farrah Melissa binti Muharam. She enlightened participants on the cost, feasibility and accuracy of conducting precision agriculture in sustainable oil palm management. She also mentioned that in the near future, the viable and sustainable approach to manage oil palm plantations is via tools offered by precision agriculture.

“Oil palm is an important oil-bearing crop cultivated mainly in South East Asia, Africa and South America. The crop is usually cultivated in large plantation areas that consist of hundreds to thousands of plantings hectarage. As a perennial crop of 20 to 25 years old, managing oil palm plantations could be arduous tasks, covering agronomical aspects such as nutrient, pest and diseases and yield management. In recent years, precision agriculture utilising remote sensing platforms have been rigorously explored for sustainable, precision management of oil palm plantations. Various remote sensing platform operating at various wavelengths and spatial scales have been tested so far: RGB, multispectral, hyperspectral, chlorophyll fluorescence, LiDAR or thermal sensor and spectroradiometer, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) and satellites. Among the established applications of precise oil palm plantation management are counting of palm stands (accuracies ranging from 90 to 98%), estimation of palm age (overall accuracy of 84%), palm health status (accuracies ranging from 57 to 97%), detection of crown projection area (overall accuracy of 73%), estimation of palm height (coefficient of determination (R2) of 0.85), estimation of chlorophyll content (accuracy ranging from 93 to 99%), estimation of nutrient content (R2 ranging from 0.77 to 0.94), early detection of Ganoderma boninense infection (accuracies ranging from 33 to 100%) and prediction of bagworm infestation (accuracy of 95.3%),” said Dr Farrah.

Last speaker, Group Leader of Geospatial & Precision Agriculture Technology, under the Agronomy & Geospatial Technology Unit, of Biology & Sustainability Research Division, Malaysian Palm Oil Board, Selangor, Nordiana Abd Aziz also presented her current research on Precision Agriculture. Participants learnt that the introduction of Geographic Information System (GIS), Global Positioning System (GPS), Remote Sensing (RS) and Decision Support System (DSS) in oil palm plantation management has opened the opportunity for practising Precision Agriculture (PA) through the application of Variable Rate Technology (VRT) to manage crop production inputs. She explained that PA uses precision information of site-specific knowledge, targeting the accurate rates and efficient use of agronomic inputs, and PA can also contribute to the sustainability of oil palm yield by applying these inputs only where and when they are needed.

“Presently, the implementation of PA is being carried out at various stages, concentrating on fertiliser requirements. The initial work was focused on building up plantation databases using GIS, GPS and RS technologies. There are many other factors such as the size of the management unit, the intensity of soil, foliar and yield sampling, the use of variable-rate applicator and the methods of analysing economic issues that need to be understood and further developed before full PA management systems and techniques can be successfully adopted in oil palm plantations. Oil palm yields are significantly correlated with leaf nutrient content. The foliar analysis has been widely used to determine oil palm fertility status and nutrients managements. The Oil Palm Efficient Nutrient System (OPENS) was applied to the leaf analysis data to determine the maximum site yield potential and the most limiting leaf nutrient of each plot. Yield and nutrient maps were created using a GIS interpolator. The variable rate fertiliser map was created by overlaying the yield map and the nutrient maps. Variable rate applicator (VRA) is used to apply the fertiliser based on the spatial information of the variable rate fertiliser map. The result of this study indicated that combining the PA technologies with OPENS could provide more precise fertiliser management of the oil palm. The current trend of the emerging technology being used in agriculture, will enhance the capability and efficiency of PA,” explained Nordiana.

Interactive Q&A sessions were conducted at the end of each speaker’s talk and marking the end of the webinar was a closing remark delivered by Dr Lim. He noted that precision agriculture, through the use of technology and innovation, has transformed the farming industry. He hopes that precision agriculture would benefit farmer by offering them better return of investment and higher crop yields to benefit the growing population and at the same time checking the issues of dwindling arable lands due to development. It was also noted that the registration fee collected, which amount to over RM 900, will be donated to the UTAR Hospital Project.