The Mitra Turindo Snake Fruit Farmers Community in Indonesia faces challenges in cultivating their crop of snake fruit due to pest interference from fruit flies, mealybugs, borers, mice, and squirrels. Issues with pests have increased due to climate change, making pest control difficult. Rainy and dry seasons are used to predict pest attacks, but with the uncertainty in weather caused by climate change, appropriate measures cannot be taken to protect crops.
To address this issue, a team of students from the Universitas Multimedia Nusantara will work with Universitas Gadjah Mada and Mitra Turindo Snake Fruit Farmers Community to design a smart agricultural system for pest prediction and management.
The pest forecasting system uses Internet of Things and Artificial Intelligence-based technologies. Sensors detect weather-related variables including temperature, light intensity, and soil moisture with an Arduino system. The data received from the sensor will be processed using a LoRa module on a Raspberry Pi. It is powered using solar energy.
In addition, farmers will provide data on pest activity. Data on rat infestation, number of rat holes, and rice field conditions will be captured through photos and farmer’s input to the system. The data will be integrated and analyzed.
The device also uses drones to collect images of the pests, and data will be put on a cloud.
Also part of the project, students will develop a web application for use by the farmers. It is split into two subsystems, pest forecasting and pest management. Forecasting focuses on prediction, while management focuses on identifying pests and tracking frequency.
This project was made possible by $5,300 in funding from the Antennas and Propagation Society (APS), an EPICS in IEEE partner.