Apiculture, the science of raising and maintaining colonies of bees and their hives, is an essential component of India’s agriculture and economy. Many rural communities in India rely on honey production as their main source of revenue. However, maintaining these beehives is challenging. Beekeepers are tasked with monitoring hive-temperature and humidity, hive-height, pest infestation, and swarming behaviors amongst the bees. These conditions are difficult to analyze, time consuming, and can become too complex to track in real-time. This creates a stressful environment for both the bees and their keepers.
To address this issue, a group of students from the IEEE Madras Section and the IEEE Student Branch at Sri Sai Ram Engineering College in collaboration with Sevalaya, a non-profit organization serving underprivileged rural communities in India, proposed a project to create an automated system that uses real-time monitoring to ensure the health of the bees.
The ApicTech: Advanced BeeHive Monitoring system combines electronics, machine learning, sensors, and renewable energy by solar power to provide beekeepers with accurate and immediate information on hive conditions. Appropriate measures including the use of microcontrollers, microprocessors, and sensor systems ensure that the bees’ natural environments remain unharmed. The team hopes that by using this advanced technology, they will improve the health and productivity of the bees, create an efficient working environment for beekeepers, and ultimately, make the practice of apiculture more sustainable for the benefit of India’s agriculture and economy.
This project was made possible by $2,915.00 in funding from EPICS in IEEE.