PRECISION FARMING

With precision farming you can determine the NEED for crop protection per square feet. This allows very precise, specific and sufficient treatment to your crops, as well as enabling you to save on chemical costs. This is different from traditional farming where there is much more global determination per field. With Precision Farming, or Precision Agriculture, Smart Farming, Satellite Farming or site-specific crop management, the goal is the same; aiming to optimise returns on input whilst preserving resources. Precision farming is based on observing, measuring and responding to inter and intra-field variables in crops.  

The practice of precision agriculture has been enabled by GPS and GNSS. This made it possible for farmers to locate their precise position in the field and allows the creation of maps and measuring data like crop yield, terrain features, topography, organic matter content, moisture levels, nitrogen levels, pH, etc.

Precision farming is an extreme form of agricultural mechanisation and uses GPS, sensors (on the ground and from the satellite) and computers on the Agrifac machine itself. GPS is accurate to a few metres and in combination with Real Time Kinematic (RTK) technique, it corrects the GPS signal. The accuracy is enhanced by the use of transmitting antennas on the ground. Because of all these signals, the precision increases substantially. The Agrifac Condor sprayers are compatible with all leading GPS systems available on the market:

In order to reach his precision farming and sustainability goals, the grower needs reliable crop spraying equipment that is also technologically advanced, which can aid his mission to achieve the highest yields possible from his crop. Not only does it help to have the precision farming tools available within the machine specification, but also boosts confidence in the ability of the manufacturer. This ensures the grower is safe in the knowledge that they are also striving to help achieve the highest quality output whilst staying at the forefront of their technology development mission also.

Over the years, Agrifac have surpassed precision farming accomplishments by delivering in-house precision technologies to growers across the globe, all backed up by the very team who developed them, from idea to field. Understanding spraying from the users’ perspective is essential for development. As well as maintaining market activity, various legal regulations from different countries, and collaborating with teams to be able to design new technology configurations, Agrifac ensure that they always keep focus on the user and the challenges that they face.

Combatting height control and thus increasing application accuracy, Agrifac’s height control system guarantees ultimate spray quality because the distance to the crop is always perfect. This fully integrated boom control system guarantees that the selected distance to the crop is always maintained. Four sensors with a wide viewing angle that are placed on the boom send the machine a reliable and precise measurement of the crop. Constantly measuring, these sensors are able to adapt to all terrain conditions and react accordingly.

Add to this further with the additional in-house pulse-width modulation system from Agrifac, and gain the perfect performance of your crop sprayer each and every time. Improve accuracy and cut chemical costs by ensuring the desired rate is consistently sprayed with your Agrifac crop sprayer. Benefit from single nozzle control to prevent overlapping and overdosing as much as possible. The in-house PWM system from Agrifac enables the grower to open and close each nozzle individually, making sure the chemicals are applied in the desired area, exactly where the plant needs it. 

Make turn compensation a thing of the past. When turning during spraying, different nozzles travel at different speeds. In the outside of the turn, the nozzles have to spray further than in the inside of a turn. In order to spray the same amount consistently along the whole length of the boom, faster travelling nozzles must spray more and slower travelling nozzles less. Agrifac’s PWM system is the first system that really compensates for turns and delivers 100% spray coverage everywhere. 

While Agrifac’s in-house PWM system ensures you can spray the same amount of liquid, the task map spraying solution ensures each plant gets the precise amount it needs. You no longer have to decide what the best treatment is for all plants but instead, can spray each plant with precisely what it needs. Working via task-maps, Agrifac Task Map measures the field to determine the right dose and ensure the right amount is sprayed in the right place. The driver doesn’t have to spend as much time on dosing and can focus more on his work and inspecting the crops. This makes spraying more effective and more efficient, thus also increasing accuracy and precision and in turn, reducing chemical costs. 

As an aid to further define their top-tier position within the precision farming market, Agrifac introduced the artificial intelligence individual spot spraying technology. Using RGB cameras to scan, recognise and apply via spot spraying, the Agrifac crop sprayers can recognise the individual plants’ needs within specific fields; resulting in providing the grower with the highest level of precision spraying currently available on the market.  

The different algorithms in the spot spraying technology were not programmed by a few technicians but learned from farmers, which guarantees that the system can automatically make the same decisions a farmer would. The intelligent RGB cameras are mounted every three metres on the boom, with the system processing and analysing the crop in real time. The desired amounts can be applied immediately with DynamicDose without the need for offline and time-consuming actions; providing unparalleled efficiency to the grower. 

Agrifac also wants to push on to the next step, because we believe Precision farming is not precise enough. To reach that next goal in agriculture, we need care at the plant level. Back to the basics of farming: taking care of every individual plant, but armed with the latest technologies. In a nutshell, taking care of every plant’s individual NEEDs, instead of the NEEDs of a whole field, resulting in higher yields.