Growing population, climate change, and increasing costs put huge pressure on the agricultural industry to continue to provide food for our planet while using fewer resources. Agribusinesses must constantly innovate to improve productivity and enhance efficiency. Over the last decade, a boom in technology has enabled the agricultural sector to step up to the challenge by going digital.

The increase in digital technology has the potential to further drive greater efficiency and productivity, but it also creates a mountain of data. This is what is known as big data.

Many organisations are overwhelmed by this volume of data. But big data has the potential to be of great value – you just have to know how to use it.

When data gets too big

Big data refers to the massive amount of data created by the increase in the Internet of Things (IoT), smart machinery, sensors, smart meters, and various individual internal and external data sources all leveraged in the production of goods and services.

From rural producers right through to retail, are all-seeing and implementing new IoT technology which provides valuable data but is only truly useful if correctly presented for quick oversight.

Around the globe, major industry bodies and producer funded research organisations are backing technology R&D to advance the industry forward whilst reducing costs and creating more sustainable practices. This means the development of even better technological advances is on the way – delivering even more data. 

For many agribusinesses, it’s just too much.

Dealing with big data often results in a time-consuming and costly reporting process. It creates silos of data that make it nearly impossible to collate. Individuals or Departments work from different data sources. Data security can become a problem if not correctly protected. This creates a perfect storm for errors to be easily introduced, leading to inaccurate decisions that cost you money.

Big data can create problems, or it can revolutionise your agribusiness. It’s all in how you use it.

The potential for big data in agriculture

Agriculture used to be largely driven by gut instinct. Today, technology like IoTs enable greater visibility and oversight of operations, reducing uncertainties and enabling decisions to be data-driven.

The benefits cannot be underestimated. The FAO estimates that every year, ⅓ of the food produced for human consumption is wasted or lost. Using big data to revolutionise agricultural processes is necessary to create more efficiency to help battle the food crisis.

Big data can drive smart decisions and better outcomes in agriculture like:

• Improved yields from data insights on weather patterns, soil temperature, fertiliser requirements, and more
• Efficient use of pesticides and sprays – know how much to use without overdoing it
• Maintain farm equipment with data that predict maintenance requirements and fuel use
• Optimise your supply chain for efficiency
• Remote monitoring of crop and livestock health
• Increased profitability through enhanced efficiency and productivity

To reap the benefits of big data, you need a big data strategy to manage how you gather, share, and use your data. A data strategy considers your business goals and all the data available to you to find out which data is useful. Then, automated reporting delivers just the relevant insights.  

To take big data to the next level, you need Decision Intelligence.

How Decision Intelligence accelerates operation performance with big data

Decision Intelligence (DI) turns your complex data into something that makes perfect sense. With a DI solution, you no longer need to worry about sorting through data and organising reports or even reading them – instead, data-driven insights are delivered to you, so you can act.

A DI solution combines human decision-makers with Business Intelligence and Machine Learning. All your data sources are collected and stored in one secure cloud-based location. The data is analysed and presented to you in a visual dashboard. From there, farmers and growers can make data-driven decisions. The result is higher yields at lower costs.

At Toustone, we have the know-how and the tech to put effective insights at your fingertips. We break down the mountain of data into fully automated and intuitive dashboards so you can easily see exactly what is going on in real-time. This abundance of data allows agribusinesses to accelerate the performance of their operations by having the information they need to create meaningful changes. 

A DI solution will:

• Remove the manual reporting process
• Stop data silos from forming
• Ensure the security of your data
• Create a single source of truth
• Put predictive insights at your fingertips
• Inject confidence into the decision-making process
• Make sense of big data!

Any agribusiness can make the most out of the data they already have with a DI solution. Our team is ready and waiting to guide your agribusiness to a DI solution that puts big data to work for you.

Want to see how Toustone helped a leading corporate farmer enhance their on-farm efficiencies with Decision Intelligence? Read our case study on Lawson Grains.

“Working with Toustone has been great. They have been able to effectively capture information off multiple platforms and automate it. The solution has definitely made the backend of the office more efficient by getting all that data into one spot. Their personal insight continues to provide different ways to look at the data and get more out of it.”

Mat Well, Business Systems Analyst at Lawson Grains

The future of Australia’s agriculture is in smart farms.

Australia is the second-largest agricultural area in the world, after China. We have over 85,000 farms using 372 million hectares of land and 9.2 million megalitres of water. In FY 2018-2019, the gross value of Australian agriculture was more than $62 billion. The National Farmers’ Federation has set a daunting vision for that number to reach $100 billion in 2030.

As we’ve seen in the past, mother nature will always throw curveballs. But by connecting the physical world with the digital, you can develop a better understanding of your farm operations to improve efficiencies, drive better decisions, and predict what’s coming next. It is the piece of the puzzle required to move Australia into the future of agriculture while reducing the environmental impact.

If you’re curious about how smart farms and Decision Intelligence will pave the way for growth in agriculture, read on.

What Is A Smart Farm?

Smart farms use the latest technology and data analytics to optimise agricultural practices. Sensors, drones, autonomous vehicles, machinery data and Artificial Intelligence (AI) combine to enhance the overall understanding of operations and identify areas to reduce costs, improve yield and quality, and forecast what’s to come.

One critical tool for smart farms is the Internet of Things (IoT). IoT refers to all of the sensors on the farm that communicate with each other wirelessly via the internet. Using internet connections means farms can be remotely monitored. Equipment, water management, weather events, crop diseases, soil requirements – all of it can be tracked in a dashboard and viewed from any device, anywhere at any time.

Using IoT technology enables automation and more autonomous activities in day-to-day operations. For example, soil sensors track moisture levels and soil health to predict diseases. Drones diagnose crop diseases and measure water and nitrogen levels. Livestock sensors monitor health and fertility. According to KPMG, every farm should be connected to the IoT by 2030. This technology enables total oversight of daily operations, improving operational efficiency without having to be at the physical location or even in the same country! 

Lack of internet access is the biggest obstacle for Australia’s agriculture industry to go digital, and the future of farm telecommunications is changing to improve farm connectivity.

“Getting these devices to talk to each other and provide real-time information in a central dashboard at the farmer’s home or office will require connectivity on a scale never seen before, and will undoubtedly involve different interfaces, methods and systems that are not always seamlessly compatible,” says Sami Makelainen, Technology Insights Manager, CTO Strategic Planning and Foresight, Telstra. “The benefits though, once successfully done, will be game changing for Australian farmers.”

Smart Farms + Decision Intelligence = Maximum Impact

Introducing IoT devices into your farm allows you better visibility and management of your operations. With this new technology comes vast volumes of data which, when utilised correctly, can provide additional benefits and insights to your farm operations and profitability. The challenge lies with how to manage these large volumes of data, also referred to as big data. Without a strategy in place, this big data becomes siloed across the different devices with no data relationships and correlation being identified and exploited for their value. 

This is where a Decision Intelligence (DI) solution comes in to connect, automate and analyse the data to provide you with actionable insights without being a data scientist. Forget organising and reading reports. Smart farms can operate from one DI dashboard that connects and presents all of the information and insights you need to make the best decisions. The beauty of DI coupled with smart farming is that it removes that risk of building silos of data across your farm which ensures you are always working with the right information on hand.

“Data delivered by digital technology coupled with advanced analytics are a game-changer for Australian farmers to push the boundaries of performance.”
KPMG & National Farmer Federation,
Talking 2030 (2018)

Using IoT technology puts a lot of data at your fingertips, but you also need DI to know what to do with it. Manual handling of data is time-consuming and jeopardises the integrity and reliability of your data. It is too easy to accidentally copy and paste a number incorrectly, throwing off all of your results. DI eliminates the risk of these errors and delivers data-driven insights instead of just data.

The Future of Farming is Now

Smart farms use IoTs to connect every aspect of farming, from soil and crop health to best animal farming practices and weather conditions. Decision Intelligence connects all those IoT devices with any other relevant data sources into one secure location, then analyses and presents that information into an easy to use dashboard.

Farmers don’t have to waste their time analysing reports or stress about whether they are making the right decisions. A DI solution makes it easy by presenting actionable insights for the farmer to make data-driven decisions. The time and resources saved along with continual efficiency enhancements drive higher yields at lower costs.

Smart farming resources are available and are being used now. Toustone has developed a ready-to-implement Agri DI solution to connect all of your data points without the need to change any of your current platforms or devices. If you’re ready to implement smart farming on your farm, get in touch with the team at Toustone today.