A recent report titled ‘Global IoT Market in Smart Farming 2017-2021’ forecasts that the market for high-tech applications in agriculture using Internet of Things (IoT) technologies will expand at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of approximately 11% in developing countries between 2017-2021. This considerable growth is expected to be driven, amongst others, by cloud computing, an indispensable component of the digital farming revolution.
In its most basic form, cloud computing refers to the storing and accessing of data and programmes via the world wide web rather than a laptop’s hard drive. This means, the term cloud simply represents a metaphor for the Internet. But why is cloud computing so important in the context of digital farming?
The reason for this is that IoT devices generate large amounts of data when applied to agricultural settings, where their primary objective is to monitor/assess weather conditions, soil moisture, plant growth or animal health, amongst others.
Wireless sensors connected to gateways have the task to collect this data and send it to the cloud, from where it can be processed, compared and analyzed in order to help farmers make better informed decisions. In this way, better broadband connectivity as well as “…the growth in cloud computing is expected to drive the market during the forecast period...” as stated by the report, enabling farmers to improve their competitive position while producing ‘more with less’.