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Published on February 19, 2008

After running a sweet-pepper farm for more than 20 years, Apiphan Phuphakdee discovered that new technologies could help significantly in improving his farm management.

As assistant managing director of Lanna Oriental Hydroponic, a family-run sweet-pepper farm in Lamphun province's Mae Thai district, Apiphan has proven that the integration of electronic technology into agriculture can bring big improvements to farming.

Today, Lanna Oriental Hydroponic's farm uses what is called "agritronics", integrating electronic systems into agriculture to make the farm much more automated. Instead of workers having to take care of fertilising and watering the crops, the new technology handles the entire process automatically.

"In this way, we can manage the farm more effectively and, importantly, increase our productivity," Apiphan says.

His family started growing sweet peppers in 1984. Like other traditional farmers in the community, it planted its crops in the soil and suffered all the pest problems as a consequence, resulting in low productivity.

The problems were overcome when the family adopted hydroponics in 1998. This process uses sand, gravel or liquid in which to grow plants, with nutrients added, but without soil. The traditional farming environment was changed to enclosed housing. The productivity of the sweet-pepper crops leapt from one to three kilograms of fruit per plant over 150 days of harvesting.

However, even though the new technique boosted the farm's productivity, all the management tasks, especially the fertilising and watering processes, were still done manually by the farm's workers.

"Every day, our workers spend their time formulating fertiliser and controlling watering systems. This had to be done five times a day, taking 10 to 15 minutes each time. And when the farm covered 40,000 square metres, it took almost all day, just to do this task," Apiphan says.

To solve the problem, the family decided three years ago to invest an initial Bt500,000 to buy a new electronic system to help control the fertilising and watering processes. The system bypasses the manual procedure by automating both processes through a computerised controller at the centre of the farm.

Because sweet-pepper plants require varying fertiliser formulas and quantities of water according to their age, human error had crept into the time-consuming manual processes. On many occasions, the farm's workers administered the wrong formulas, and the growth of the plants suffered.

With the new electronic system, human error was cut out of the system. The fertilising and watering processes became much more accurate.

Controlled by computer software, the system allows farm managers to input information on fertiliser formulas and the quantity of water needed and the system automatically mixes formulas and administers fertiliser and water in precise quantities at preset times.

When it's time for watering, the system draws fertiliser from holding tanks to combine with water in the required quantities and each plant house is supplied with exactly what its crop requires.

"The system controls everything at the centre of the farm, allowing us to allocate other tasks to our workers."

The software also allows farm managers to trace the watering process back through files logged in the system, so they can assess the plants' watering progress.

The new system has helped the farm to increase its productivity once more. From harvesting 10kg of sweet pepper from one square metre of area under the old manual regime, the farm now delivers 12kg per square metre.

Apiphan says that as well as increasing the overall yield rate, the farm has been able to reduce its operating costs by about 10 per cent.

However, there are other benefits, and the most important of these is better use of labour.

Normally, one worker takes care of between 3,000 and 5,000 plants. Each day, they examine each plant closely and cut away drying leaves to help it grow. Having been relieved of the fertilising and watering burden, they can now lavish more attention on the crops.

Having proven that automated electronic systems can make a big difference to farming productivity, Lanna Oriental Hydroponic has decided to take the issue a step further. Why spend a lot of money bringing agritronics equipment from overseas, Apiphan says, when similar systems can be developed locally?

He says the system can be applied to other farms, and if it can be developed locally at lower cost, other Thai farmers will be encouraged to adopt the new technology to the benefit of the country's overall agricultural output.

Lanna Oriental Hydroponic is investing about Bt620,000 to develop an automatic watering system. Because it seeks to develop an innovation for agriculture, it has received Bt370,000 in financial support from the National Innovation Agency, and has attracted collaboration from the Payap Campus of the Rajamangala University of Technology Lanna.

Currently, the development team is designing and developing the system. It is hoped that a prototype will be completed by November and testing will begin on an area of 10,000 square metres of Lanna Oriental Hydroponic's sweet peppers.

"We hope that with local development, we can reduce the cost of the system from Bt500,000 for an imported one to only Bt300,000. At the same time we hope to be able to customise the system to fit our requirements," Apiphan says.

Perhaps it will come as no surprise that Apiphan regards automatic watering as simply the first step in a wider adoption of agritronics technology. He believes his farm will become even more automated. He plans to adopt sensor technology to monitor humidity and temperature. The information will show farm managers the overall status of their crops, allowing them to plan more accurately.

"We hope to see our farm to become more automated within three to five years," he says.

Pongpen Sutharoj

The Nation