Monitoring Agriculture using Remote Sensing
Monitoring Agriculture using Remote Sensing
Remote sensing is the technology that detects and monitors characteristics of an area that are visible, by measuring its reflected and emitted radiation at a distance (typically from satellite or aircraft).
High-tech cameras enable the collection of remotely sensed images, to help researchers “sense” relating to the Earth.
Remote sensing is classified into two main types, relating to the source of signal they use to explore the object, active vs. passive sensors.
Remote Sensing and GIS technology enable agencies to process and interpret observable facts occurring over the earth’s surface without physical contact.
Application Areas of Remote Sensing
The development of many technologies like world mapping, GPS, City planning, etc. Satellites play a major role around the world.
Some major fields in what remote sensing can be used for
- Weather
- Forestry
- Agriculture
- Surface changes
- Biodiversity
How we apply Remote sensing to Agriculture
- Crop conditions are identified:
In monitoring global food supplies, satellite imagery and normalized difference vegetation index(NDVI) technologies are uniquely applied. Crops that are healthy are detected.
- Precision farming is improved:
The health of crops is measured using remote sensing applications so that almost 10 percent of fertilizer, money, and time can be saved
- Soil moisture is conserved:
When soil moisture is detected using active and passive sensors of a satellite in space, moisture variations can be controlled and improved.
- Flood Impact:
Satellite Remote Sensing provides significant information through the use of satellite imagery along with ground-based data collected from ground surveying teams, to compute precise damage assessment. In the case of a flood due to rainfall, the excess amount of water caused by the precipitation affects the agricultural area where the water drainage system is absent causing inundation.
- Increase in crop production:
With remote sensing technology, we can detect how much crop can be realized following specific conditions. Crop quantity can be determined by researchers in given farmland over a period of time.
- Crop reduction and crop progress are determined:
Remote sensing helps farmers know crops that are under stress and those that are not in order to record the progress of farmland.
- Drought can easily be detected:
Weather patterns such as drought fluctuations are determined, in order to forecast rainfall patterns over a given area. Which also tells the time difference between the current and the next rainfall which can be helpful to keep track of the drought.
- Crop health analysis:
Health analysis of a crop can also be determined which helps in determining the overall crop yield.
- NATCAT Modelling:
Natural Catastrophe modeling is a system to estimate the real-time or possible forecast of risk assessment, using the probabilistic approach to predict the outcome and behavior of natural hazards.
