Smart Agriculture: Bringing Farming into the Digital Future

One of the most exciting use cases for 5G, with the potential to have an immediate global impact, is smart agriculture. From opportunities to expand thespectrum, enhance crop monitoring, deploy tactical machine learning (ML), and implement predictive technology, the door for innovation in agriculture opens to a bright future. 

Ismail Guvenc moderates a panel with experts from a wide variety of 5G and agriculture areas. During this robust discussion, they deploy their expertise to touch on 5G use cases, ROI, AI/ML, UAS, testbeds, and the challenges faced by these potential adoptions. 

Dez O’Connor of Cisco dives into his work expanding access to rural communities in the UK, touching on the necessity of providing reliable spectrum to areas that don’t yet have internet access. Abhilash Chandel leans heavily on his experience working with farms, detailing significant use cases that have taken advantage of 5G, most notably exploring the possibility of saving apple harvests through surface temperature checks. Michael Prorock shares his expertise with ML to highlight the critical areas where ML can fill the gaps in 5G adoption. Tony Sammarco speaks on growth from 4G to 5G and how everything connects to a more expanded and operable Internet of Things for agriculture. 

Through their independent contributions, these innovators and experts bring insight into the most interesting aspects of smart agriculture, and the larger discussion around the past, present, and future will inspire those interested in 5G to picture a sustainable, accessible, widely adopted future for smart agriculture across the world. 

Moderator: Ismail Guvenc, Professor, Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, North Carolina State University​ 

Panelists: Abhilash Chandel, Assistant Professor, Precision Agriculture Technologies and Data Management, Virginia Tech Tidewater AREC; Dez O’Connor, Sr. Sales Business Development Manager, Cisco Systems; Mike Prorock, Founder and CTO, mesur.io; Tony Sammarco, Director, Product Technology Strategy, Device Solutions Inc.