UNIVERSITAS AIRLANGGA NEWS – In agriculture, the harvest is influenced by several factors. One of them is soil. However, not all farmers understand the needs of soil for farming.
For this problem, Affandy Fahrizain, a student of Faculty of Science and Technology Universitas Airlangga (FST UNAIR) created an app based on Internet of Things to help farmers in managing their land for farming. The app is named Smart Watering System for Greenhouse Farmers based on the Internet of Things and Android.
According to Affandy, the app aims to help farmers regulating soil moisture and controlling mater management to plants.
“The innovation is in the form of Internet of Things software that is connected to the server, so users can monitor the level of soil moisture and the temperature around the plant easily,” said the final year student.
By using a sensor, when the app detects the level of soil moisture below the specified limit, the water pump will automatically turn on and when it reaches or exceeds the specified humidity limit, the water pump will automatically shut down.
” It works if the sensor detects the level of soil moisture below the specified limit, the water pump will automatically turn on. When the humidity reaches or exceeds the limit, the water pump will automatically shut down, “explained the Information Systems bachelor’s degree program student.
Affandy said that in the process, the internet became one of the obstacles because the tool is very dependent on internet connection.
“The obstacle is because this is connected to the internet, so it really depends on the quality of the internet connection. If the internet is slow then the device will also have slow response, ” he explained.
Affandy also revealed that the application has been able to work well as planned. Moreover, the application has also been successfully used to monitor plant conditions in real-time.
Affandy hoped that the app can be developed further to help many people, especially in other fields.
Furthermore, Affandy got a gold award for the app in the International Exhibition of Research, Idea & Innovation on Creative and Humanizing on December 16-18, 2019 at the Convention Hall, Level 5 E-Learning, Sultan Abdul Jalil Shah Campus (KSAJS) , Sultan Idris Education University (UPSI), Malaysia. In addition, Affandy’s work was named Best Project by IEEE Systems, Man and Cybernetics Society (IEEE SMC). (*)