Farmers in Pakistan’s Sindh province click with digital tools to boost crops

KARACHI/SANGHAR: These days Shah Nawaz Behan only plants 5 kilograms of cotton seeds per acre instead of the usual 10 and has to supply the field with half the amount of water — all thanks to a precision farming program launched by a private tech company in Pakistan’s southern Sindh province.
Precision agriculture refers to using a combination of advanced technologies like IoT sensors — electronic chips that sense system conditions and transmit data to the Internet — and satellite imagery to increase crop yield. It involves recording as well as analyzing soil and weather data to provide farmers with real-time data on crops so they can make more informed decisions about use of seeds, water and pesticides, among other issues. 
In Sindh, one of Pakistan’s regions hardest hit by climate change, agri-tech company Crop2X has piloted the first-ever IoT-based climate-resilient precision agriculture project for local farmers in Sanghar district. 
Crop2X initiated the 18-month-long project in March this year, funded by the Global System for Mobile Communications (GSMA) Innovation Fund for Climate Resilience and Adaptation 2.0. The program will help approximately 50 small and low-level private farmers restore their agricultural lands across Sindh.
“This type of farming has been fruitful and we have benefited a lot from this,” Behan told Arab News.
Humaira Rana, Crop2X’s project manager, said through the GSMA project, farmers in Sindh could save water resources by half and reduce their fertilizer and pesticide costs to around one-third. Since March, farmers had already saved 37.5 percent of agricultural water, increased crop yield by 27 percent, reduced the use of fertilizers by 27.7 percent and cut the use of pesticides by 34.4 percent, Rana added. 
The way the project works is that Crop2X has deployed sensor probe into fields to capture soil and weather data, which is uploaded to cloud data storage, from where farmers are provided analyzes, adviseries and weekly reports prepared by the company’s agronomists to guide them on how to increase crop yield, save costs and reduce environmental impact.
The sensor probe measure the pH values, conductivity, salinity, nutrients and moisture levels of the soil and farmers receive the information in the form of mobile and web-based applications.
“So, farmers with low literacy rate are being updated about the field condition and advisory through mobile SMS and calls,” Rana explained. 
Behan, who had been facing the issues of water shortages and overuse of pesticides and seeds, employed the technique on 20 of 200 acres of his ancestral agricultural land. 
“By the Grace of Allah, all three issues have been resolved,” Behan said, adding that he was now saving on pesticides, water and seeds while his crop yield had also increased.
“Average crop production has also enhanced due to new farming methods. Earlier the per acre average of cotton was 30 maunds, which has now gone beyond 50 maunds.”
“CLIMATE CHANGE”
Across South Asia and Africa, a growing number of smallholder farmers are tapping into digital technologies to access information, services and products to improve efficiency, boost crop yields and increase incomes.
From India to Kenya, a slew of innovations in agricultural technology have emerged over the last decade to serve small farmers, who have long been neglected, yet are crucial to the continent’s food security. These range from SMS weather alerts and mobile apps offering credit, seeds and machinery to more advanced solutions such as precision farming.
During the last 50 years, experts say the use of fertilizers worldwide has increased eightfold, resulting in rich harvests but carrying a high price for the environment. In intensifying crop cultivation, farmers also employed more agricultural machinery and applied massive amounts of fertilizers that led to soil degradation, water pollution, and accumulation of greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere. 
Agriculture accounts for 24 percent of human-generated greenhouse gas emissions, which makes it the world’s second-largest emitter after the energy sector.
As Earth warms and floods and droughts occur more often, yields are declining, and farming is becoming more difficult in many places. Estimates show that climate change may reduce global agriculture productivity by 17 percent by 2050. 
Research suggests that technology should play a major role in making farming more sustainable, without sacrificing productivity or farmer’s incomes, and with precision agriculture being a large part of the solution. The World Economic Forum estimates that, if 15-25 percent of farms adopted precision agriculture, global yield could be increased by 10-15 percent by 2030, while greenhouse gas emissions and water use could be reduced by 10 percent and 20 percent, respectively.
According to Rana, precision agriculture was “crucial” for Sindh given its susceptibility to climate change catastrophes. The province accounted for over 70 percent total losses and damages in the devastating rains and floods of 2022 that killed over 1,700 people, inflicted damages of over $30 billion on the national economy and affected 33 million people across the country. 
“By optimizing water use, adapting to unpredictable rainfall patterns, and mitigating drought effects, farmers can conserve water resources, enhance crop yields, and ensure food security in a region highly vulnerable to climate change,” Rana said. 
Farmers like Behan, who now plans to employ precision methods on wheat crops after the successful experiment with cotton, agree and hope others in Sindh will follow suit. 
“Ever since I installed this technology, my neighboring farmers have also contacted me,” Behan said, “and they also want to use this technology and work with it.”