SAMA Operational Group: Andalusian Rice Monitoring Service based on satellite images, IoT, and artificial intelligence

The SAMA project will contribute to meeting the challenge of sustainable agriculture by developing operational services capable of monitoring the condition of rice, facilitating its management for farmers. These crop monitoring and automation systems have a direct impact on the productivity and sustainability of end users, improving crop production and quality and enabling efficient management of natural resources. Another added benefit of monitoring systems is that they reduce the use of environmentally polluting products, such as fertilizers and plant protection products.

From an economic perspective, the project aims to contribute to: Reducing sampling costs by around 20%. Modernizing and using resources more efficiently, saving up to 20% on available treatments, reducing their impact on the soil and the environment. Saving 15% on the cost of fertilizer application by evaluating different types of selective fertilization. Monitoring flooding of plots to optimize water resource management.

The proposed research could be a decisive step in the widespread implementation of this variable-rate agriculture, by providing a diagnostic tool that allows for spatial and temporal knowledge of the crop's water and nitrogen demands. This provides the necessary "intelligence" so that, either through specific variable-rate technology or by adapting current irrigation and fertilization systems, the appropriate amounts of water and nitrogen are applied at the right place and time to obtain optimal yield.