Sky to soil: Role of drones in maximizing agricultural crops yield

Abstract

As agricultural practices aim to boost productivity to meet global food demand, drones have emerged as transformative tools offering aerial intelligence to guide data-driven crop management. Drones are revolutionizing agriculture by their capacity to perform precise tasks related to crop health monitoring, pest and disease detection, spraying, mapping and other related activities. Comparing the advancement with traditional ground techniques such as manual crop scouting, ground-based sprayers and satellite imagery reveals many advantages regarding accessibility, precision, efficiency, safety and sustainability, besides increasing farm productivity. Drones also help to make well-informed decisions by delivering timely, high-quality agricultural data to increase yields. However, significant obstacles, such as battery life restrictions, expertise shortages and problems with data processing, are highlighted. The various applications of drones in optimizing agricultural outcomes, ranging from assessing crop vigour to assisting in pollination, are conferred. Additionally, there is a vast potential for drones to transform farming through precision agriculture, provided that proactive measures are taken to address the limitations. With remote sensing and autonomous capacities improving continually, drones can grant farmers unmatched awareness and control to reduce risks and extract the maximum productivity from finite land resources.