CAAIN
CAAIN
Smart farms provide real-world validation of the latest agricultural technology, from sensors to automated vehicles and everything in-between. The platform can also demonstrate to farm operators the potential return on investment of adopting a particular piece of equipment, while providing a useful hands-on tool to educate post-secondary students enrolled in relevant programs. That said, our nation is as ecologically diverse as it is large, and a tool used one way in Nova Scotia may have a different application or value in Alberta.
The overall goal of this project is to develop a collaborative framework among smart farm initiatives to share data and expertise, thereby providing greater value to Canada’s farmers, industry players, and technology developers. So as to identify the most effective ways to use data to make informed on-farm management decisions, activities will focus initially on evaluating sensor connectivity, as well as assessing and validating crop, climate, and soil data collection.
The original network partners represent three organisations, Olds College and Lakeland College in Alberta, and Glacier Discovery Farm in Saskatchewan. They will seek to expand from the original three and incorporate technologies such as prescription mapping and variable rate applications, autonomous agricultural equipment, remote sensing and UAV/aerial/satellite imagery, and regenerative agriculture practices.
CAAIN Contribution
$1,127,193
Total Project Value
$ 3,383,589
Project Contact
Joy Agnew, PhD
Associate Vice-President, Research
Olds College
jagnew@oldscollege.ca
Project Video