Application of UAV’s in Agriculture: Nigeria’s Case

Abstract: Precision Farming has been described as a new approach to farming whereby information technology is introduced into the whole production process so as to increase yield, save time and cost and improve the overall economic outlook of a nation. Information has been found to be one of the key requirements to achieve this great feat. Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV’s) have been used over the years mostly in military applications. Recently, these low cost, low maintenance vehicles have been utilized in precision agriculture from overall monitoring of the crop field to spraying of pesticides and fertilizer. In this research, the need to adopt UAV’s in the context of Nigerian farmers most of whom are small scale in nature is presented. Potential areas of application such as in the field of crop monitoring and spraying system are analyzed.

Keywords: Nigeria, Precision Farming, UAV, Crop Monitoring, Spraying Systems