Sustainability analysis of FarmFox IoT device towards Agriculture 5.0

Abstract

Sustainable agriculture is gaining importance amid the shift to Agriculture 5.0, highlighting the need to evaluate the sustainability aspects of precision agriculture devices. In this study, the sustainability of FarmFox has been explored and compared with existing devices using AHP considering four use cases. A sustainability index has been developed to improve any ambiguity imposed by AHP ratings. The sustainability index value for FarmFox ranged between 4.7 and 4.85, indicating a high level of sustainability. In contrast, the other two devices demonstrated sustainability index values within the ranges of 4.0 to 4.2 and 1.31 to 1.34, reflecting moderate to strong sustainability levels, respectively. The two successful applications of FarmFox in small- and large-scale system respectively showcases its robustness. The proposed sustainable solution framework highlights four out of five aspects of sustainable farming crop management, soil management, water conservation and disease management. Furthermore, the SWOTC reveals that data privacy and data loss are the two major threats whereas dealing with power supply disruption and RTC synchronization was found to be the major challenges. It is expected that with the growing trend of urban farmers, prototypes such as FarmFox ensure the paradigm shift towards Agriculture 5.0. With commercialization of FarmFox at an affordable cost will ensure agricultural sustainability in line with the sustainable development goals.