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Felda Agricultural Services Sdn Bhd (FAS) and MIMOS Bhd yesterday signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to collaborate towards the development of intelligent plantations – the first of its kind in the world.
Under the terms of the MOU, the two parties will collaborate in six areas whereby MIMOS will develop new applications for FAS based on its Micro Electro Mechanical System (MEMS) sensor technology, semantic technology, wireless technology and grid computing technology platforms. These tools will be used to enhance FAS’ R&D and advisory services to the Felda Group which oversees some 740,000 hectares of oil palm plantations.One of the key thrusts of this collaborative venture is to develop an intelligent platform based on frontier ICT technologies for remote and accurate monitoring of soil conditions and crop parameters in Felda estates.
The other is to develop an information system based on MIMOS’s semantic technology, harnessing FAS’ 40-year knowledge of in-field variability for strategic usage to enhance the productivity of Felda’s oil palm plantations. The collaboration is expected to herald a new era of precision agriculture marrying ICT with agriculture whereby digital databases will guide estate management and lead to higher profitability.
MIMOS’ Sensor Technology platform involves using MEMS technology integrated with electronic and wireless modules whereby MEMS sensors collect in-field data and relay the information automatically to crop databases. Apart from eliminating manual assessment through soil sampling, this automated system will be able to capture critical data to aid decision making in the plantations.
Worldwide including in Malaysia, this is the first move to use MEMS-based technology towards increasing palm oil productivity. It is currently used mainly in manufacturing and security sectors.
However, FAS and MIMOS will utilize frontier tools and technologies to widen the scope of analytical data usage to make explicit FAS’ tacit knowledge for more strategic purposes.
The collaboration also involves the transformation of data collected through the Intelligent Planttaion System to be transposed into the data collected by FAS over the last 40 years to enhance FAS’ ability to forecast yields, emerge site specific information for better estate management and analyse data for decision making.
Felda Chairman Tan Sri Dr Mohd Yusof Noor said that the collaboration is a significant step forward for the industry because sophisticated technology will be brought to bear to re-engineer some of the existing practices in oil palm plantations.
“Felda aims to be a respected and successful global enterprise in palm oil. In an environment where rising plantation costs, volatile commodity prices and labour issues impact profitability, technology becomes an important enabler towards improvements in yield and quality.’
“This collaboration will eventually usher in an era of intelligent plantations. I foresee the establishment of a new, ‘Modern Felda’, where the convergence of knowledge technology and ICT with agriculture will produce ‘digital planters’ in Felda”, he said.
MIMOS’ Chairman, Dato’ Suriah Abdul Rahman said the collaboration with FAS is a further demonstration of the efficacy of MIMOS’ technology platforms in line with the National Innovation Model to drive the country from a factor-driven economy to a knowledge-based one.
“The collaboration with FAS provides MIMOS with the opportunity to validate MIMOS’ frontier technology applications. We are indeed very excited to be working with Felda in applying frontier ICT technologies in non-traditional industries such as agriculture and the plantation sector to enhance productivity,” said Dato’ Suriah.
“FAS has 12,434 hectares of land of which 11,500 is planted with oil palm, while the Felda Group has some 800,000 hectares. It goes without saying that the possibility of the entire Felda Group being managed based on the applications and technology platforms that we develop is a very exciting prospect indeed for us,” she added.
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