Recently, Techworld pointed out the promise of growing agricultural productivity by adopting IoT-related technologies [9]. With the literature survey and our experience on developing IoT systems, previously existing smart farming systems can be enhanced by employing IoT systems in two aspects: 1) makeiteasytoextendsystemsbyallowingnewtypeofdevices to be efficiently and effectively integrated into smart farms; 2) facilitate horizontal smart farm platforms, which enables all smart farms to be connected and take advantage of experts’ (i.e., experienced farmers) farming knowledge.
The smart farm, embedded with IoT systems, could be called a connected farm, which can support a wide range of devices from diverse agricultural device manufacturers. Also, connected farms could provide more intelligent agricultural services based on shared expert knowledge. For example, people having even little experience on farming could grow plants or crops for profits. Infectious disease prevention could also be another benefit of developing the connected farms by detecting influenza virus in a specific pig farm, and proactively isolating that one from others.