Partnership will bring connectivity and digital technology to pest management on small and medium-sized properties

Date:01-20-2025

A partnership between the technology company Elsys, Embrapa Digital Agriculture, and the Secretariat of Agriculture and Supply of the state of São Paulo will test connectivity solutions and the use of smart traps for integrated pest management on small and medium-sized rural properties. 

The technical cooperation agreement, established at the end of December, should benefit rural producers in Alto Alegre, Jacupiranga, and Lagoinha.

The municipalities in São Paulo are among the ten selected by the Semear Digital project throughout Brazil to function as Agrotechnological Districts (DATs) and receive actions to expand internet access and the adoption of digital technologies in agricultural production. Based on this new partnership within the project, the expectation is that this month, the first long-range antennas will be in operation to bring 4G connectivity to rural areas without signal coverage.

″Conducting proof of concept tests on the DATs in these municipalities is another step in the search for connectivity solutions in the field. With this equipment installed, the project team will be able to test Internet of Things (IoT) and artificial intelligence devices in production areas and validate whether the Elsys solution can be adopted more widely,″ explained Luciana Alvim Romani, Semear Digital partnership coordinator and researcher at Embrapa.

The partnership with Elsys also involves the direct participation of the Institute of Agricultural Economics (IEA) and the Agronomic Institute (IAC). For researcher Priscilla Fagundes, from IEA, who is working on the project, the choice to implement the technology in these municipalities is in line with the efforts that the Department of Agriculture has been making to expand connectivity in the agricultural regions of the state of São Paulo. 

″With this, the objective is to contribute to increasing the competitiveness of small and medium-sized producers in São Paulo through digital agriculture,″ she added.

Photo: Divulgação

Integrated digital pest management

In Alto Alegre, the partnership also includes the installation of an Elsys AI solution to support the integrated management of the sugarcane borer, one of the main pests that affect sugarcane fields in Brazil, harming the crop's development and productivity. The technology consists of a trap to capture the insects and create images to monitor the crop remotely daily using artificial intelligence and computer vision techniques.

″The digital trap is capable of providing information on the level of pest infestation and generating georeferenced maps and alerts that reach the producer via a mobile messaging app and will help them make decisions for control and management,″ explained Franz Bories, Elsys New Business Manager. With more detailed information on the conditions of the plantation, which guides when and where to act, it is possible to optimize the use of pesticides and other products in the crop and achieve more significant savings and sustainability in production.

The solution has already been installed for testing on a property in the Santana neighborhood. The Semear Digital project team and Elsys will analyze the first data collected in the experiment. Bories explained that the goal is not only to validate the gains of automation in pest monitoring but also to democratize and expand access to this technology for various rural properties and agricultural crops.

"The sugarcane trap solution is just one of the options we have developed within Elsys, and we want it to be the starting point of a partnership that aims to collaborate with Brazilian agriculture, later extending to other important crops, such as soybeans and citrus, promoting greater efficiency, productivity, and sustainability in the field," he said.

Semear Digital seeks to include small and medium-sized rural producers

Launched in 2023, the Science Center for Development in Digital Agriculture (Semear Digital) is led by Embrapa Digital Agriculture and is funded by the São Paulo State Research Support Foundation (Fapesp). The initiative focuses on including small and medium-sized rural producers in the digital transformation process of the countryside. The goal is to promote connectivity solutions in rural areas and the insertion of digital technologies, including, for example, artificial intelligence and remote sensing, automation and precision agriculture, traceability, and certification.

The project's actions are carried out in ten Agrotechnological Districts (DATs) selected in the five regions of the country, covering all Brazilian biomes and different production chains. In addition to Embrapa, the project's associated institutions include the Telecommunications Research and Development Center (CPQD), the Luiz de Queiroz College of Agriculture at the University of São Paulo (Esalq/USP), the Agronomic Institute (IAC), the Institute of Agricultural Economics (IEA), the National Telecommunications Institute (Inatel) and the Federal University of Lavras (UFLA).