IoT-Based Intelligent System Adapted for Different Types of Irrigation Crops in Senegal

In Senegal and many African countries, the primary sector consisting mainly of agriculture plays a dominant role in economy. However, irrigated agriculture in Senegal faces problems such as water availability and control, the drudgery of manual watering, and a lack of adaptation to new techniques. All these factors can contribute significantly to lower yields and scaling-up problems for irrigated crops. Consequently, it is necessary to develop new smart irrigation systems based on ICT (Information and Communication Technology) tools, given their advantages and their increasing use in agriculture today. It’s in this context that we have designed and implemented a smart IoT-Based irrigation system that we have tested in different types of crops in Senegal such as onions, tomatoes, potatoes and carrots. We chose these four types of crops because they are among the most in demand in the Senegalese consumer market; and also, because they are adapted to the sandy-clay soil we used for the tests. Furthermore, irrigation methods for these crops are often arduous and costly in terms of water and energy consumption. With our IoT-Based irrigation system, the water requirements of each type of crop are determined automatically based on parameters collected in the fields (air temperature, air humidity, soil moisture) and the water balance depending on the climate of the area and the type of soil. In addition, our system automates manual irrigation, which is very laborious, by using ICT tools to monitor water requirements and activate watering from a computer (or smartphone). It also makes it possible to control and ration water supplies to crops, which contributes, among other things, to reducing the impact of irrigation on the environment. In addition, our system is configurable and can be adapted to all types of irrigated crops in Senegal.