IoT Communications for Distributed Urban Farms

Singapore’s government is pushing to produce 30% of all food consumed locally by 2030. However, due to the scarcity of land in Singapore, smart farming technologies are used to increase yield in smaller spaces. A smart farming solution can be split into four main components, physical structure, data acquisition, data processing, and data analysis. However, to achieve a higher yield, crops have to be grown in a controlled environment, and there is a challenge to find suitable technology to monitor and control these farms. The paper discussed multiple standard data acquisition protocols, including Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE), Zigbee, and Wi-Fi, along with IoT data acquisition protocols such as Message Queuing Telemetry Transport (MQTT) and Constrained Application Protocol (CoAP). The need to use 6LoWPAN at the adaption layer to bridge between the standard and IoT data acquisition protocols was also discussed. The paper then implemented the selected protocols and conducted experiments on power consumption and distance range to determine the most suitable protocol to be implemented in that smart farm.