June 28, 2011

China's development of the Internet of Things (IOT) fosters huge potential for promoting agricultural management, said an expert with the Chinese Academy of Engineering (CAE).

Through establishing an IOT platform, highly-effective governance could be achieved in managing production resources, farmland environment and production mode, Wang Maohua, a CAE academician, said at a science forum held in Kunming, capital of southwestern Yunnan province.

According to Wang, the IOT could be first adopted in areas such as important land reclamation projects, supervision over basic farmland and production resources, farmland environment, as well as crop and aquaculture production.

Citing the example of controlling temperature, humidity, fertiliser and pesticide in flower planting, Wang said the IOT will enable personalised management and help establish a biological environmental control and information management system.

"Accelerating the engineering science and technology innovation, which has played an active role in field management of agricultural production, will further enhance modern agriculture," Wang said.

The IOT, the so-called third wave of the information industry after the personal computer and the Internet, is a network of real-world objects linked to the Internet that interact through Web services.

According to China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the ministry will increase efforts to make breakthroughs in the core technologies of IOT, and boost their research, development, application and industrialisation.