The collaboration would be in six areas, said representatives from both organisations. MIMOS chairman, Dato' Suriah Abdul Rahman, said new applications for FAS would be developed, based on its Micro Electro Mechanical System (MEMS) sensor technology, semantic technology, wireless technology and grid computing technology platforms.
"These tools will be used to enhance FAS' R&D and advisory services to the Felda Group which oversees some 740,000 hectares of oil palm plantations," said Rahman. "One of the key thrusts of this collaborative venture is to develop an intelligent platform based on frontier ICT technologies for remote and accurate monitoring of soil conditions and crop parameters in Felda estates."
"The other is to develop an information system based on MIMOS semantic technology, harnessing FAS' 40-year knowledge of in-field variability for strategic usage to enhance the productivity of Felda's oil palm plantations," she said.
The collaboration is expected to herald a new era of precision agriculture marrying ICT with agriculture whereby digital databases will guide estate management and lead to higher profitability.
Felda Agricultural Services (FAS) is a direct subsidiary of Felda Holdings, providing R&D services to the Felda Group.
First to use MEMS-based technology
Rahman said that MIMOS' Sensor Technology platform involved using MEMS technology integrated with electronic and wireless modules whereby MEMS sensors collect in-field data and relay the information automatically to crop databases. "Apart from eliminating manual assessment through soil sampling, this automated system would be able to capture critical data to aid decision making in the plantations."
"Worldwide including in Malaysia, this is the first move to use MEMS-based technology towards increasing palm oil productivity," she added. "It is currently used mainly in manufacturing and security sectors."
However, he said, FAS and MIMOS would use frontier tools and technologies to widen the scope of analytical data usage to make explicit FAS' tacit knowledge for more strategic purposes.
Felda chairman Tan Sri Dr Mohd Yusof Noor said that the collaboration is a significant step forward for the industry because sophisticated technology will be brought to bear to re-engineer some of the existing practices in oil palm plantations.
"The collaboration also involved the transformation of data collected through the Intelligent Plantation System to be transposed into the data collected by FAS over the last 40 years to enhance FAS' ability to forecast yields, emerge site specific information for better estate management and analyse data for decision making," said Dr Noor.
"Felda aims to be a respected and successful global enterprise in palm oil. In an environment where rising plantation costs, volatile commodity prices and labour issues impact profitability, technology becomes an important enabler towards improvements in yield and quality,' he said
New era of intelligent plantations
"This collaboration will eventually usher in an era of intelligent plantations. I foresee the establishment of a new, 'Modern Felda', where the convergence of knowledge technology and ICT with agriculture will produce 'digital planters' in Felda," said Dr Noor.
MIMOS' Rahman said the collaboration with FAS is a further demonstration of the efficacy of MIMOS' technology platforms in line with the National Innovation Model to drive the country from a factor-driven economy to a knowledge-based one.