10 Mobile App Ideas for Boosting Productivity in Farming and Agriculture
Mar 20, 2018
The farming and agriculture industry has never been more competitive. Facing the challenges of a changing climate, increasing costs, global pressures on grain and feed, and more, farmers need to make the most out of existing resources to maximize profits.
Mobile apps can help farming and agriculture businesses stay connected to workers and operations in the field, and improve efficiency throughout the entire operation.
Here are ten ideas for improving productivity with mobile apps.
1. Manage staff in the field
Improve accountability and productivity by having employees or contract workers fill in mobile timesheets while on the job rather than after the fact. Record more accurate start and end times, track break times and durations, capture GPS locations and more.
2. Track and maintain equipment fleets
Keep track of equipment in use, locations, schedules, and issues with real-time updates from the field. Look up past service records or maintenance logs from mobile devices, anywhere. Report on fuel consumption and other indicators to improve preventative maintenance.
3. Record pickups and deliveries
Replace existing spreadsheets or paper forms with flexible mobile apps to accurately track pickups and deliveries of crops, seeds, livestock or other items. Record signatures, pictures, weight, volume, location, status, time, or anything else you want to track by building your own custom mobile forms.
4. Empower mobile sales teams
For sales teams that are always on the go, create your own mobile apps to automate sales estimates and orders. Streamline the approval process by having quotations sent directly to management for approval within the same app. Distribute sales materials to smartphones or tablets for immediate access by mobile sales teams.
5. Record work done in the field to stay compliant
Design mobile data collection forms to fill in work details such as chemicals used, weather conditions, GPS locations, time, and more. Perform on-device calculations online or offline. Create an accurate, electronic audit trail of all activity for customers or regulatory bodies.
6. Access regulations and standards
Maintain an up-to-date document library of environmental regulations or government standards, readily accessible from mobile devices in the field.
7. Integrate custom mobile forms with GIS mapping software
If you already use GIS software to manage different areas of a farm, you can create custom mobile data collection and workflow forms to integrate with that software. For example, click on a geographic location to launch a corresponding form, fill out the required data, and have the area marked as completed automatically.
8. Estimate or calculate yields
Use apps to perform instant, on-device calculations based on standard input data. Get instant reports on yields or projected yields.
9. Leverage RFID for accurate measurements
Use RFID sensors to record pH, moisture, temperature, or humidity and gather the data with NFC-enabled smartphones and tablets such as Android or iOS devices.
10. Access and submit inspection reports
Ensure that your inspection reports are always accurate and up-to-date by submitting them from mobile devices directly from the field. Improve quality control by enabling two-way data transfer between record-keeping databases and mobile devices. Visualize all of your important data in interactive dashboards.
