p { margin-bottom: 0.1in; direction: ltr; line-height: 120%; text-align: left; }
To feed the increasing population with proper nutrition both in the growing cities and the shrinking rural areas due to urbanization, efforts are made to reduce the loses and to increase productivity in different ways, one of them is reclamation but difficulties as skilled-labor shortage, cost of huge machines, water …etc. are hindering those efforts. Agricultural machinery as part of the global food system and on the top of them are agricultural robots, as one of the solutions to reduce losses and to eliminate the need for labor. Many people worked to introduce them to farmers but still not used in wide range due to culture, cost, legal issues, safety, ease of use and reliability.
Al Jazari’s vision is to promote self-reliant modern agriculture from robotic implements to power sources and shelters in support of peace. Starting with the robotic implements specially our autonomous crop sprayer “DoDo” then we will work on the other robotic implements from planters to harvesters. We are working to promote the self-reliant agriculture, with our work extended to the power source to shift from fossil fueled robots to electrically driven ones with renewable sources. Also shelters in those lands, we have the inspiration to build the Eco friendly shelters in agriculture called “superadobe” using the earth bag concept. Finally, we are seeking peace for the mankind through self-sufficiency.
The 120L/5M version of DoDo is designed and tested in different places in Egypt from El-Nubaria city, as a new reclaimed land, to El-Menofya government, as a traditional agricultural land, where farmers found it easy to use in the manual mode using the mobile application, while the autonomous mode needs to be used in the large areas with the bigger 3000L/24M version of DoDo which is still in development. DoDo is valid for the rural areas with minimum infrastructure in the manual mode, while in the autonomous mode it’s a challenge that we are working on.
For the traditional agriculture in small areas, DoDo brings youth back to farming through the use of technology and saves the health of the farmer himself from applying pesticides using knapsack sprayer. For the large new reclaimed lands, DoDo offers accurate spraying all the time.
The cost of the 120L/5M version is 2500$, while the 3000L/24M version is 37500$ both in Egypt in 2019, we are working to improve reliability and to reduce unit cost with the start of production.
Comments