Assessment of smart agriculture technology: case study of Japanese green tea enterprise in Shizuoka, Japan
2023
Asano, K.
Changes in society and consumer preferences have led to a decline in Japanese green tea demand and prices for leaf green tea in Japan. While domestically produced tea prices are decreasing, Japanese tea and matcha increasing trend via overseas due to a health-conscious Japanese food boom. However, obtaining international certifications for export is a burdens for farmers. Therefore, this study assesses the utilization of 'Agrion', a work recording tool of smart agricultural technology promoted by the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, to reduce administrative workload and utilize work record data for tea industry improvement. The data gathering was conducted with Toho farm in Shizuoka Prefecture, measured the time required for conventional work record operations using a stopwatch and verified differences when Agrion was replaced. Approximately 3,000 work records from the company were collected in the 2022, with additional qualitative data via questionnaire surveys. One of the results of questionnaire showed that the cloud sharing of data facilitates work communication and reduces data input load. However, Agrion presents a high entry barrier for those unfamiliar with tablets and smartphones. A comparison of working hours by hand-writing and Agrion work records showed almost 20% reduction when using Agrion in the year. This also suggests the transition from book keeping record to use of Agrion doesn't increase farmer's stress. Moreover, past working records, such as labor working hours, yields, and the use of pesticide information and so on can be visually organized by using Agrion. In conclusion, replacement from conventional book keeping to smart farming technologies like Agrion provides effective operation-improving by visualizing productivity, work efficiency, working hours, and even geographical conditions of differences. Authors also confirmed that the effectiveness of using smart technology in almost all phases from production site to shipment.
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