Tuesday 6 February 2018

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Farmers could soon be able to avail of Artificial Intelligence to assist in managing their farm as a result of a €2m R&D partnership announced by Dairymaster, IT Tralee and Lero, the Irish Software SFI Research Centre. The programme is backed by Science Foundation Ireland. A team of researchers will be hired, including PhD students and post-doctoral scientists and engineers, to work with Lero and Dairymaster R&D teams. The researchers will have a range of skills from embedded electronics and sensor technology to software development and data analytics.

Develop autonomous systems

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As part of the R&D programme, Lero and Dairymaster will look to develop autonomous systems to ease the workload on the dairy farm. “The availability of skilled labour has been identified as one of the key challenges to the dairy industry,” said Dr Joseph Walsh, head of the school of STEM and Lero researcher at IT Tralee. “Automating labour-intensive processes will not only be hugely beneficial to the farmer but will also enhance animal health and milk quality by ensuring tasks are completed to consistently high levels.” The R&D programme also includes the development of Internet of Things (IoT) technology to boost milk quality and animal health. This will involve the application of advanced data analytics to boost dairy farm productivity combining existing Dairymaster equipment such as MooMonitor+ health and fertility monitoring system with data from new sensors and monitoring technology. This will utilise data analytics and machine learning to automatically generate predictors and classifiers for dairy cow health and productivity.

Automate management of farm

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The goal will be to help automate the management of the farm itself, providing the farmer with not just a set of metrics, but with tangible advice and recommendations on the key decisions needed to boost productivity. “We see this whole area of artificial intelligence and autonomous systems as being key to the future of dairy farm profitability and sustainability and we are delighted to be involved in the largest indigenous project in Lero,” said Dr John Daly, research and innovation manager, Dairymaster. Dairymaster, which employs 350 people, operates from its headquarters in Causeway, Co Kerry, as well as having operations in the UK and USA. Founded in 1968, it exports to 40 countries in five continents. Dairymaster has been identified as one of the key players in Ireland’s IoT ecosystem and has won numerous innovation awards for the new developments it has introduced to the dairy industry. Dairymaster has a strong history of collaborative research with partners such as Teagasc, UCD, IT Tralee and now Lero and the University of Limerick. Professor Conor Ryan, Lero researcher at UL said: “Advanced R&D programmes such as this can help Ireland become an international centre of excellence in the use of robotics, Internet of Things and data analytics on the farm.”