The Role of Drones as an Enabler for the 4th Agricultural Revolution

Abstract

The domain of agriculture is constantly evolving in terms of means and tools used. The rapid evolution in Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) and drone technology has facilitated a series of applications in the field of agriculture. The use of drones, combined with advanced ICT technologies as well as connected analytics methods, provides great potential in supporting and resolving some of the most challenging issues faced by the agricultural domain especially in real time data acquisition, monitoring and decision-making processes, triggering the so-called 4th agricultural revolution. The present paper provides an overview of the application of drones in the agriculture domain worldwide. Initially, the paper presents some introductory information concerning the technological evolution in the agricultural domain with special focus on the use of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles. It then conducts a research concerning different applications of UAVs in agriculture. It proceeds with discussing relevant existing research initiatives, highlighting the relevant advantages and the prospects in using drone technology in agriculture.