A4 Refereed article in a conference publication
Co-design in Bird Scaring Drone Systems: Potentials and Challenges in Agriculture
Authors: Dayoub Moammar, Birech Rhoda J., Haghbayan Mohammad-Hashem, Angombe Simon, Sutinen Erkki
Editors: Ella Hassanien, Adam Slowik, Václav Snášel, Hisham El-Deeb, Fahmy M. Tolba
Conference name: International Conference on Advanced Intelligent Systems and Informatics
Publisher: Springer Science and Business Media Deutschland GmbH
Publication year: 2021
Journal: Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing
Book title : Proceedings of the International Conference on Advanced Intelligent Systems and Informatics 2020
Journal name in source: Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing
Series title: Advances in intelligent systems and computing
Volume: 1261
First page : 598
Last page: 607
ISBN: 978-3-030-58668-3
eISBN: 978-3-030-58669-0
ISSN: 2194-5357
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-58669-0_54
In Namibia, agricultural production depends on small-scale farms. One of the main threats to these farms is the birds’ attack. There are various traditional methods that have been used to control these pest birds such as making use of chemicals, fires, traps, hiring people to scare the birds, as well as using different aspects of agricultural modifications. The main problem of using such methods is that they are expensive, many are harmful to the environment or demand extra-human resources. In this paper, we investigate the potential and challenges of using a swarm of drones as an Intelligent surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) system in a bird scaring system targeting a specific type of bird called Quelea quelea, i.e., weaver bird, and on Pearl millet crop. The idea is to have a co-design methodology of the swarm control system, involving technology developers and end-users. To scare away the birds from the field, a disruption signal predator-like sound will be produced by the drone. This sound is extremely threatening and terrifying for most bird species. The empirical results show that using the aforementioned technology has a great potential to increases food security and sustainability in Africa.