Smart and Climate-Smart Agricultural Trends as Core Aspects of Smart Village Functions

Abstract

Attention has shifted to the development of villages in Europe and other parts of the world with the goal of combating rural–urban migration, and moving toward self-sufficiency in rural areas. This situation has birthed the smart village idea. Smart village initiatives such as those of the European Union is motivating global efforts aimed at improving the live and livelihood of rural dwellers. These initiatives are focused on improving agricultural productivity, among other things, since most of the food we eat are grown in rural areas around the world. Nevertheless, a major challenge faced by proponents of the smart village concept is how to provide a framework for the development of the term, so that this development is tailored towards sustainability. The current work examines the level of progress of climate smart agriculture, and tries to borrow from its ideals, to develop a framework for smart village development. Given the advances in technology, agricultural development that encompasses reduction of farming losses, optimization of agricultural processes for increased yield, as well as prevention, monitoring, and early detection of plant and animal diseases, has now embraced varieties of smart sensor technologies. The implication is that the studies and results generated around the concept of climate smart agriculture can be adopted in planning of villages, and transforming them into smart villages. Hence, we argue that for effective development of the smart village framework, smart agricultural techniques must be prioritized, viz-a-viz other developmental practicalities.

Territorial and Human Geography Challenges: How Can Smart Villages Support Rural Development and Population Inclusion?

“…The research on this unexplored territory is under development and is a matter of concern in both European research (Komorowski and Stanny 2020;Adamowicz 2021;Zavratnik et al 2018Zavratnik et al , 2020Adesipo et al 2020;Stojanova et al 2021) and the international literature (Murty and Shankar 2020;Zhang and Zhang 2020;Klenova et al 2021;Kim 2021). It is still at an embryonic stage, so there is yet no official definition of smart villages and researchers propose the consideration of special features including demography, location, human geography, social, and physical resources (Heap and Hirmer 2020).…”

“…Additional motivations driving the development of smart villages include improving the quality of life in rural areas, diversification of the rural economy, creating employment opportunities, and protecting environmental and sustainable management of natural resources. In recent years, several smart villages have been developed in Europe focusing on different areas, including innovation, management, growth, and knowledge (O'shaughnessy and O'Hara 2013; Barraket et al 2019;Kelly et al 2019;Nieto and Brosei 2019;Krizanovic Cik et al 2018;Wolski and Wójcik 2019;Bacco et al 2020;Majumdar 2020;Adesipo et al 2020).…”

Integrated-Smart Agriculture: Contexts and Assumptions for a Broader Concept

“…In this perspective, this part will be structured in the following subsections: environmental impacts and climate change; new technologies and approaches; food supply and security; farming systems and crop management; multifunctionality and agricultural/rural development. [2] The new technologies and approaches are not exempt of risks and vulnerabilities [40] CSA approach is a promising solution for the sustainability [41] Some studies use the terminology of Environment-Smart Agriculture (ESA) [19] CSA is a concept presented by FAO in 2010, is known as the "triple win" approach [42] CSA practices improve the soil resilience and quality [43] The Internet of Things (IoT) and the Internet of Everything (IoE) may bring relevant added value for the farms [44] The wireless sensor network is an interesting tool to collect data [45] The biosensors are other techniques to collect information [46] Mobile applications, big data analytics and information systems, cloud computing, drones, blockchain, artificial intelligence [47] An efficient use of the agriculture resources, such as water, soil and energy, is crucial for competitiveness and food and security [48] Agriculture is one of the most vulnerable sectors to the global warming [49] The agricultural sector contributes with about a third of the anthropogenic GHG emissions worldwide [50] The eco-efficiency is the buzzword for the sustainability [51] The rice-wheat cropping systems concern particularly the researchers specifically in South Asia [52] Africa is another world region where it is important to promote cleaner farming systems [53] Sometimes the sustainable practices are misunderstood in these countries [54] In other cases and contexts there is not a convergent view about the CSA practices [20] CSA concept has a narrow perspective about the current farming contexts and a wider debate is needed [55] Rural development may benefit from the concept of smart villages [56] Sometimes is easier to convince the entrepreneurs than the policymakers [57] For an effective CSA implementation the farmers should be involved in the policy design process [58] Vocational training and the extension services may contribute for the adoption of the CSA practices [59] The European Union invested over the last years a significant part of its budget to promote CSA practices…”

“…A better organised and planned farming sector may improve productivity and profit. The smart agriculture approaches may be determinant to obtain a more competitive and sustainable agricultural sector with advantages for the rural development in a context of smart villages [55], where the ecosystems are able to adapt to the new realities [170]. The terminology of "smart" came to stay, including for the cities [171].…”

Editorial: Special Issue “Implementation of Sensors and Artificial Intelligence for Environmental Hazards Assessment in Urban, Agriculture and Forestry Systems”

“…This special issue focused on the applications of AI to environmental systems related to hazard assessment in Urban, Agriculture and Forestry. A total of ten papers were published in this special issue, with topics ranging from reviewing the current climate-smart agriculture approaches for smart village development [ 1 ] to the integration of visible and infrared thermal cameras for automated urban green infrastructure monitoring on top of moving vehicles [ 2 ]; the implementation of machine learning to classify contaminant sources for urban water networks [ 3 ]; water network contamination assessment using machine learning in the UK [ 4 ]; future landscape changes, seismic and hazard assessment tested in Tabriz, Iran assessed using satellite remote sensing [ 5 ]; AI applied to a robotic dairy farm to assess milk productivity and quality traits using meteorological and cow data [ 6 ]; AI and computer vision from visible and infrared thermal images to obtain non-invasive biometrics from sheep to assess welfare [ 7 ]; the assessment of smoke contamination and smoke taint in wines due to bushfires using a low-cost electronic nose and AI [ 8 ]; the classification of smoke contaminated grapevine berries and leaves using chemical fingerprinting and machine learning [ 9 ]; and the detection of aphid infestation in wheat plants and insect-plant physiological interactions using low-cost electronic noses, chemical fingerprinting and machine learing [ 10 ].…”