HAEVIC, a South African drone manufacturer has introduced a new drone platform called the AgriAnalys Drone, which contains an installed multispectral camera recently acquired by HAEVIC. The drone is able to perform its flight survey for nearly 50 minutes, and the camera begins to process information while the drone remains in flight. 

Dr. Gerhard Coetzee, Managing Director of HAEVIC, explains: “The results of the aerial survey are therefore available minutes after the drone has landed. This is a first for South Africa. In addition, the resolution available is from 4 cm per pixel, which improves by far the results acquired by satellite imagery. No Internet connection is required for the AgriAnalys product, which means that the AgriAnalys drone can be used in remote areas. There is simply no comparable product available in the market when coming to the NDVI imagery rendering industry. ”

Drone usage has become quite popular in the agriculture business due to the large amount of land that farmers often must monitor. The use of drones enables the farmers to more quickly and effectively evaluate the status of the crops. However, prior to the AgriAnalys Drone, it could take two to seven days to receive back images from the drone. Having this type of lag time can be detrimental if diseases continue to spread in the crops during that time. 

Farmers will now be able to more quickly react to crop problems, and hopefully, this will help the farmers rescue crops that otherwise would have become endangered. Additionally, farmers will be able to collect historical data for future use.