ANOTHER innovation in agriculture is taking center stage.
In October of last year, MyDrone Services was one of the several exhibitors during the Banana Congress held at the SMX Convention Center, SM Lanang Premier. Their booth displayed a 25-kilogram drone that can used to spray pesticides, herbicides, fungicides, and nutrients more efficiently.
“MyDrone Services is a Philippine company. We are here in Davao and also Pampanga. We offer turnkey solutions for people that want to hire us to do agricultural spray. If you have banana crops, sugarcane, pomelo, that sort of thing, you can contact us. We will bring the drone and the pilots and we will then spray the crop area you want us to spray on a one offer on a regular basis,” said MyDrone Services president and CEO Bryce Mitchell during an earlier interview.
Mitchell also said that this agricultural drone is environmental-friendly and may also help the farmers save money as it would be prevent over-spray.
“We also see that it’s going to be cost-effective versus using hands spray which still needs to be done but drones can really help you with the tough terrain areas and the more irregular-shaped areas. We would not replace crop spray, but we can help be more efficient on the fringe areas and the hard-to-reach areas. And also, we can fly at night. You can do nighttime operations,” he added.
Following this initial interest and introduction of agricultural drones, Davao City Investment and Promotions Center (DCIPC) head Lemuel Ortonio said they have received three different investors signifying interest in investing for agricultural drones in the city for the month of June alone.
Ortonio said that these interests may not instantly signify that the investors will already invest here in the city as all three of them are still in the planning and checking stages. He said these inquiring investors were Chinese and American.
“These drones can also be used to properly survey the areas. That is the purpose. And to properly monitor the crops. So far, the drones introduced to us are specific for agriculture,” Ortonio told SunStar Davao. He added that last month as well these investors did an actual field demo in the city.
DCIPC has also connected these investors with local farmers of the city through the City Agriculture’s Office.
“Well, this is a new technology and it will make the monitoring of our farmers’ produce easier for them. Again, it’s a new technology and an innovation in terms of agriculture that we welcome,” he said.