HIS grandfather was a farmer who grew padi and vegetables in small fields, besides rearing cows.
"I remember growing up and helping him in his padi field. It was very tough, and I still remember it was a struggle during that time as he had to raise 10 children," said SM4RT TANI founder and SAT.ASIA chief executive officer Hafeiz Hassan.
"Unfortunately, after 30 years, not a lot has changed. We are still reliant on conventional farming techniques, which can be labour intensive and often wasteful," he said.
Now 42 years old, Hafeiz aims to change the way farming is done, and he is no ordinary man for the task.
Born and raised in Melaka, he did his master's degree at Imperial College, London, and MBA at the International Islamic University Malaysia.
Hafeiz is an aeronautical engineer, who used to work in the designing and engineering of international aircraft programmes, such as the Airbus A380, A350 and A400M.
"However, my work and experience are not limited to the aerospace field, as I have done technology adoption in other sectors, such as automotive, civil/construction, and oil and gas.
"In the last two years, my company has put a strong focus on emerging technologies, such as Internet of Things (IoT) and advanced data analytics," he said.
Now, Hafeiz is revolutionising farming through the SM4RT TANI platform.
WHAT IS SM4RT TANI?
SM4RT TANI is an agritech platform that combines traditional farming with the IoT and cloud-based solutions to provide Malaysian farmers with robust digital tools to revolutionise the agriculture industry.
"We want to enable local farmers to increase their efficiency, productivity and yield with cutting-edge solutions," said Hafeiz.
The platform was conceived during a brainstorming session between Hafeiz and one of his friends, who was in the pineapple plantation business.
"My friend lamented the high cost of fertiliser and difficulties he faced in managing the farms remotely.
"He needed a solution that could enable precise farming methods, and remote monitoring and tracking," he said.
"Upon closer investigation, we found out that there was a huge gap in technology adoption in the sector, and most of the solutions were well within our reach and capability to develop.
"Agriculture is such an important sector in the country, and it is for this reason that we must ensure that the industry benefits more effectively from the technological advancement Malaysia has seen in the last decade," he added.
Hafeiz said the end goal was to move Malaysian farmers from their conventional farming practices to smart farming, which in the end, would improve the quality of the produce, as well as increase the yield and revenue of the farmers.
"To achieve this, the industry must completely embrace the Industrial Revolution 4.0 by transforming every aspect of the operation into a smart system.
"SM4RT TANI will be the platform that encompasses all aspects of smart farming, realising the modernisation of the industry from farm to fork," he said.
HOW IT WORKS
SM4RT TANI helps farmers by leveraging IoT technology, where data from the soil, water and air are collected autonomously with minimal intervention by humans.
With plug-and-play sensors, all the farmers need to do is to install the sensors onto the farm and start receiving data almost immediately.
"The simple IoT sensor technology also means that there is no maintenance needed from the farmers.
"Periodic maintenance is performed by the SM4RT TANI technicians throughout the contract period, and any troubleshooting is done either remotely or on-site without any involvement of the farmers," said
Hafeiz.
The data is then presented to the farmers in a simple and user-centric intuitive dashboard called SATU Dashboard.
With a single click, the farmers will not only get data for selected parameters, but they may also receive alerts on anomalies and corrective actions to be taken.
"These data will help farmers improve the efficiency of their farm operations by only tending to plots with problems instead of a blanket approach.
"They may anticipate problems before they happen and take preventive rather than corrective actions, which may be too late in ensuring yield and quality of their crops," explained Hafeiz.
TAKING UP THE CHALLENGE
Development of SM4RT TANI began in 2019.
"Initially, there were only three people involved in coming up with the concept, and later, we had our network and device maker partners on-board," Hafeiz recalled.
About two months and five more team members later, SM4RT TANI had its first prototype deployed in a pilot farm in Hulu Selangor.
"Within a year, we branched out to cover IoT applications in aquaculture and greenhouse farms. We then started working on the Digital Farm Management System earlier this year," he said.
As for challenges, Hafeiz said it was important to know that there was nothing for his team to benchmark the product against as they were developing something novel in the country.
"We had to work very closely with the subject matter experts to ensure that the product could address the problem while engaging the stakeholders and potential users to make sure that the technology would be affordable enough for them to use," he said.
"There is also the challenge of introducing technology and convincing the farmers of the value and importance of using data in farming," he added.
As digital transformation is not considered a priority by most farmers, Hafeiz and his team have to engage with various parties and organise seminars and showcases to get the market familiar with the smart farming concept.
"For this, we are very grateful to have good partners and government agencies under the Agriculture and Food Industries Ministry, especially the Malaysian Pineapple Industrial Board, supporting us since the beginning of SM4RT TANI," he said.
Today, SM4RT TANI is installed in 10 farms across five states. The farms are generally producing high-value crops.
"We have onboarded farms that grow Musang King durians and MD2 pineapples onto SM4RT TANI. We have also deployed SM4RT TANI in the aquaculture industry, like crayfish or udang kara, and tilapia fish farming," said Hafeiz, adding that they were currently looking into deploying the system at oil palm plantations.
Singularity Aerotech Asia (SAT.ASIA), meanwhile, which Hafeiz also leads, is a technology service provider specialising in engineering, IoT and big data analytics. SM4RT TANI is a product under SAT.ASIA's technology division.
MOVING FORWARD
Hafeiz said he planned to have SM4RT TANI installed in 100 farms by the end of next year with the deployment of around 5,000 new devices.
"We also have plans to expand SM4RT TANI further to cover other agricultural sectors, such as livestock and dairy farms.
"Currently, we are working with a few companies in Malaysia that run cattle and poultry farms to explore opportunities of introducing IoT into their operations," he said.
"There is also a plan to integrate SM4RT TANI with the supply chain management system, as well as a point-of-sales system so that farmers can enjoy an end-to-end digital transformation of their business," he added.