Web-based decision support system for paddy planting management

Precision farming offers numerous benefits and advantages to the farming community for farm productivity improvement. Previous research has led to the development of the offline-based Precision Farmer©. Our current research extends further the previous work by developing a Web Paddy GIS©. The need for this arises due to limitations of Precision Farmer© such as portability, offline system accessibility and affordability by the end users, who include semi-literate farmers. This new system has been developed to function on Windows and Linux platforms. A user satisfaction assessment was conducted on website acceptability, and performance testing was made. This study demonstrates that Web Paddy GIS© can successfully run on both platforms. However, the Linux platform has proven to be superior to Windows, based on factors such as CPU usage, speed and user satisfaction. This paper presents a novel management tool of Web-based precision farming for the semi-literate paddy farming community of a developing country. The development of the Web Paddy GIS© is very useful for paddy farmers, farm managers, decision makers and researchers

Applications of drones in emerging economies: a case study of Malaysia

Drones or unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) are becoming increasingly popular for commercial and noncommercial uses - especially in fields of environment, surveillance, aerial photography, digital communications, search and rescue operations and military. Drones are in fact low cost aerial robots, that require little preparation and infrastructure and can be equipped with any number of sensors or cameras making them ideal for monitoring the environment. Environmental monitoring plays a major role in analyzing climate and management impacts on natural, agricultural systems, assessing, forecasting and even preventing natural disasters and enhancing hydrological cycle. Monitoring and data collection systems are based upon a combination of ground-based measurements and remote sensing sensors observations. These data however have spatiotemporal constraints. Drones offer an opportunity to bridge the existing gap between field observations and remote sensing by providing high spatial detail over relatively large areas in a cost-effective way. Drones have become popular in several developed countries in recent years. However, the use of drones is still in the infancy stage of development at developing countries such as Malaysia. This paper attempts to review the development of drone applications in Malaysia in order to identify future directions, applications, developments and challenges. We summarize that, to leverage the full potential of drones approaches in Malaysia, measurement protocols, retrieval algorithms, and processing and evaluation techniques need to be harmonized to ensure the sustainability and resiliency of the implementation

[Virtual Reality Technology of Hajj Practice: An Innovation of The Future] Teknologi Virtual Reality Amali Haji: Satu Inovasi Masa Hadapan

Hajj is the culmination of worship required of every able Muslim. The implementation of this pilgrimage not only revolves around the theory or law of hakam, but this worship requires a thorough understanding while performing it. Practice, along with a clear understanding, is required for this worship to be accepted by God. The practice of HajjHajj is different from other acts of worship because it is an act of worship performed in a distant place, difficult to imagine and requires a clear and detailed explanation. Most pilgrimage teachings use actual aids such as the Kaaba model and the model of jamrah to enable a more precise picture to be given to the hujjaj or students who study it. Nevertheless, to what extent is the existing model able to give an accurate picture of this worship situation to the individual. Thus, the invention of Virtual Reality (VR) technology is one of the virtual technology approaches that can solve this problem. Through Virtual Reality (VR), students will be brought to an actual situation to someone as if they were in the realm of reality in the Holy Land while implementing the fifth pillar of Islam. The integration of VR technology in the teaching of umrah and HajjHajj is one of the best solution methods to provide in-depth exposure and give individuals a more precise understanding of umrah's implementation of Hajj. This VR innovation is an innovation of the future that is expected to have a practical impact on education, especially Islamic Education. Ibadah Haji merupakan kemuncak ibadah yang dituntut ke atas setiap muslim yang mampu. Pelaksanaan ibadah haji ini bukan hanya berkisar kepada teori atau hukum hakam sahaja namun ibadah ini memerlukan kepada pemahaman yang jitu semasa melaksanakannya. Amali beserta dengan pemahaman yang jelas memang dituntut agar ibadah ini diterima oleh Allah. Amali haji berbeza dengan ibadat lain kerana ia merupakan ibadat yang dilaksanakan di satu tempat yang jauh, sukar dibayangkan dan memerlukan kepada penerangan yang jelas dan terperinci. Kebanyakan pengajaran ibadah haji menggunakan bahan bantu sebenar seperti model Kaabah dan model jamrah bagi membolehkan gambaran lebih jelas diberikan kepada para hujjaj atau pelajar yang mempelajarinya. Namun sejauh manakah model maujud tersebut mampu memberi gambaran sebenar kepada situasi ibadah ini kepada individu. Maka, ciptaan teknologi Virtual Reality (VR) merupakan salah satu pendekatan teknologi maya yang mampu menyelesaikan permasalahan ini. Melalui Virtual Reality ( VR) pelajar akan didatangkan dengan situasi nyata kepada seseorang seolah-olah mereka berada di alam realiti di Tanah Haram sambil melaksanakan rukun Islam yang kelima. Integrasi teknologi VR dalam pengajaran ibadah umrah dan haji merupakan satu kaedah penyelesaian terbaik untuk memberi pendedahan yang mendalam dan memberi kefahaman yang lebih jelas kepada individu tentang pelaksanaan umrah dan haji. Inovasi VR ini merupakan satu inovasi baharu masa hadapan yang dijangkakan memberi impak yang efektif kepada dunia pendidikan khususnya Pendidikan Islam

Applications of drones in emerging economies: a case study of Malaysia

Drones or unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) are becoming increasingly popular for commercial and noncommercial uses – especially in fields of environment, surveillance, aerial photography, digital communications, search and rescue operations and military. Drones are in fact low cost aerial robots, that require little preparation and infrastructure and can be equipped with any number of sensors or cameras making them ideal for monitoring the environment. Environmental monitoring plays a major role in analyzing climate and management impacts on natural, agricultural systems, assessing, forecasting and even preventing natural disasters and enhancing hydrological cycle. Monitoring and data collection systems are based upon a combination of ground-based measurements and remote sensing sensors observations. These data however have spatiotemporal constraints. Drones offer an opportunity to bridge the existing gap between field observations and remote sensing by providing high spatial detail over relatively large areas in a cost-effective way. Drones have become popular in several developed countries in recent years. However, the use of drones is still in the infancy stage of development at developing countries such as Malaysia. This paper attempts to review the development of drone applications in Malaysia in order to identify future directions, applications, developments and challenges. We summarize that, to leverage the full potential of drones approaches in Malaysia, measurement protocols, retrieval algorithms, and processing and evaluation techniques need to be harmonized to ensure the sustainability and resiliency of the implementation

Impacts of fertigation via surface and subsurface drip irrigation on growth rate of rockmelon

Fertigation is one of the most important application of irrigation that are being used in commercial farming. This aplication help farmers to timely supply the water through drip irrigation coupled with accurate amout of water, rate of fertilizer application, and at the same time improving the nutrient uptake and water use efficiency (WUE) by the plant. The water supply through surface and subsurface drip irrigation system is the most efficient irrigation practice compared to others.Water supply from subsurface drip irrigation system is directly into the root zone, while for surface drip irrigation, water is supplied above the root zone. However, the use of surface drip irrigation system can cause the irrigation water easily evaporate to environment and reduce the WUE by plant. Rockmelon (cucumis melo) was selected as plant material in this study. Rockmelon is one of the plant that contain sweet and juicy along with other nutritional value. It also has commercial interest in a number of countries, including Europe, the United States, Mediterranean and Asia. The objectives of the study were to observe the different growth rate of rockmelon between surface and subsurface drip irrigation as well as to observe the efficiency of irrigation. This study was conducted under the rain shelter at Unit Fertigasi Projek Keusahawanan Ladang 10, Universiti Putra Malaysia (UPM). There were two treatments of irrigation tested, surface drip irrigation and subsurface drip irrigation. Data collection include leaf diameter, leaf length and fruit circumferences. The effect of irrigation on growth performance of rockmelon were observe during week one and week six and was analyzed with Statistically Analysis System (SAS). The result of this study showed that, the growth for surface drip irrigation is higher compared to subsurface drip irrigation and both of the treatments achieved 25% of irrigation application efficiency

Assessing the suitability of affordable housing based on demand criteria

Affordable housing has become essential to provide housing with affordable prices, but most of the locations of affordable housing are often not suitable with the people's demand. To assess the suitability of affordable housing, several initiatives has been developed, to match the demand and location of the affordable housing, but most the models lacks of spatial element, other model focusing on the goal related to site suitability to cities, and people's preferences of housing. This study aims to integrating spatial information and analysis to assessing the suitability level of affordable housing in Malaysia. This assessment model consists of 3 main indicators; suitability house according to neighbourhood context, demographic factor and commute distance. The method use in this study is using multi-Criteria Analysis, using weighted scoring techniques. The results show that most of the affordable housing score more than 60% average, with the highest score are 84% and the lowest score are 57.9%. this shows that the suitability level of affordable housing in the study area is good. These indicators can be used for further investigation of other affordable housing, and also in finding the suitable site for affordable housing in the future

Mapping of utilities risk for sewerage system asset management

Sewerage system provide infrastructure that conveys sewage or surface runoff using sewer network. Sewerage system requires perfect infrastructure to ensure that sewage can be channelled to the sewage treatment plant safely. Meticulous asset management for sewerage system is highly recommended to avoid any risk to assets that deliver sewage. Risk assessment strategy for sewerage asset is basically will evaluate the risk factor that influences the asset to encounter the potential problem. Current risk assessment framework didn't include spatial analysis to show the locations of the assets with risk. This study focused on the production of risk map that aims to analyse potential risk for asset management of sewerage system in Majlis Perbandaran Johor Bahru Tengah (MPJBT) using spatial analysis. The spatial analysis used in this study is slope analysis and asset's analysis focusing on age sewerage assets parameter. Combination of both factors show the risks that require more attention from the sewerage system management. The results show there were 90.8% of the asset have low risk, 8.9% have medium risk and 0.3% asset have high risk. These results can be used by the sewerage assets authority to make better decision in preventions and manage risk that could happen to the sewerage assets

How can unmanned aerial vehicles be used for detecting weeds in agricultural fields?

Weeds are among the most harmful abiotic factors in agriculture, triggering significant yield loss worldwide. Remote sensing can detect and map the presence of weeds in various spectral, spatial, and temporal resolutions. This review aims to show the current and future trends of UAV applications in weed detection in the crop field. This study systematically searched the original articles published from 1 January 2016 to 18 June 2021 in the databases of Scopus, ScienceDirect, Commonwealth Agricultural Bureaux (CAB) Direct, and Web of Science (WoS) using Boolean string: “weed” AND “Unmanned Aerial Vehicle” OR “UAV” OR “drone”. Out of the papers identified, 144 eligible studies did meet our inclusion criteria and were evaluated. Most of the studies (i.e., 27.42%) on weed detection were carried out during the seedling stage of the growing cycle for the crop. Most of the weed images were captured using red, green, and blue (RGB) camera, i.e., 48.28% and main classification algorithm was machine learning techniques, i.e., 47.90%. This review initially highlighted articles from the literature that includes the crops’ typical phenology stage, reference data, type of sensor/camera, classification methods, and current UAV applications in detecting and mapping weed for different types of crop. This study then provides an overview of the advantages and disadvantages of each sensor and algorithm and tries to identify research gaps by providing a brief outlook at the potential areas of research concerning the benefit of this technology in agricultural industries. Integrated weed management, coupled with UAV application improves weed monitoring in a more efficient and environmentally-friendly way. Overall, this review demonstrates the scientific information required to achieve sustainable weed management, so as to implement UAV platform in the real agricultural contexts

Alternate wetting and drying (AWD) on rice irrigation

In Malaysia, numerous methods have been subsequently established subjected to water-saving irrigation aiming to improve the common conventional irrigation system. However, among the most preferred water-saving method, alternate wetting and drying (AWD) irrigation adoption are presently in paddy cultivation yet has very limited information, especially locally. Hence, this study intended to propose two treatments, namely continuously flooded (control) and AWD irrigation, to investigate the feasibility of AWD implementation. The experiment was conducted at the paddy field of Padang Raja Kelantan, Malaysia. From the result, the agronomic performance was evaluated by several attributes under the growth performance evaluation, grain yield performance evaluation, and chlorophyll measurement. Statistical analysis was performed on the obtained data, and both growth, yield performances, and chlorophyll content resulted in no significant difference at p < 0.05, a 95% confidence level