Farming the Web of Things

Primary industry in Australia has a proud record of both remarkable productivity and investment in innovation. The combine harvester, for example, revolutionized broad-acre crop production after its first commercial production in Australia in 1885. Today, there are new economic pressures driving a new round of information-based innovation, this time aligned with the technology push called the 'Web of Things'. Since 1999, it has been mandatory for all Australian farmer to affix passive RFID ear tags to their cattle and to report movements between farms to a national database. Now, the first commercial systems for on-farm livestock location tracking are emerging; the Taggle system, for example, triangulates wireless signals from active ear tags as they are received at base station antennae. A national broadband network is being developed to deliver telephony and high-speed broadband to all Australian homes, schools, and businesses, including rural farms. Farming "things" are becoming electronically identifiable and measureable, but the "Web" that connects and adds value is largely unexplored.