Multispectral aerial image processing system for precision agriculture

Abstract

Cuban agriculture has the growing need to increase its productivity. To achieve this, precision agriculture can play a fundamental role. It is necessary to develop an image processing system able to process all the crops information and calculate vegetation indexes in a satisfactory way. This will entail in accurate measurements of the nitrogen lack, the hydric stress, and the vegetal strength, among other aspects, seeking to improve the accuracy in the care of these aspects. This document reports the results of an investigation pointed to develop a procedure for capturing and processing multispectral aerial images obtained from Unmanned Aerial Vehicles [UAV]. This procedure searched to measure the vegetation indexes of sugarcane crops that may be correlated with the level of vegetal strength, the number of stems, and the foliar mass per lot. We used a USENSE-X8 UAV together with a Sequoia multispectral sensor and the QGIS processing software. The procedure was experimentally validated.