SHAH ALAM - The agriculture sector has radically transformed since the introduction of smart farming, giving farmers access to technologies and devices that help to maximise the products’ quality and quantity, while reducing the cost of farming.
E-Petani, a local online platform which sells fresh products and over 20,000 types of vegetables and fruits from farm to doorstep s has been utilising smart farming in addition to traditional farming since 2020 as they aimed to use this in order to improve their business.
The co-founder of E-Petani, May Teh stated that there are many reasons for the brand to use smart farming as it posed many benefits in terms of cost, method and reliability.
"We decided to leverage on smart farming since it is cost effective as these can be easily done in our outlets.
"We have collaborated with The Urban Farm Malaysia and they will come to check on us from time to time, hence there is a price difference between the products from normal and smart farming but in terms of cost, it is reasonable,” she said in the new episode of Bang For Your Buck on Sinar Daily.
According to May, their smart farming uses the aquaponics systems and the plants are brought to the outlets once they reached their maturity.
They have a selective range of vegetables grown pesticide-free using aquaponics, a method of growing vegetables in water from tanks in which they rear fish in.
The waste from the fish acts as natural fertiliser and provides tons of nutrients to the vegetables.
"At our indoor farm we utilise aquaponics as the method to grow our vegetables, but have additional control over the environment with regards to temperature and daylight (through the use of LED growlights).
"This controlled environment allows us to grow many varieties of vegetables which are unable to tolerate the high temperature outdoors. We grow different varieties of kale (Curly kale, Red russian kale), lettuce (lollo bionda, romaine etc.), herbs (rocket, sweet basil) and local favourites such as dwarf bok choy as well using this method,” she explained.
Not only that, smart farming has been a huge help for E-Petani since it helps to reduce wastage as it can be cultivated according to the specific amount, making sure that no fresh vegetables or fruits would be thrown away in huge amounts if they are not sold to customers.
"The reason for E-Petani adopted smart farming is because we wanted to advance in agri-tech and solve the farming issues faced by the farmers and suppliers.
"With the fresh products already available in the outlets, it can be delivered no matter the circumstances and it gives us reliability to overcome the shortage issue of our products,” she said.
May said that many customers have been giving positive responses to the fresh products cultivated through smart farming and shared that they tasted sweeter and different from those grown at the farm.
E-Petani is a platform founded in 2020 with the aim to help the local farmers and traders in the agricultural industry who are affected by the recent national lockdown.
Customers can purchase fresh products and have them delivered straight to their door in 45 minutes or less and the variety of products is not limited only to fresh vegetables, but also a full range of fresh fruits, meat, vegetables, dairy and pantry food.
Visit their website at epetanimalaysia.com or get your fresh products from their outlets in OUG Parklane, Taman Taiping, TTDI and Sunway Damansara.