Water-quality monitoring system from Kerlink & GISupply gives Japanese aquaculture producers real-time data for enhanced decision-making
The customized smart-aquaculture solution supports sustainable seafood production and lowers farmers’ costs by enabling producers to make real-time, data-driven decisions.
Japan is one of the world’s biggest fish economies. Its Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (MAFF) estimates that aquaculture production in 2015 totaled nearly $4.4 billion or 24 percent of the country’s total fish production. Kerlink and GISupply’s smart-aquaculture solution targets that market as well as the global fish-farming industry with a LoRa-based sustainable aquaculture business model. Like land-based agriculture, sustainable seafood production is vital for feeding a growing global population, but the worldwide global wild-fish catch has not increased significantly since the early 1990s.
The Kerlink and GISupply solution enables farmers to optimize operations and make informed decisions in real-time by automating water monitoring that formerly was done manually by farm owners or employees who visited farms to collect and analyze data. Their new system improves effectiveness of fish breeding by enabling producers to continuously monitor water quality and temperature, which is critical because of global warming.
Another positive ROI feature enables installation of multiple sensors that were not used in legacy systems, and which improve pattern recognition and forecasting for farm operations. Altogether, system sensors measure dissolved oxygen, oxidation reduction potential (ORP), salinity, pH, turbidity, brightness, ammonia and chlorophyll.
The sensors, which have SDI-12 or analog interfaces, are supported by industrial-grade Kerlink Wirnet® iStation gateways, which meet standard requirements of public and private network operators, private businesses and public authorities. A LoRa controller from Tekbox, a manufacturer of equipment for environmental monitoring, agricultural-yield applications and test equipment for niche applications, also powers the system.
The sensors are provided by Aqualabo, which designs, manufactures and markets a wide range of water analysis and testing devices and instruments, and Eureka, a global leader in the design and manufacture of multiparameter water quality probes. Customers develop their own cloud software to support the system, because the required data varies significantly depending on the species – fish, shellfish or invertebrate marine animals (echinoderm) – being raised in each farm.
“As a trusted distributor of innovative applications that help Japanese companies in large verticals benefit from the data-gathering and analysis solutions afforded by the IoT, GISupply has been a valued partner for Kerlink,” said Kilian Halopeau, vice president of Kerlink Japan K.K. “The company’s familiarity with Kerlink’s suite of products and services is a key part of the success of our partnership.”
“The Japanese and global smart-aquaculture markets embrace sustainable practices and expect new technologies, such as the IoT, to operate 24/7 regardless of what Mother Nature has to offer, even winter blizzards. The reliability of our system has been proven in both land-based and open-ocean aquaculture farms, providing farmers with continuous readings of their conditions – and more confidence that they can meet their production and financial goals.”
Satoshi Kitaoka, president of GISupply