In the current era of the industrial revolution 4.0, the agricultural sector has also experienced major changes that include elements of technology in various stages of its production. These changes are made possible by the desire to increase agricultural production yields many times over from before and obtain quality agricultural products, but by prioritizing effectiveness and efficiency, efficiency in various fields that support it.

These things also trigger the birth of various innovations in agriculture, including the tools used in agriculture as well as new techniques for managing and processing agricultural products. Fresh graduates alumni of the Universitas Sumatera Utara (USU) who are members of the start-up CV Mandike Instruments, namely Dwi Budi Prasetyo, Rizki Ari Mihalza, Intan Dewani and Rico Wardana, also do not want to miss taking advantage of this opportunity. They then created a new innovation that is expected to be able to help farmers in carrying out their activities in the agricultural sector.

The tool created by these young people is called Smart Farming. Smart farming is in the form of a portable tool that can be disassembled, equipped with special applications that are still being refined in technology. Smart farming consists of sensor nodes and gateways as well as applications.

According to Dwi Budi Prasetyo as CEO of Mandike Instruments, Smart farming is used to monitor and determine the degree of acidity, temperature, rainfall, humidity and weather conditions in an area that will be used as agricultural land.

"By knowing these things, it is hoped that farmers will be able to measure the need for fertilizers to be used in agricultural activities appropriately and not excessively, so as not to damage the nutrients contained in the agricultural land. In addition to getting the right calculations, knowing the level of soil fertility and determining the types of plants that are suitable for development will also increase the efficiency of farmers' own expenditures," Budi said.

According to him, the application that will accompany the use of Smart Farming has already reached the completion stage. However, when testing the use of the application there are several things that need to be added in completing the application concerned.

"We want this tool to be really effective in helping farmers. Thus, the trials carried out cannot be done in one or two trials. It must be done many times so that the right results are obtained, he said.

Regarding whether Smart Farming will be sold in limited quantities or mass-produced, Budi admits that he cannot decide yet, because it will be discussed with the commissioners of CV Mandike. In addition to assessing prices, consumer capabilities and market acceptance, which of course are dominated by farmers, also adjust to the needs that can be handled by their start-ups.

"This will be discussed further later after the application is complete and can be used 100 percent. Considering that if it is sold or mass produced, of course, the price is not cheap. With the price that is not cheap, the ability of consumers must also be considered. We don't want our tools to burden farmers and increase the amount of capital that must be spent, which will affect the selling price of agricultural production itself. Maybe in the beginning, what we did was to collaborate with the agriculture office through agricultural extension workers to use this tool. Or it can be rented out, given away or there may be other alternatives. Basically, it has not been discussed seriously. We first still want to make this tool perfect, “said Budi.

In the future, Budi also hopes that Smart Farming will become a tool that will start the collaboration between CV Mandike and USU agricultural alumni to create other tools in the agricultural sector that are more useful.

"We are majoring in engineering. So, collaboration with agricultural people will certainly have the opportunity to produce new innovations in agriculture," hoped this alumni of the Faculty of Electrical Engineering.