Real Seeds

Memo
To:

CEO Sandi Hubnik

From:

Brian Cisneros (Project Manager), My Nguyen (Research Analysist), Rebecca

Valenzuela (Project Materials Coordinator)

Date:

November 12, 2015

Re:

Progress Report: Implementing Drones in the Farms

Purpose:
The purpose of Progress Report is to show the CEO of Real Seeds our current standings on
what we have done and what we need to do. The head of our department authorized us to
continue the project on November 10, 2015 after the CEO had looked over our proposal.

Introduction:
With the cost of land surveying becoming more expensive due to the rise of gas prices,
farmers now need new and cost effective ways to make sure they will profit after the harvest.
Many factors contribute to the expense of land surveying, but time and resources are the most
costly. With gas prices going up using airplanes to survey land is becoming a burden.
Corporate and local farmers alike are loosing money each time they check to see if their crops
need more water, are growing properly, or if theyre being overrun by weeds (Anderson).

Completed Work:
1. Preliminary Research When trying to find a way to improve our company we looked
at the main issues that farmers faced financially, because gas prices are going up so
surveying land with mini craft airplanes is becoming expensive. With drones costing
around one thousand dollars to nine thousand dollars it seems like a much cheaper
alternative (Anderson). Drones are bought one time as apposed to having to pay for
fuel and maintenance for passenger airplanes every time a farmer decides to survey
their land (Green).
2. Secondary Research When researching secondary resources we found that drones
are starting to gain momentum in the agricultural field because it reduces costs and
maximizes yields (Senger). Drones are also reducing the amount of damage crops go
through because they monitor the crops on a regular basis to make sure the crop have

everything that they need (Anderson). All of the benefits that the drones bring provide
for a more precise farming in the agricultural community (Drone).
There are also some downfalls to using drones. Ag web recently posted an article titled
The Good and the Bad of Agricultural Drones it is about how the fear of crowded skies
collision is a constant fear in the drone industry (Morgan). According to an article the
New York Times released there are quiet a couple of regulations and posted by the
F.A.A. when it comes to using drones but most of them are unnecessary. These
regulations range from having to make the drone stand out in the sky to being fined
$27,500 for not following the regulations. Another issue is that those rouge fliers who
dont follow the rules seem to make it harder for everyone else who would benefit from
using drones. On top of that there is a long waiting list to obtain a permit from the
F.A.A. as of May there were about one thousand people on the waiting list (Turkewitz).
3. Gather Success Stories According to two videos that we obtained from the web it
seems that using drones helps farmers implement precision farming (Patel).
4. Primary Research (Meet with Farmers) On November 7 we interviewed some
farmers at the Farmers Market in Dallas. Although many we interviewed had not heard
of using drones to survey their land they did seem interested in the idea of using
drones (Mendoza).
5. Organize Presentation As of right now we have not started to gather all of our
information to present it just yet.

Future Work:
So far we have gathered all of our information for our project but we have yet to put together
our report and presentation. For the presentation we plan to make a power point to go along
with our pitch as well as come up with a handout to pass out to those present at the meeting.

Updated Schedule:
Task

Dates of Taks

Task: prelimanary research

Task: Secondary research
Task: Primary Research
Task: Gather Stories
Task: Meet with farmers
Task: Conclusion
Task: finish project
Task: Presentation and report
20

22

27

October

29

10

12

17

November

19

24

31

Conclusion:
We expect to conclude our project without any complications and to hopefully persuade our
CEO to implement drones in our farms. One of our counterarguments will probably be that it
will be a while until this project is implemented, because without a license from the F.A.A the
farmers cannot start using the drones on the farms. Also because the technology is fairly new
the drones can only take pictures and predict how the plants will turn out (Patel). But even
though the technology needs improvement it will still produce more yield then if we farmed
without drones. Since it will take a while for us to receive licenses to use drones by then the
technology will probably have already been improved.

Work Cited
Anderson, Chris. "Agricultural Drones: Relatively Cheap Drones with Advanced Sensors and
Imaging Capabilities are Giving Farmers New Ways To Increase Yields and Reduce
Crop Damage." Technology Review [Cambridge, Mass.] May-June 2014: 58+.
Biography in Context. Web. 5 Nov. 2015.
"Drone Takes Flight at Barton Agriculture Research Center." Targeted News ServiceJul
25 2014. ProQuest. Web. 12 Nov. 2015 .
Green, Miranda. "Unmanned Drones May Have Their Greatest Impact on Agriculture:
Unmanned Drones Have Emerged as a Controversial Tool for the Military and National
Security Apparatus. But in a Few Years, They May Become Ubiquitous over America's
Farms." The Daily Beast [New York] 26 Mar. 2013: n. pag. ProQuest Research
Library. Web. 27 Oct. 2015.
Mendoza, Juan. "Dallas Farmer's Market Questionnaire." Personal interview. 07 Nov.
2015.
Morgan, Tyne. "The Good and Bad of Agricultural Drones." AgWeb. US Farm Report, n.d.
Web. 12 Nov. 2015.
Patel, Neel V. "The New Age of Drones and Farming." Inverse. Inverse, 11 Sept. 2015.
Web. 12 Nov. 2015.
Senger, Emily. "Farming on the fly: military drones are finding new uses: keeping track of cattle
and, perhaps one day, delivering the mail." Maclean's 14 Jan. 2013: 49. Biography in
Context. Web. 27 Oct. 2015.
Turkewitz, Julie. Farmers Flying Drones May Soon Be Given Clearance. New York Times 16
May 2015: A10(L). Biography in Context. Web. 5 Nov. 2015.