The Fish Farmer’s Efforts In Getting Singapore To Reach Its “30 By 30” Goal
As Singapore strives to achieve its goal of producing 30% of its nutritional needs by 2030, The Fish Farmer has been adopting IoT and AI technologies in order to streamline and maximize efficiency in its farming operations to assist Singapore in reaching its 30 By 30 goal.
Company Profile
The Fish Farmer is a wholesale seafood distributor in Singapore. They supply a diverse selection of natural grown fish from their farms. They distribute to various retail outlets, restaurants, hotels and more. Some of these includes NTUC FairPrice, Amazon Fresh, Elfuego and PARKROYAL Hotel & Resorts. Among The Fish Farmer’s top-selling items include; barramundi, red snapper and milkfish.
At present, The Fish Farmer holds the following certifications:
- Good Aquaculture Practice (GAP) Certification
- Industry Organization for Standardization (ISO) 22000:2018
- Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) & Aquaculture Stewardship Council (ASC) Chain Of Custody Certification
The certifications show their commitment to adopting the best practices in quality assurance, safety and sustainability. They apply these practices across the entire production cycle of their goods. This makes them the preferred distributor for their customers.
Some Challenges The Fish Farmer Faces & Its Solutions
Low Dissolved Oxygen In The Fish Farmer’s Farms
The Fish Farmer has farms in 2 locations; Lim Chu Kang and Changi. Fish need dissolved oxygen to breathe. If the dissolved oxygen level in water is too low, it will affect the fish. The Lim Chu Kang farm faces lower levels of dissolved oxygen in the water compared to the farm in Changi. This led to the implementation of water quality monitoring system in both locations.
Adopting IoT Technology On The Farm
This is where MWI comes in to assist The Fish Farmer in tackling the low dissolved oxygen in both of their farms. Together, we worked on developing, testing, and implementing a water quality monitoring system. The system monitors water temperature and dissolved oxygen levels of the farm. It also tracks its fluctuations throughout the day and night.
How Does The Water Quality Monitoring Solution Work?
Each of The Fish Farmer’s farms has specialized water quality sensors, coupled with an autonomous, wireless and communicating module (Radio LoRa®), from Aqualabo. Each sensor is placed in the water. These sensors track both parameters and automate data collection for them. This guarantees continuous monitoring of water quality. A gateway from RAKwireless, is also placed in each of the farm. The gateway receives the collected data from the water quality sensor.
The gateway sends these data to an application, allowing for real-time monitoring. Farmers can access the application from their smartphones. This means that farmers can track the water quality parameters from anywhere in the farm. It ensures that the fish are thriving in ideal conditions at all times.
Furthermore, the system sends low dissolved oxygen notifications to farmers through the application. This alert system prompts farmers to take immediate action. Farmers will on aerators and pumps to increase dissolved oxygen levels in the water. This then ensures the well-being of the fish.
Water Quality Monitoring Solution
“The quality of the water is not something we can observe with the naked eye. The system has made it much easier for me when it comes to monitoring water quality as I can easily receive alerts for deviation in the water quality, allowing me to take corrective actions and focus on other tasks,” said Soe Pyae Kyaw, The Fish Farmer’s Farm Manager.
Like insurance, the cost of prevention is always lower than the cost of reaction. The system is reliable and gives the farmers peace of mind to allow them to focus on other areas of operations.
Manual Counting Of Fish Population & Harvests
On top of using IoT, The Fish Farmer also adopted the use of AI technology, developed by MWI as well. They use AI for both fish counting and estimation of fish weight and length. Before the use of AI on their farms, their farmers relied on manual fish harvest counting. It was time-consuming and labour-intensive. They also faced challenges in determining and estimating fish populations in each of their farms. Farmers were also unable to analyze if the fish is growing well based on the fish’s length and weight in the farms.
Farmers can use the technology very easily. Only a few steps are required for these challenges to be solved.
Adopting AI technology On The Farm
Together with The Fish Farmer, we worked to ensure that the AI can accurately detect the fish. We achieve this by having the farmers send us videos and photos of the fish on a weekly basis. This method ensures that our AI keeps learning and makes few errors when estimating the number, weight, and length of the fish.
How has AI technology helped The Fish Farmer in their daily operations?
With AI, the technology helps them to overcome these challenges.
AI allows the fish to grow without stress during population estimation. Farmers can conveniently use the AI web application on their phones to determine the number of harvested fish and fish population in the farms. Accurately estimating the fish population minimizes their wastage in fish feeding. This, in turn, prevents overfeeding and water pollution. Farmers can now also track the growth of the fish over time.
*MWI harnesses the power of AWS services such as Amazon Sagemaker, Containers and EC2 instances to build on computer vision models that have allowed the AI fish monitoring, to perform object-tracking. With the data generated, the AI could then be trained on foundation models to generate insightful information and forecasts for livestock and feedstock management.*
Through The Fish Farmer’s use of AI, the business is able to contribute to Singapore’s food production by using sustainable methods in its fish farming practices.
Preserving Integrity & Quality Of Goods
The Fish Farmer places high priority on maintaining the quality and integrity of their products.
From harvest to delivery, they maintain their goods in optimal conditions. The Fish Farmer used to have a temperature monitoring system from a different vendor. But, the previous system did not have all the features that the business needed in the system. If the doors to their cold room or freezer are accidentally left open or if similar incidents happen, it could lead to their goods spoiling.
Remote Temperature Monitoring For The Integrity And Quality Of The Fish Farmer’s Goods
MWI’s temperature monitoring system has everything that The Fish Farmer needed. Using a temperature monitoring system has helped optimize its operations. It ensures consistent and ideal storage conditions for the goods in their cold rooms and freezers. This protects their goods, prevents spoilage, and guarantees top-quality products for their customers. MWI’s system is essential in meeting The Fish Farmer’s temperature monitoring needs, making it a vital tool in their daily operations.
By using all these technologies in The Fish Farmer’s operations, they are able to proudly contribute to Singapore’s 30 By 30 goal by supplying quality goods in a sustainable way.