SYSTEM OPERATED PLANT WATERING POST

PROJECT RATIONALE:

Mindanao is the country's food basket, producing 40% of the country's food needs and contributing

more than 30% to the national food trade. One-third of its land area is devoted to agriculture (Francisco,

2017). However, there is an emerging global water crisis where managing scarcity of water has become a

tedious job, and water resources pollution has crossed the levels that lead to limit food production and low

down the ecosystem. Furthermore, the COVID-19 pandemic affects the farmers' daily work wherein there

is a paradigm shift or limited time to stay outside the field, having lesser time to look out for the crops.

Farmers are also facing a significant increase in demand for products across food commodities at the onset

of the COVID-19 outbreak (FAO, 2019).

A couple of years back, a study conducted by the Japan International Cooperation Agency showed

Davao City as one of the nine major cities in the country listed as "water-critical areas." The other eight

cities are Metro Manila, Metro Cebu, Baguio, Angeles, Bacolod, Iloilo, Cagayan de Oro, and Zamboanga.

Several factors contribute to water shortage. These include variability in climate, demographic patterns,

and unsustainable water-use patterns. In some urban centers of the country where water is available, 50

percent never reaches the designated consumers due to leakage, theft, and poor management (Tacio, 2014).

The manual irrigation system is simple and cheap but is more labor-intensive and wastes water. As

water is brought into the system manually, this requires high labor input. Moreover, it is essential to check

the systems regularly to improve production and avoid water loss on the plantation. Due to water costs and

increasing water demands, gardeners need to be concerned about conservation to avoid water scarcity in

our country. As time passes by, with the aid of technology, there are five irrigation systems, namely, pop-

up sprinklers, drip irrigation, soaker hose, portable sprinklers, and a garden hose. Pop-up sprinklers are an

underground system that emerges under the ground when watering. Drip irrigation is a system in which

tubing and nozzles, called emitters, pinpoint the water's exact flow or direction. A soaker hose is similar to
a drip system as it releases water directly into the soil. Portable sprinklers mostly spray water into the air

and come in handy for spot watering small areas. Lastly, a garden hose enables a person to water plants in

large areas and spot watering (National Geographic, 2011). However, there is a need for an automatic

watering system that requires little to no labor work and conserves water without negatively affecting food

and agriculture production.

The water shortage in Mindanao and the global health pandemic demands agriculture to utilize a

precise amount of water in the middle of paradigm shift and pressure to increase food production. Thus,

there is a need for a watering system capable of watering plants and crops with the right amount of water,

no more and no less. Useful and budget-friendly technology is necessary for the farmers and gardeners to

lessen their time outside doing work and save their plants and crops. There is a need for innovation to help

Mindanao solve and avoid the water shortage crisis that people face and substitute for labor work while

increasing productivity for food and agriculture.

The project "SYSTEM OPERATED PLANT WATERING POST" prevents the water which is

being wasted during irrigation. It is an automatic plant irrigation system that works by sensing the soil's

moisture content and decides whether the pump has to operate. The water supply needed for this irrigation

can be from any source like pond, stream, well, tank, and other sources. This system is not as expensive as

the other systems and is time-saving since the work is done by the system automatically.

Moreover, the project works by implementing a controlled technique to meet soil moisture

requirements that will contribute to water conservation and minimize gardening labor. This system makes

gardening and watering systems much easier for daily maintenance. The project requires creating a suitable

design and prototype of a System Operated Plant Watering Post and encoding a program using Arduino

software to process the data from soil sensors. It also controls the releasing of water processes, which

depends on what types of soil moisture level into it, and adds an alert and sound display on the central

controller that the water level in the tank is at a critical level. Nonetheless, the project is only limited to be

used for small-scale area garden design, focuses on types of soil moisture content as the basis for the release
of water, water level sensor as a basis to determine the amount of water within a closed container or the

flow of water in open channels. Maintenance of the system still requires human intervention to keep the

device on the process, manual refill of the water tank to store and establish an adequate amount of water

enough for irrigation. The basis of releasing water depends on different types of soil: Loam, Clay, and sand.

Combined with the principle of rainwater harvesting, this project could lead to substantial water

savings if applied in the right manner. It will be the key to help the world solve the water shortage crisis

and for gardeners who do not have enough time to water their crops while increasing food production. This

new system is developed for water conservation, time-saving and lesser labor work. This project will be the

first step and will guide making it bigger, from the small-scale garden to large-scale such as farms. The

farmers' and gardeners' contribution to providing essential ingredients is needed not just for their living but

also for the community's residents.

REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE

The article entitled The Arduino based Automatic Plant Irrigation System with Message Alert

shares similar information to the project. The Arduino-based Automatic Plant Irrigation System with

Message Alert is designed to automatically provide water to the plants and keep the owner updated by

sending messages to their mobile devices (Saddam, 2016). This plant watering system is equipped with a

Soil Moisture Sensor to check the soil's moisture level, and if the moisture level is low, then Arduino

switches on a water pump to provide a water plant. The water pump automatically switches off when the

system finds enough moisture in the soil.

As eloquently stated by Saddam (2016), whenever the system is switched on or off the pump, a

message is automatically sent to the owner through the GSM module, updating the water pump status and

soil moisture. This system is completely automated and is very useful in farms, gardens, and homes, where

human intervention is no longer needed. Modern irrigation systems can be effectively used when they need

it to water plants. This manual watering process requires consideration of two crucial aspects: Where to
spray and How much to spray. Added by Patil (2016), an automated plant watering system to a garden or

farm field will help all your plants achieve their full potential as well as water conservation. There is a need

to design an ideal system for every plant in our yard using sprinklers, drip emitters, or a combination of

both (Punjabi, 2016).

By comparison, the article Sensor for Monitoring Soil Moisture content in real time discloses a

sensor for monitoring the soil moisture content in real-time, an automatic irrigation system, and an irrigation

method. A soil moisture content real-time monitoring and control system with excellent performance can

be developed by applying the quality sensor according to the characteristic that the vegetable root layer has

relatively shallow distribution so that the monitoring result is representative. The volume and range for soil

monitoring can be enlarged according to requirements to achieve the effects of accurate real-time

monitoring and soil moisture content control. The soil moisture content situation can be monitored in real

time, and essential effects of saving water resources, increasing yield, and improving benefits can be

achieved in production application (Jian et al., 2016).

Similarly, the Gardens automatic irrigation system, the utility model can be with the kind of

sufficient gardens automatic irrigation system of automatic decision soil moisture. A kind of garden

automatic irrigation system, including a water tank. The water tank is provided with many aqueducts, and

the aqueduct is equipped with the control valve of the control aqueduct break-make. The control valve is

provided with the soil humidity sensor for controlling the control valve to open and close by a feedback

signal when the signal of soil humidity sensor feedback reaches the setting value. The control valve is

closed and is no longer irrigated (Ronghao et al., 2017).

The article Moisture responsive apparatus for controlling moisture content of soil, expounds that

by measuring the dynamic response of soil moisture under wet soil conditions, one can determine a practical

field capacity for the soil. Through looking at how the soil moisture level varies with time, one can

determine the field capacity. When the soil is wetted above field capacity, its moisture content will fall

reasonably quickly to a point where field capacity is reached. After this point, moisture levels will continue
to decrease but at a much slower rate reflecting evapotranspiration from the soil. Using sensor data, an

appropriate algorithm, one can develop procedures for automatically setting determining field capacity and

setting thresholds. In residential, agriculture, or turf markets, the present invention sets this as either a “set

threshold” mode or a continuously adapting mode adaptive (Gibson, 2014).

This project shares essential and relevant information conducted by other researchers that is helpful

to our study. There are five related studies provided: Design and Construction of an Automatic Soil

Moisture Irrigation System using Microcontroller by Bello (2015), Automatic Irrigation System on Sensing

Soil Moisture content by Vagulabranan et al. (2016), Solar Driven Arduino based Automatic Irrigation

using GSM by Sindhuja (2016), Automatic Soil Moisture Sensing Water Irrigation System with Water

Level Indicator by Ecija et al. (2015), Automatic Irrigation System for Agriculture Field using Wireless

Sensor Network (WSN) by Jain et al. (2016).

In the Design and Construction of an Automatic Soil Moisture Irrigation System using

Microcontroller (Bello, 2015), the system’s functionality has been tested, and it functions successfully. The

moisture sensors measure the moisture level of the different plants. When the moisture level is found to be

below the desired level, the moisture sensor sends a signal to the Microcontroller, which triggers the Water

Pump to turn ON and supply the water to a respective plant. When the desired moisture level is reached,

Water Pump is turned OFF.

Additionally, the Automatic Irrigation System on Sensing Soil Moisture content (Vagulabranan et

al., 2016) is intended to create an automated irrigation mechanism which turns the pumping motor ON and

OFF on detecting the moisture content of the earth. This automated irrigation project is programmed to

collect the input signal of the earth's changeable moisture circumstances via a moisture detecting system.

Furthermore, the Solar Driven Arduino based Automatic Irrigation using GSM (Sindhuja, 2016) is

a system wherein plants' moisture and temperature is precisely controlled. The irrigation system uses valves

to turn irrigation ON and OFF. These valves may be easily automated by using Arduino and solenoids. In
this project, an attempt has been made to automate farm or nursery irrigation that allows farmers to apply

the right amount of water at the right time, regardless of labor availability, to turn valves on and off. Farmers

using automation equipment can reduce runoff from over watering saturated soils and avoid irrigating at

the wrong time of day, improving crop performance by ensuring adequate water and nutrients when needed.

The proposed system implemented GSM is used to report the details about irrigation.

Similarly, the Automatic Soil Moisture Sensing Water Irrigation System with Water Level Indicator

(Ecija et al., 2015) comprises Arduino Board, Driver Module, Relay Module, Real-Time Clock Module,

Hygrometer (Soil Moisture Sensor), Water Level Sensor and Power Supply. The entire system has been

tested thoroughly, and it is proven to be efficient and successful. The device was able to measure the soil's

moisture level with the help of the soil moisture sensor or Hygrometer. With this, the sensor automatically

signals the microcontroller, which will then triggers the water supply to release a sufficient and exact

amount of water to the plant using the drip hose system.

On the other hand, the Automatic Irrigation System for Agriculture Field using Wireless Sensor

Network (WSN) (Jain et al., 2015) has a primary objective to develop a smart wireless sensor network

(WSN) for an agricultural environment. Monitoring the agricultural environment for various factors such

as soil moisture, temperature, and humidity, along with other factors, can be of significance. A traditional

approach to measuring these factors in an agricultural environment meant individuals manually took

measurements and checked them at various times. This investigates a remote monitoring system using the

RF module. These nodes send data wirelessly to a central server, which collects the data, stores it, and will

allow it to be analyzed, displayed as needed, and sent to the client mobile.