1.

Discuss the use of company in data collection and analysis

in Agriculture.
The application of the computer in agriculture research
originally exploited for the conversion of statistical formula or
complex model in digital farm for easy and accurate calculation
which are found relatively tedious in manual calculation. the
same computers have been used in mechanization, automation
and to develop decision support system for taking strategic
decision on the agricultural production and protection research.
Recently remote sensing and geographic information system has
place a major and crucial role in agriculture research especially
in the field of yield prediction, suitability of soil for particular
crop, and site specific resource allocation of agriculture inputs,
etc.
Computers and their applications changed the face of most
traditional occupations including agriculture. From
computerized milk collection and seed estimators to weather
predictions and automated farmland assessment, computers have
revolutionized farming practices. Technological advances have
brought about drastic changes in farming and animal husbandry
resulting in a tremendous increase in production capacity. The
most common use of computers has been in replacing human
effort and intervention in traditional farming machinery and
other equipment. In addition, even the support functions for
farming such as delivery of machinery, fertilizers and production
of raw products have been successfully automated. But all these
are just the labour-saving, basic uses that have been around even
before the turn of the century.
Applications of Computing Technologies in Agriculture In
today’s times, agriculture is not just about crop production or
livestock farming and associated activities. The challenges
brought forth by ecological factors affecting the environment
need to be a major consideration for any kind of farming
activity. Farmers need to pre-empt environmental impact due to
climate change and this is where modern technology comes to
the rescue. In a nutshell, the uses of computers in agriculture
include:
▪ There are softwares which help in the prediction of weather
conditions and estimation of agricultural production.
▪ Computers are used for record-keeping of information related
to costs involved in production, transport, agricultural processes,
and in the estimation and calculation of profit and/or loss.
The Internet aids communication among farmers and between
farmers and agriculture experts. This leads to an exchange of
knowledge and serves as guidance for farmers to improve
production and earn profits.
▪ Thanks to the use of software technology, farming practices
have evolved into those requiring less effort and leading to
greater output. Mechanization has reduced human/animal effort
and increased the speed and quality of production.
Farmland Assessment:
Geographic Information Systems (GIS) are being used for
developing ranking systems that evaluate land and provide a site
assessment to aid what is now known as precision agriculture.
These hi-tech, interactive systems provide information based on
a variety of factors such as soil conditions, drainage and slope
conditions, soil pH and nutrient status, etc. Prior to the use of
these systems, farmers were often in the dark about soil output,
and unpredictable weather conditions affecting crop quality and
profitability.
Precision agriculture provides farmers with control by
predicting vital information including fertilizer application and
problems with drainage, insects, and weeds.
Autonomous Farm Equipment and Tractors
Automated farm equipment, needless to say, scores over human
controlled equipment in terms of consistency and reliability.
Engine and machine functions such as transmission and
hydraulic power output are controlled using microchips built
into the equipment. Guidance technology is already being
widely used in self-propelled equipment to aid crop seeding and
fertilizer application. Automated feeding systems, computerized
milk collection and milking machines have been around since
the late 20th century, resulting in better economic yield for the
dairy industry as well as livestock production.
Farm Software
With regard to livestock farming, ready-made computer
applications are available to track animals, storing and
evaluating information such as age, health records, milk
production, offspring productivity, and reproductive cycle status.
This is often called herd recording. Similarly, most farm
accounting software and other computer applications in
agriculture provide services for record keeping, simulation of
prediction-based models using that data, and revenue and
productivity estimation. Most farm software vendors provide
you with an option to customize their applications to the specific
needs of your farm or ranch.
Internet Forums, Social Networking and Online Knowledge
Bases
Any business in the world that you can think of, has benefited
from the advent and global reach of the Internet and related
communication technologies (mobile computing, e- commerce,
etc.). Agriculture is no different. There are several forums and
social networking sites on the Internet where farmers can
connect with other farmers and farming experts and exchange
know-how. In addition, there are several learning repositories
that provide information on a wide variety of agricultural topics.
These avenues serve to reduce the rural digital divide, influence
public policies, foster partnerships and connect all stakeholders
across the agricultural value chain. For instance, a farmer can
easily seek out and connect with an agricultural entrepreneur
and begin the exchange of ideas or business proposals.
Information such as price review for grain and livestock, pest
information, real-time weather information (precipitation,
temperature, humidity, solar radiation, wind speed, soil moisture
and soil temperature) in any part of the world is literally
available at one’s fingertips.
E-agriculture
An emerging field of agricultural practices, e-agriculture focuses
on coming up with innovative ways and best practices to use the
existing information and communication technologies (ICTs) for
sustainable agricultural development and food safety standards,
particularly in rural areas. E-agriculture encompasses other
related technological fields such as agricultural informatics,
agricultural development and business. It aims to deploy all
available technologies (computers, mobile computing, satellite
systems, smart cards) for the empowerment of farmers and
strengthening of partnerships across the food value chain.
2. List 10 Software and Package used for Agricultural
Research and give their Functions
1. ODK Collect
Open Data Kit (ODK) is an open-source software for data
collection and management. It is used in farm survey data,
ranging from text, pictures and location mapping using GPS
according to research needs. It works both online and offline,
and updates data regularly once online. ODK supports multiple
languages, and it has mobile and desktop versions. It advance
version, ODK-X, offers tools for more complex workflows. It
allows for JavaScript customisation that gives flexible suite with
further features for longitudinal data entry, bidirectional
synchronization, and on-device data management.
2. R
R is an open source statistical software that has the capabilities
of handling data analysis and visualization, and heavy
computing. It is programming command line interface (CLI). It
has many packages integration which are used for medical
researches especially in the areas epidemiological, molecular
biological, biostatistics, meta-analyses. R-studio integrated
Development Environment (IDE) that contains R tools works
the same way Oracle Data Base Engine that uses SQL works. R
statistical software tools is relatively new, as it first version was
released in 1993 and the version with IDE released in 2011. R is
compatible with some other statistical software that uses
spreadsheet like Excel, Stars, SAS.
3. STAR
STAR is developed with Eclipse Rich Client Platform (RCP)
and R Language for crop research (plant breading and generic
analysis). The graphic user interface of STAR makes it easy to
use. It provides modules for randomization and design of
experiment layout for crop research, data management, and
statistical data analysis. It has the capabilities to perform
descriptive statistics analysis, hypothesis testing of experiments,
data management, estimation of breeding values, mating design
analysis, multivariate analysis, regression and correlation
analysis, stability analysis.
4. PBTools
PBTools which means Plant Breeding Tools, is statistical
software for plant breeders. It is developed using Eclipse Rich
Client Platform with friendly user interface. With the use of
PBTools, data from plant breeding can be analysed  with speed
and accuracy for effective decision making. It an easy to use
tool with good user interface
PBTools provides modules for single and multi-environment 
trails analysis (METs). Plant Genotypes are either used as fixed
or random effect (factor). The outputs include ANOVA tables,
pairwise comparison, and for METs,  regression-based stability
parameter, Shukla's stability variance, All Effect and
Multiplicative Interaction implemented.
5. SPBD 1.0
Statistical Package for Balanced Incomplete Block Designs is a
agricultural research software that has the module that can be
used to generate a randomized layout of Balanced Incomplete
Block Design. It is an easy to use software tool which can be
used by students, researchers in field of agriculture as well as in
field of statistics for experimental designs or computing genetic
parameters for one-way and two-way classified data (ANOVA
and ANACOVA).
Using the software you can generate BIB designs with
replication numbers of up to 30 for symmetric BIB designs and
20 for asymmetric BIB designs. The packages can run analysis
of variance ANOVA for treatments adjusted and block adjusted
sum of squares, adjusted treatment means, estimated treatment
contrasts variance and the contract sum of squares, and so on.
6. SPSS
SPSS stands for Statistical Package for Social Science. SPSS, a
product of IBM, is a comprehensive software tool for statistical
computing and analysis. It has the capability of performing of
statistical data analysis task with an easy-to-use graphical user
interface. SPSS is best suited for analysis of variance (ANOVA)
and analysis of covariance (ANACOVA), and to use it, you need
to have good understanding of statistics.
7. Develve
Develve is a statistical software that provides a technical
environment for fast and easy analysis and interpretation of
experimental data in science and research and development
(R&D). Use of Develve software helps researchers especially
medical and agric researchers to make accurate decisions rather
than making false assumptions. It is easy to be used by students
as well as professional.
8. InvivoStat
It is a powerful tool in animal experiment as does not require
large sample sizes. It allows the scientist to get better
understanding of the analysis processes and help make informed
decision and to design efficient studies in the future.
9. Mini tab
Minitab Statistical Software is used for different statistical data
analysis starting from basic statistics to professional statistics. It
used in predictive mark trend analysis, experimental design,
Balanced Incomplete Block Design, ANOVA, ANACOVA,  and
medical research data analysis. It uses graphic user interface that
makes easy to be used by even novice.
10.GraphPad Prism
This software is has capabilities that to run t-test, ANAOVA. It
is unique from other statistical software in way that it comes
with an interpreted result analysis page after the output results.
GraphPad Prism also has default feature that combines the
analysis and the graphical results in one snapshot, without
having to do each separately and to prevent alterations in the
data. It is mostly used by biologists, and it helps in performing
laboratory research and clinical trial test using the t-test, one-
way ANOVA, logic regression model, survival analysis,
contingency table, life expectancy table.
11. Statistics
Statistics is a suite of analytical software tool with data
management, analysis visualization, data mining and machine
learning. It enables R programming environment integration
which provides additional analytical techniques.
Originally developed by StatSoft, but now owned by TIBCO,
Statistica  is compatible with Excel,IBM SPSS, JMP, Stata files
thereby allowing for import and export of data from other tools
without copying manually.