Florida’s agriculture has been the cornerstone of the state’s economy, contributing over $160 billion annually. This Southeastern state largely owes its agricultural success to the diverse and temperate climate, which allows for the thriving production of around 300 commodities. The south of Florida is perfect for growing juicy tomatoes and iconic citrus fruits, providing ample sunlight, while its northern parts are more favorable for grain and fiber crop types.
This agricultural production powerhouse spans nearly ten million acres and is home to over 44,000 farms, which supply most of the U.S. and the world with fresh produce. Over the years, Florida’s name became synonymous with fresh tomatoes, sweet corn, sugarcane, and Valencia oranges, and for a reason: the state is only outpaced by California in terms of national vegetable production and grows 45% of all the country’s citruses.
Nevertheless, it’s not always sunny in Florida’s agricultural landscape – the state’s croplands have declined over the past decades due to economic drivers, weather calamities, and increased competition with urban development. Against all odds, the production has held up against the blows and shown sustained growth so far, which makes us wonder: What’s helping local farmers stay afloat? The answer is increased efficiency achieved by using state-of-the-art technologies and innovative solutions, including satellite crop monitoring and field-specific crop type classification. In this article, we’ll explore the unique challenges faced by Florida growers and the role of technologies in tackling them.
The Challenges and Struggles of Florida’s Agriculturists
Cultivating crops in Florida has never been easy. Over history, farmers have had to deal with severe freezes in winter, devastating hurricanes in summer and autumn, and tough diseases all year round. Rising air temperatures and sea levels driven by climate change have added a couple more challenges for crop growers, such as erratic rainfall, increased intensity of extreme weather events, and water quality deterioration. Let’s briefly overview the major vulnerabilities faced by Florida’s agriculture and where they originate.
Freeze probability
Don’t get fooled by Florida’s notorious mild winters, considered the state’s primary agricultural asset, which favors lavish production of winter vegetables and citrus types of crops. The probability of cold snaps is in the local climate’s DNA. It has not once taken a toll on crops in various parts of the state, gradually pushing growers to move citrus groves from the Orlando area further to the south, e.g., Polk County.
Hurricanes, tornadoes and floods
From mid-August to late October, the peak of hurricane season, Florida farmers monitor tropical cyclone activity, keeping their fingers crossed that the weather will be kind. Strong wind gusts and flooding caused by torrential rains directly damage crops, soils, and farm infrastructure, disrupting agricultural cycles, exacerbating soil erosion and nutrient loss, polluting water bodies, and accounting for whopping economic losses. The most recent hurricanes, Ian (category 5) and Idalia (category 3), which hit Florida in 2022-23, inflicted $1 billion and $450 million in agricultural damage, mainly affecting field crops, iconic citruses, and vegetables.
As a peninsular state with a 1,200-mile-long coastline, Florida is inherently vulnerable to tropical storms brewing in the Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico – it’s where most of them make their first landfall, not sparing a single county. The bad news is that the intensity and scale of these weather calamities are only expected to increase in the coming years.
Florida also hosts a record-breaking number of tornadoes per 10,000 square miles, outpacing even the infamous Oklahoma, although they aren’t as intense.
Climate change: air temperatures and precipitation
Climate projections suggest that Florida farmers must brace themselves for less favorable growing conditions brought by climate change. Rainfall will become more unpredictable, and temperatures will keep rising alongside CO2 concentrations.
A lot of Florida’s crops have already been cultivated at above-optimal temperatures. With a couple more degrees on top of that, crop growth will likely decrease, and so will the crop yields. Rising air temperatures typically shrink crop cycles, robbing plants of the precious time they need to capture resources. Further down the line, heated air reduces fruit and grain set, culminating in critical loss of pollen viability. The point of failure due to heat stress varies with crop types: peanuts and soybeans are more heat-tolerant, while tomatoes and bean crops sustain most damage from rising temperatures. Identifying crop stress early and either planting more heat-loving varieties or moving the production northward will remain key strategies for upkeeping agricultural production.
Variability is the middle name of Florida’s precipitations, which strains farmers as proper crop development heavily relies on adequate moisture levels throughout the season. Under future climate scenarios, torrential rains will remain the main contributors to precipitations. Still, their increased intensity will likely leave less of that moisture available for use by crops due to the poor water-holding capacity of local soils. This will lead to increased irrigation demand exacerbated by a drier climate. Higher odds of saltwater intrusion into aquifers supplying irrigation water due to rising sea levels might worsen things for Florida farmers.
Pests and diseases
As one of the wettest states, Florida is an idyll for pests and diseases that flourish in heat and humidity. Local farmers have a long record of fighting against diseases that target the state’s signature crops – citruses. Having withstood the blow from citrus canker, they now face a new plague called citrus greening.
In the 20 years since the first registered case in Florida, the disease spread by a bug has ravaged the state’s groves, decreasing citrus production by 75%, doubling cultivation costs, and driving many farmers out of business. Despite years of research, no cure has been found so far, and infected groves have been massively eliminated to stop the outburst. Some recent experiments with antibiotic injections and genetic breeding provide a glimpse of hope for raising the once-thriving Florida’s citrus production from the ashes.
Role of Satellite Technologies in Elevating Florida’s Farming
Hotter seasons leading to lower crop yields, rising pest and disease pressure on crops, and intensified hurricanes and rainfall, affecting water availability, place crop and weather monitoring front and center in adaptation strategies.
Satellites offering an in-depth look at vegetation, soils, and water bodies from space lend farmers a helping hand to facilitate decision-making. By leveraging remote sensing technology and the wealth of information it provides about fields and crops via such specialized software as EOSDA Crop Monitoring, agriculturalists achieve streamlined farm operations, efficient resource use, and enhanced crop productivity – think higher profitability.
An average farm size in Florida is 200 acres, making it ideal for satellite-based observations across a range of applications aimed at maximizing crop production sustainably.
- Precision irrigation: Given the impressive diversity of crops grown in Florida and the fact that every crop type has individual water needs and heat tolerance, keeping tabs on soil and leaf moisture is essential for adjusting irrigation to prevent heat and water stress. EOSDA Crop Monitoring platform provides precipitation data and satellite-based measurements of moisture in and around crops, enabling variable-rate irrigation to ensure every drop goes exactly where it’s needed.
- Crop rotation: Growing crops in specific sequences is a tried-and-tested method of elevating productivity and building immunity to pests and diseases. Widely recommended by the USDA as a practice against hurricane damage for most of Florida’s commodities, crop rotation benefits soil health and minimizes the risk of nematode infestations and pathogen attacks in waterlogged fields inaccessible due to hurricanes.
With EOSDA Crop Monitoring, farmers can generate field productivity maps based on a series of satellite images to assess the nutrient availability and efficiency of their crop rotations. Moreover, EOS Data Analytics, the satellite analytics provider behind the platform, offers custom crop classification for fields of nearly any size (7 acres and more), which can be used to fill the gap in crop rotation data for previous growing seasons.
- Crop classification: Tracking crop rotations is just one of the many applications of crop type maps generated from satellite imagery. They can reveal insights into regional, national, and global trends in crop production for companies engaged in food processing, farm input or equipment production. EOS Data Analytics marries accurate satellite data with machine learning algorithms to deliver the classification of field crops, forage, oil, fiber crops, and other cultivated varieties with up to 90% accuracy.
To Florida’s agricultural stakeholders and policy-makers, crop classification using remote sensing is a workable tool for gaining insight into the state’s food security and its issues. Accurate maps of crop types improve crop yield predictions, reveal how farmers make crop choices and growing decisions, and power the understanding of how various crops interact with environmental factors.
Advancing Sustainable Practices from Space
Sustainable production powered by data and technology is critical to withstanding the current agricultural challenges. Around 88% of farmers in Florida have already implemented some of the best practices powered by satellite data and analysis, including:
- High-residue cover cropping: The use of high-biomass winter cover crops (rye, wheat, black oats, etc.) reduces soil erosion, improves water infiltration, and slows down moisture loss via evaporation, which is especially crucial in dryland regions;
- Conservation tillage: Leaving at least 30% of the soil surface covered with crop residue is known to increase the amount of water available to plants while also reducing soil erosion and enhancing water infiltration – a major advantage for Florida’s soils with poor water-holding capacity and low soil organic content;
- Sod-based rotation: Planting perennial grasses (e.g., bahiagrass) for several consecutive years between row crops (e.g., peanuts and cotton) builds resilience to droughts through higher water infiltration rates and lower soil bulk density.
- Precision irrigation: By individually managing field zones within variable-rate irrigation, crop producers can reduce the risk of crop failure, avoid water losses, and prevent groundwater contamination.
Satellite data analytics solutions like EOSDA Crop Monitoring support the existing adaptation strategies to help Florida’s crop growers minimize risks associated with increasingly unpredictable weather and enhance input use efficiency. By equipping farmers with accurate and timely insights into crop health, soil moisture, nutrient availability, and other critical production variables, satellites pave the way for sustainable and resilient agriculture where reliable data drive each growing choice and decision.
Author:
Rim Elijah holds a double degree in business administration and political science from Stockholm University. As a VP of Sales, she oversees all aspects of business model development and implementation and the growth of the company’s global coverage. She has successfully established a number of strategic partnerships with an emphasis on sustainable solutions in Australia, Africa, and Asia.
