"One battery can carry Vtol drones flying as far as 22 km and take pictures of almost 300 hectares of land," said Irvan, a Bachelor of Geography graduated from Gadjah Mada University. To fly hundreds of millions of drones not just anyone can. There are pilot licenses (like SIM, red) too. Even the name also uses the term pilot and co-pilot. Irvan is the main pilot. This BPPT employee, for seven days on the Mandala Putra soccer field in Bongas Subdistrict, Indramayu Regency, West Java flew one type of drone owned by BPPT, namely Vtol.
In addition to Vtol, BPPT plans to also fly another type of drone, PUNA Alap-Alap which has a wider range than Vtol which is 1,700 hectares per hour. This type of drone cannot fly vertically like Vtol. It takes run-way around 50 meters for take-off. Alap-Alap's initial plan will be to fly from Kertajati International Airport in Majalengka. Unfortunately, until this report was written, flying permission from NAV had not yet been released.
Indramayu Regency is the location of the Data Accuracy Test Area Sample Framework (KSA) method using the Unmaned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) / drone by BPPT, (17/6). Around 24 segments spread across Bongas Subdistrict will take aerial photographs to obtain data on harvested rice fields which will be juxtaposed with field testing using KSA.
"The results of this accuracy test will add to our belief that we are on the right track to produce one quality food data," said Hermanto, Director of Food Crops, Horticulture and Plantation Statistics, BPS. "In the future this technology can be used in areas that are difficult to reach by KSA officers. So it is expected that later it will be easier for officers in the field," he added.
KSA is a collaborative program between BPS, BPPT, and the Office of the Presidential Staff (KSP). Besides Hermanto, there was also the Head of the BPS of West Java Province, Dody Herlando; Expert Staff of KSP, Wahyu Widodo; and several employees from BPPT.
"The use of drones can be one of the benchmarks for the accuracy of KSA data. It's just that if applied on a large scale there are still many factors that need to be considered, such as weather and equipment used, "said Dody.
On the other hand, according to Wahyu, the results of shooting rice fields using drones will be a comparison of the accuracy of KSA data. "This is important to convince the users of the data so that planning can be more targeted according to field conditions," he said. The hope is that one Indonesian food data can soon be realized.
