Background
A leading coffee retailer needed to determine the optimal placement of shade trees across 12,000 hectares of coffee plantations over a five-year horizon. This strategic planting is critical to create the right microclimatic conditions that minimize the risk of coffee leaf rust, a devastating crop disease.
Scaling Microclimate Planning
The company’s primary challenge was scale. Their previous process for assessing farms was manual, slow, and resource-intensive. This former process required three days and eight technicians per farm, plus manual analysis of drone and satellite data. A manager calculated that assessing all 12,000 hectares at that pace would have taken more than five years, exceeding the project's timeline. They needed a solution that could analyze the entire area quickly and accurately, as their traditional monitoring methods were proving too time-consuming to scale.
Remote Sensing & Data Analytics
The company partnered with TLG to deploy a remote sensing and data analytics solution. This platform was used to track two key metrics across all their coffee plantations: current shade tree coverage and the health of the coffee plants themselves. This data provides a detailed, large-scale map of environmental conditions, allowing for precise planning.
Cost-Effective and Precise Data
TLG's solution provided a cost-effective alternative to manual field assessments. It delivered the precise environmental data the retailer needed to effectively plan the large-scale shade tree planting initiative. This data-driven approach ensures sustainable disease prevention and long-term resilience for their coffee crops. According to the client, with TLG's solution, they can now achieve the same assessment results in a fraction of the time.
