Toyota updates its agricultural IT management tool

Toyota Motor Corporation has made improvements to its “Housaku Keikaku” agricultural IT management tool and will launch the revised service in Japan on April 1. Verification began last October with trials at 3 sites including SuGWat Farmers, an agricultural corporation based in Aichi Prefecture.

Adapting Toyota Production System to agriculture

Since 2014, with agriculture facing many issues in Japan, Toyota developed and introduced Housaku Keikaku, an agricultural IT management tool, by adapting the Toyota Production System to agriculture in an attempt to increase productivity.

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In 2014, Toyota developed Housaku Keikaku as a means to organise data gathered from independent field laborers into a central database so that work on scattered, independent rice farms can be better managed. – Photos: Toyota Motor Corporation

This Housaku Keikaku is a cloud service developed to centrally manage paddy fields and enable efficient farming. Currently, it has been introduced to 94 agricultural management bodies nationwide, in the process of growing seedlings through management of abnormalities in work processes and costs.

Toyota says they have “achieved great results in improving the management of Japanese agricultural business, such as reducing waste due to overproduction.”

Expanded to fruits and vegetables

With the update to Housaku Keikaku, supported products have been expanded to include fruits, vegetables, livestock and more, based on the request from the agricultural management body, so that it can be widely applied not only to rice cultivation, but also to outdoor vegetables and greenhouse cultivation.

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The system lineup comprises three types – Type A, Type B, and Type C3. New business management, agricultural machinery management, environmental management, and ledger output functions and other are available as options, enabling customers to select functions based on individual needs.

Reduce waste loss and shipping delays

In addition, by adding a new function that centrally manages a series of information on orders, personnel, production, shipping, and inventory, it is possible to reduce waste loss and shipping delays, for example, by improving the accuracy of production planning for custom-made vegetables.

It has also made possible the creation of production and personnel plans, which has been a burden on management, and to streamline management operations.

3 types

The system lineup comprises 3 types: Type A, Type B, and Type C3. New business management, agricultural machinery management, environmental management, and ledger output functions and other are available as options, enabling customers to select functions based on individual needs.

• Type A – In line with the previous Housaku Keikaku, Type A is for farm produce such as rice, barley, and soy beans with land-use crops as the main focus. The price per account is approximately 30 percent less than before.
• Type B – The main focus is a wide range of products and crops including fruits, vegetables, livestock, and forestry products. Type B enables monitoring of growth status, formulation of work plans and part-time worker shift management based both on growth status and on order, delivery, inventory, and harvesting volumes.
• Type C – For produce covered by both Type A and Type B.

New options

• Business management – Contributes to increased future profitability with functions including results tables that make visible the more profitable crops based on input data concerning sales revenues by crop or variety as well as simulations of harvests, sales units, and land area.
• Reports and outputs – Enables issuance and management of invoices for contract work using input data. Reduces unnecessary labor due to input errors and so on. Also, enables efficient sharing of work progress by issuing daily report emails.
• Agricultural machinery management – Manages maintenance timing and costs based on agricultural machinery operating times. Prevents breakdowns during busy seasons and reduces the running costs of agricultural machinery. It also contributes to reducing labor for fuel tax exemption applications.
• Environmental management – Makes the cultivation environment visible by inputting greenhouse temperatures, humidity, CO₂ concentrations, and other data and automatically reflects the data in cultivation plans. Supports the creation of highly accurate plans based on environmental data and reduces excess personnel.

New functions include Business management, Reports and outputs, Agricultural machinery management, and Environmental management.