A Practical Smart Farm Competing on ‘Data Cost-Effectiveness’ Opens the Future of Rural Communities

Traditional agriculture, where farmers touched the soil and checked crop conditions only with their eyes, is rapidly evolving into data-based digital agriculture. In particular, as the spread of smart farms has stalled amid the burden of technology adoption costs and an aging farming population, farms that directly analyze data on-site and design their own systems to achieve 'low-cost·high-efficiency' are drawing attention.

The person at the center of this is CEO Kim Tae-kyung, who runs ‘Dasom Farm(Homyeongsan Agricultural Cooperative Corporation)’ on a 23,140㎡(about 7,000 pyeong) site in Yangju, Gyeonggi Province. 1982-born Kim, now in his 21st year in agriculture, switched crops four years ago from cucumbers and squash to bujigaengi greens(Aster glehnii, a specialty of Ulleungdo), and after that introduced a data-based smart nutrient solution system to break through the limits of analog farming methods.

By designing it himself, he cut facility costs worth hundreds of millions of won by 60% ...Reached break-even in just 2 years
Although Kim designed a smart farm, he emphasized, “The smart farm I pursue is one that increases efficiency with low-cost input”.

Looking at the budget standards for youth self-reliant smart farm support projects typically implemented by local governments, about 450 million won is provided per site for the construction of a smart farm of about 1,000 pyeong. Industry sources explain that the actual cost is more than 450 million won. In such cases, even if sales per pyeong reach the level of top-performing farms, it still takes 15 to 20 years just to repay principal and interest and reach break-even, making this the biggest economic obstacle to adoption in the field. High land prices in the Seoul metropolitan area are also a barrier to entry.

Kim saved on site costs through a 10-year long-term lease contract and used years of accumulated facility engineering know-how to personally design and build the greenhouse with used pipes. After carrying out the construction himself for about 6 months and utilizing policy funds from the central government(Facility Horticulture Modernization Project) and Gyeonggi Province(Agricultural and Fisheries Income 333 Project) , the actual amount he invested came to around 170 million won. That represents a remarkable 62% reduction compared with outsourcing the work to a company.

Currently, Dasom Farm’s sales per pyeong are around 70,000 to 80,000 won, and the farm aims ultimately to achieve 100,000 won per pyeong by raising the unit price to around 7,000~8,000 won per kilogram. Kim said, “Because we drastically lowered the investment cost, we can recover the full facility investment in 1.5 to 2 years”, adding, “I approached it with the mindset of interior costs for a typical self-employed business and thoroughly calculated profit and loss”. Next year, he expects a high net profit margin of 70% excluding fertilizer and pesticide costs. This year, he plans to test low-height beds in a single-span greenhouse and then expand their application. 

Drainage data on a smartphone cut fertilizer waste and raised productivity by 30%
The core of the smart agriculture expansion strategy promoted by the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs and the Rural Development Administration is ‘precision control through data’. Dasom Farm has not only built a cost-effective smart farm but also maximized the efficiency of data use. 

Through a self-built integrated environmental control system, Kim monitors in real time on his smartphone the greenhouse’s carbon dioxide(CO₂) levels, soil temperature, and wind direction and speed. The key is ‘drainage data control through a smart nutrient solution machine’ costing about 15 million won. He constantly checks on his smartphone the electrical conductivity(EC) value of the drainage flowing out after being supplied to the crops, as well as the nutrient utilization ratio.

In conventional soil cultivation, fertilizer is absorbed into the ground, making it difficult to determine overapplication or deficiency, but by combining substrate cultivation with data monitoring, precise fertilization has become possible. Kim explained, “Compared with conventional soil cultivation in single-span greenhouses, fertilization is now applied evenly, crop death has disappeared, productivity has improved by more than 30%, and management costs such as labor and fertilizer expenses have been cut in half”.

Crop control is also precise. When the temperature reaches 20℃, the windows open under partial control, and they are custom-set to close at 18℃. Circulation fans are set to run for 30 minutes and then rest for 20 minutes to prevent the crops from drying out, creating what he describes as ‘a gentle breeze at 60% humidity’, the best condition for growth. To control sunlight, if the temperature reaches the threshold at 10 a.m., a shading screen is automatically deployed.

Combined with the crop characteristics of bujigaengi, which compared with cucumbers revolves mainly around harvesting, pest control, and nutrient solution management, the farm is currently managing a large 7,000-pyeong operation smoothly with only 6 foreign workers.
“We need a paradigm shift toward fostering smart management talent”
Kim, who also serves as a mentor to young startup farmers in the field, did not hold back advice for young farmers who recently completed training at places such as Smart Farm Innovation Valley.

He pointed out, “Some expensive imported remote-control programs cost tens of millions of won just for the license, and implementing precise logic requires more than 1 billion won in greenhouse facilities alone”, adding, “Domestic programs cost around 3 million to 5 million won. If you install only expensive imported programs whose control environment does not fit ordinary greenhouses, poor compatibility between systems can render them useless”.

Agriculture is different from manufacturing: if environmental control fails and crops go off track even once, recovery takes time and can ruin a farming cycle that lasts a full year. This shows the harsh reality in which young people who receive hundreds of millions of won in startup farming funds without sufficient preparation, while under pressure to repay loan principal and interest, can end up becoming debtors. Kim himself, who in the past received 70 million won in successor farmer funds and faithfully repaid them over 15 years, is also currently repaying facility investment debt in stages that amounts to 400 million won, showing that the financial risk of smart farms is a very real issue.

Kim Tae-kyung said, “Rural areas today definitely have a better agricultural labor environment than before, as the foreign seasonal worker system has taken root. And it is true that there are now more smart farm owners who farm with data”, adding, “The real problem is not that there are no people in rural areas, but that there is no ‘talent’ that knows how to manage. For a smart farm, blindly spending enormous sums is the shortcut to failure”.

He continued, “1000-pyeong 기준으로 15억~20억 원을 투자해 생산량을 극대화할 수 없다면, 대다수의 농가는 나처럼 자본 효율성을 극대화한 ‘practical model’로 승부를 봐야 한다”며 “To do that, constant study and knowledge of nutrient solution control are essential. Knowledge of cultivation and pests and diseases is basic, and people must come in having mastered the basic 'engineering literacy' needed for farm owners themselves to handle basic fixes on-site. The government and local authorities should also disseminate highly cost-effective data control logic suited to Korean realities and focus on high-quality education that fosters technical management talent with on-site response capabilities”.