About existing problems National Agrarian Agency said the operators of agricultural drones.
Currently, many regions of Russia have introduced a complete temporary ban on the use of civilian UAVs over the territories of the subjects, without even indicating an approximate date for the end of the ban. The professional community of agricultural drone operators, including representatives of the Krasnodar Territory, Rostov, Bryansk, Penza, Voronezh, Tula, Moscow, Yaroslavl - more than 22 regions in total, express concern about the situation ahead of the new agricultural season, which begins in the southern regions at the end of February.
Market participants turned to local ombudsmen with a request to assist in resolving a number of issues, the most important of which is the permission for flights from March to November for field spraying.
In addition, the operators of agricultural drones declare the need to change the qualification of drones "not by weight, but by purpose." One of the interlocutors admitted that the ideal solution would be to attribute agricultural drones to agricultural machinery. Here is how Irina Semenova, General Director of Agrodezservice, commented on the initiative:
“It’s just that people don’t know what agricultural drones are. This is, roughly speaking, a tank with a propeller that flies 1 meter higher than the John Deere combine cabin ends. Those. we fly at ultra-low altitudes: 3-5 meters from the ground. Agricultural drones are a new phenomenon for our country, and there is no regulatory framework at all. The Federal Air Transport Agency registers drones, ranging from toy drones weighing 150 grams to geodetic drones. But the fact is that registration by mass does not carry any semantic loads. Let's take, for example, a drone that is used in geological exploration: it has a mass of 20 kg, vertical takeoff, it flies at an altitude of 300 meters, develops a speed of 80 km/h - this is one thing. And let's compare it with an agricultural drone: the mass is also 20 kg, but it flies at a height of 3 meters above the ground and can reach a maximum speed of 18 km/h. What does registration by mass give in this case?
We also note that the agrodrone on one battery can work no more than 15 minutes.
Another problem that agricultural drone operators are talking about is that drones can only fly with permission from regional air traffic control centers. The application must be submitted 72 hours before the start of work, while the time is counted according to Greenwich Mean Time, which is extremely inconvenient for farmers. In addition, while waiting for a permit, “pests can eat everything up to the black earth,” one of the specialists emphasized. Market participants are asking to introduce a notification procedure for agricultural drones instead of a permissive one.
Operators are convinced that changes in the industry are necessary because drones in the agro-industrial complex are now in great demand, and they hope that positive changes will occur before the start of seasonal work.