1 Abstract—Agriculture is the major occupation in India and forms the backbone of Indian economy in which irrigation plays a crucial role for increasing the quality and quantity of crop yield. In spite of many revolutionary advancements in agriculture, there has not been a dramatic increase in agricultural performance. Lack of irrigation infrastructure and agricultural knowledge are the critical factors influencing agricultural performance. However, by using advanced agricultural equipment, the effect of these factors can be curtailed. The presented system aims at increasing the yield of crops by using an intelligent irrigation controller that makes use of wireless sensors. Sensors are used to monitor primary parameters such as soil moisture, soil pH, temperature and humidity. Irrigation decisions are taken based on the sensed data and the type of crop being grown. The system provides a mobile application in which farmers can remotely monitor and control the irrigation system. Also, the water pump is protected against damages due to voltage variations and dry running. Keywords—Android application, Bluetooth, humidity, irrigation, soil moisture, soil pH, temperature, wireless sensors. I. INTRODUCTION NDIA is the seventh largest country in the World, where agriculture forms the source of livelihood for more than 70% of Indians. Despite rapid industrialization, agriculture remains a dominant sector of Indian economy in terms of both Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and source of employment. Indian agricultural sector contributes about 18% to GDP and employs nearly 50% of the country’s population [1]. According to the New York Times edition published in 2008 [2], with the use of appropriate technology and right policies, India cannot only feed itself but the entire world. Ancient agriculture in India was largely dependent on monsoons. As monsoon rainfall occurs only for four to five months in a year, it was impossible for the farmers to cultivate their farms throughout the year, and this was leading to low crop yield and financial crisis. With the green revolution that took place in late 1960’s, the irrigation infrastructure was expanded to modern equipment such as electric motor pumps for supplying water to crops. However, this modern equipment requires physical presence of farmers in the field in order to monitor their working status and avoid water and electricity wastage. Also, crops have different water requirements at different stages of their growth, which need to be addressed during irrigation. Soil and environment parameters such as soil moisture, temperature, humidity and soil PH play a crucial Rajeshwari Madli, Santhosh Hebbar, Vishwanath Heddoori, and G.V. Prasad are with the Department of Computer Science and Engineering B.M.S College of Engineering, Bangalore 560019, India (e-mail: m.rajeshwari1626 @gmail.com, santhoshshebbar@gmail.com, vishwanathheddoori@gmail.com, drvaraprasad@gmail.com). role in determining the water requirement of crops. Most of the irrigation systems currently used in India do not consider these factors and this problem needs to be addressed in order to increase crop yield. Fig. 1 shows irrigation systems that are currently used by most farmers in India. Water from reservoirs such as canals or bore well is lifted by water pumps and supplied to farms. Fig. 1 A typical irrigation system [15] The presented system makes use of wireless sensors to control the irrigation process based on the water and nutrition requirements of the crop being grown. This in turn helps to reduce wastage of water and electricity. II. RELATED WORK Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) have brought a paradigm shift in agricultural practices, which have inspired many researchers to work in this area. This section briefly describes some of the works that make use of WSNs to aid agricultural processes. Abbas et al. [3] proposed a smart irrigation system for gardens that makes use of wireless sensors. It uses moisture sensors that not only detect the moisture content in soil, but also help in identifying various soil characteristics such as water holding capacity. The research aims at identifying the time taken by sensors to get activated based on which they can determine the duration of irrigation. The fact that different plants consume different amounts of water in different seasons is considered in this system. Sensor nodes communicate with the wireless base station using ZigBee. The application in the base station logs data sent by sensor nodes and controls irrigation valves based on sensor inputs and the duration configured. However, the system does not take into account other factors such as soil pH, which play an important role in irrigating the plants. Ahmed et al. [4] have designed an automatic irrigation control system that makes use of an Intelligent Irrigation Control System Using Wireless Sensors and Android Application Rajeshwari Madli, Santhosh Hebbar, Vishwanath Heddoori, G. V. Prasad I World Academy of Science, Engineering and Technology International Journal of Computer and Information Engineering Vol:10, No:8, 2016 1464 International Scholarly and Scientific Research & Innovation 10(8) 2016 ISNI:0000000091950263 Open Science Index, Computer and Information Engineering Vol:10, No:8, 2016 publications.waset.org/10005092/pdf