A team of Arba Minch Water Technology Institute (AWTI) has assembled a soil moisture sensor system with arduino and micro-electronics. Last summer, I was able to bring five soil moisture capacitance sensors from The Netherlands. Demiso Daba, Tafesse Fitensa and Getachew Enssa followed the one-day Arduino workshop. A PhD student (Edmealem Temesgen) and MSc student (Chanako Dane) from the faculty of Irrigation became also involved, as the availability of measurement instruments makes it possible for them to collect primary data for their research.
As part of his PhD study, Edmealem Temesgen conducts field comparisons between the sensor system and the laboratory volumetric method for soil moisture tests. The first results are very promising, see below figure.
