In a filing with the Federal Communications Commission’s International Bureau, a coalition of organizations representing farmers and agribusinesses in all 50 states have urged the International Bureau – to adopt without delay – the bureau’s proposals to withdraw the conditional waiver it granted LightSquared and prohibit it from building a ground-based wireless network. The groups declared that – high-precision GPS technology is vitally important to American agriculture, and would be gravely harmed by LightSquared’s plans.
The petition cited an economic study which showed that precision GPS increased 2007-2010 crop yields by about 20-billion dollars per year, the equivalent of nearly 12 percent of total annual production. The groups believe that – by enabling farmers to make precise applications for planting, irrigation, and crop protection, GPS technology has been responsible for remarkable growth in productivity, farm income, and improved environmental sustainability.
The coalition remains strong supporters of expanded broadband access in rural America. But not at the expense of degraded access to high precision GPS for U.S. farmers. It should be utterly clear that LightSquared’s network would be incompatible with U.S. agriculture use of high precision GPS.
Source: NAFB News Service