SAN FRANCISCO, Aug. 21 (Xinhua) -- The global precision agriculture market will grow at an average rate of 13.7 percent from 2018 to 2025 to reach 10.55 billion U.S. dollars, a U.S. market research and advisory firm said Tuesday.

Business Intelligence and Strategy Research (BIS Research), a U.S. market intelligence, research and advisory company, attributed the growth to the increasing demand for higher crop yield, rising market penetration of information and communication technology (ICT) in agriculture, and greater government support for sustainable farming technologies.

With the rapid development of ICT farming since the past decade, precision agriculture technology-based solutions are allowing farmers to optimize the use of resources such as seed, water, fertilizer and pesticides, a BIS Research study said.

Countries in the Eastern European region, where farmers enjoy modern technologies with government support, offer major growth opportunities in precision agriculture, the study said.

It cited the Asia-Pacific and South America as the regions with the fastest growth in precision agriculture as traditional agricultural countries like China, India, Indonesia, Brazil and Argentina will boost the market for advanced farming techniques.

Precision farming is prevalent not only in developed nations but also developing ones. Countries such as China and India, which have witnessed massive deployment of smartphones and internet of things systems, have benefited from the rapid adoption of precision agriculture solutions, it said.

Sonali Mazumdar, an analyst at BIS Research, said hardware systems solutions accounted for more than 70 percent of the global precision agriculture market share in 2017, while irrigation was the largest application sector for precision farming technologies.