  The use of an efficient coverage planning method is key for autonomous
navigation in agricultural environments, where a robot must cover large areas
of crops. This paper generally reviews the current state of the art of coverage
path planning methods. Two widely used techniques applicable to agricultural
environments are described in detail. The first consists of breaking down a
complex field with obstacles into simpler subregions known as cells, to
subsequently generate a coverage pattern in each of them. The second analyzes
spaces composed of parallel strips through which the robot must circulate, in
order to find the optimal order of visiting strips that minimizes the total
distance traveled. Additionally, the combination of both techniques is
discussed in order to obtain a more efficient global coverage plan. This
analysis was conceived to be implemented with the soybean crop weeding robot
developed at CIFASIS (CONICET-UNR).
