Thinking about the future of arable farming is not only an exciting thought experiment, but also a useful way to prepare for the future and its challenges. After all, when imagining possible futures, stakeholders are forced to think about overcoming possible challenges and strategies to remain successful under changing circumstances. Exploring sustainable futures for arable [ … ]
Arable
Invitation to the network and knowledge event AGROS: “Data and intelligence in horticulture, arable farming and dairy”
Date: Wednesday April 5, 2023 Time: 13:00 – 17:00 Venue: WUR Greenhouse Horticulture, Violierenweg 1, Bleiswijk, The Netherlands Complexity of systems in greenhouse horticulture, arable farming and dairy is increasing, and society demands sustainable production systems. Current farming systems can only meet this demand to a limited extent. The way forward involves [ … ]
Scenarios for smart mixed cropping systems of 2040
Thinking about the future of smart mixed cropping systems is not only an interesting thought experiment, but also a good way to prepare for the future and associated challenges. Within AGROS, we have developed three future scenarios and corresponding transition paths together with stakeholders. These scenarios are explorations of the future and we have used [ … ]
Future Infrastructure for Energy on farms
Energy transition is happening in all sectors of society. Also on the arable farm in the field of energy use a lot is going to change. Within the AGROS work package “Infrastructure for Energy” we are analyzing the alternatives on arable farms. The EU policy document Farm2Fork as well as the Green Deal described that [ … ]
AGROS weed control
The use of crop protection products is under pressure. It is an important part of the EU’s Farm2Fork strategy, but in the Netherlands, too, efforts to reduce use have been underway for a long time. In the meantime, many agents are on the “Candidates for Substitution” list, agents that should no longer be used in [ … ]
First meeting AGROS – Exchange between the three sectors
On May 31, 2022 representatives of the 3 sectors were invited to share experiences within AGROS. Some 20 participants listened to the visions that are the basis for the activities per sector. Renske Landeweert (IMEC-One Planet) kicked off with their vision on the developments in data use. IMEC-One Planet works at the forefront of chip [ … ]
Successful Future Farming & Food Experience day
On May 31st WUR Field Crops together with Farm of the future and NPPL (National Project for Precision Farming) organized the Future Farming & Food Experience event. A total of 500 visitors including arable farmers, students of agricultural education, companies and policy makers. The full-day program offered a wide variety of activities. Boerderij van de [ … ]
Smart Disease detection in Seed potatoes
In collaboration with AgroIntelli, Kubota and BO-Akkerbouw we are working on early detection of diseased plants with vision technology and deep learning. The diseases we are focusing on are virus infections and Erwinia, a bacterial disease. The goal of the project is to develop a prototype disease detection device consisting of a camera system and [ … ]
Thinking ahead: the future of smart mixed cropping systems
What can the future of arable farming and smart mixed cropping systems look like? Scenario planning is a good way to think about this question and explore potential futures. We applied the scenario method in AGROS’ arable use case. On 25 November 2021, we organised an interactive scenario workshop with farmers, farmer representatives, researchers, policy [ … ]
Kick-off AGROS project
In may 2020, the AGROS programme was launched with a digital kick-off during which the plans for the coming four years were explained. The programme is developing agrotechnologies to support ecological and biological processes in the greenhouse horticulture, arable farming and dairy industries. The AGROS programme is a collaboration between Wageningen University & Research (WUR) [ … ]