The archives of this newsletter
See: http://www.informatique-agricole.org/category/gazette-efita/


Jokes, Quotes and Anecdotes... an Anatomy of Wit
Mick Harkin, ex Secretary of EFITA, who has kept us amused with his Friday Jokes over the years, has published a book on Amazon entitled "Jokes, Quotes and Anecdotes... an Anatomy of Wit".
See: http://www.jokesquotesandanecdotes.com
Contact: Mick HARKIN
E-mail: harkin(a)iol.ie


EFITA 2013
>>> Thanks to Remigio and his team
The organisation of the EFITA 2023 congress in Totino (IT) was excellent thanks to the tremendeous work done Remigio BERRUTO, and his team together with the company GEYSECO.
It was a splendid opportunity to discover the very interesting and living city of Torino, its extraordinary Egyptian museum, and many museums and palaces, the nice hill of Superga with its old train, plenty of streets with arcades and places where people were playing music, the rich wine region of Barolo too.
I love Italy and always appreciate Italian culture and agriculture (with plenty of nice food products).

>>> Emotions
For me, the EFITA 2013 was full of emotions because of the participation of old friends that I met for the first time in 1985 in Brussels: Mick HARKIN (former general secretary, and collector of a number of excellent jokes), Ian HOUSEMANN (general secreatry) and Val REILLY who is at the origin of the creation of EFITA and of European collaborations at European level in this domain of ICT in Agriculture.

>>> An interesting conference
We had an excellent conference with the usual mix of "visionnary" contributions to "very practical" case studies, of presentation of projects "just starting" to results of projects fully achieved. We observed the rather important participation of friends from non European countries: USA, Japan, Brazil, Korea, Taiwan…
At this conference, we see that ICT remain a key success factor for agriculture, food industries, protection of the environment, and (but not least) rural areas. Our EFITA organisation and our bi-annual congress remain really useful and really necessary.
ICT in Agriculture is an active domain of investigations and innovations. New tools, new projects, new web sites are presented every week in the Afia (in French) and Efita Newsletter (in English). These tools, projects, models, DSS, web site, etc. are developed by "pure" scientists as well as by "close to the ground" people and this diversity is difficult to manage in our EFITA congresses, but I believe that is an opportunity for cross-fertilisation.

>>> A new start of EFITA?
In the city of Torino which saw the Risorgimento (rebirth of Italy as a nation in the 19^th century) and which has recently been able to move from a purely industrial city to a city hosting a mix of industrial and services activities, Karel CHARVAT (former President of Efita) and a number of us are hopping that EFITA will be able to renew itself.
We have to cope with a few weaknesses:
- Lack of activities between our congresses and lack of support to our national member organisations. Could we try to organise webinars and videoconferences to develop exchanges between EFITA members?
- Lack of interest in EFITA of private commercial actors (except Progis from Austria!): it is a pity since the scientists need to know what tools are used by farmers and what are the needs of farmers as seen by industrial actors. And agri-ICT companies could pick up new ideas, develop co-operations through EFITA.
- Lack of presence in Brussels: we do not enough promote our SRA and declarations.
See: http://www.agrixchange.org/sites/default/files/agriXchange%20D5%201%20SRA_draft_v4.pdf
Is it possible to nominate an EFITA representative to promote our ideas to national and European authorities?
- The offer of our Hungarian friends to open their journal to EFITA members must be consolidated to offer to EFITA scientists an opportunity to publish their papers.

>>> A few challenges to address
- Further developments of modelling / simulation projects, with some necessary interactions with the private sector which is aware of real needs of farmers,
- Open Data
- Open Archives with special attention on the Advisory Organisations that could share their information resources thanks to Open Archives
- Information and data standardisation and exchanges from farm to fork
- Renewal of remote sensing thanks to the use of drones
- Development of Internet of things
See: http://www.ebbits-project.eu/news.php
- Development of Apps including Apps for e-learning as shown in Torino by Fedro Zazueta (University of Florida)
- Development of Web 2.0 solutions for groups of farmers / advisors
… / …
But I know that the development of EFITA as well as many developments will continue to provide all of us with lessons of modesty!

>>> The newt congress
Thanks to Jerzy Weres the next congress will take place in early July 2015 in Potsdam (Poland).
E-mail: weres(a)up.poznan.pl

Contact: Guy WAKSMAN, EFITA president (2013-2015)
E-mail: guy.waksman(a)laposte.net


ICTs for future Economic and Sustainable Agricultural Systems
6 - 9 October 2014 - PERTH
The Australian Society of ICT in Agriculture cordially invites you to participate in the 9th AFITA conference. The conference is organized by ASICTA, ECU and CSBP and will be held at Hyatt Hotel, Perth.

The conference is supported by Edith Cowan University and AFITA.

Over the last few decades, several research and development efforts have been made to exploit the potential of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) to improve the efficiency of production in agriculture and to achieve sustainable development. Precision Agriculture involves identification, analyses and management of spatial and temporal variability in soils and crops for profitability, sustainability and protection of the environment. Precision Agriculture employs emerging technologies such as ICT; geospatial technologies such as Geographic Information Systems (GIS), Global Positioning Systems (GPS) and Remote Sensing (RS); Sensor Technologies and Wireless Sensor Networks (WSN).

This conference will examine the role that ICT can play in agricultural economic and environmental sustainability. The aim of the conference is to show case how advances in ICT is leading to exciting developments in the delivery of knowledge to growers, researchers and agriculture industry in general. The agricultural sector is an important sector in the world economy and its sustainability is vital with increasing population growth and global environmental change. ICT has played a vital role in the push to deliver services to this industry and rural entrepreneurs. All participants (academicians, researchers, practitioners, policy makers, and observers) will be challenged and invited to contribute, share, and disseminate their ideas, products, solutions, good practices or policies relevant to the topic and critical issues addressed in this international conference.

The conference deliberately includes practical aspects and hands-on experiences by incorporating demonstrations of ICT applications in the field as well as conducting workshops for programmers, advisors or extension officers and farmers. Practical outcomes of ICT applications and its benefits to the agricultural sector are an important part of this conference.
See: http://www.asicta.org/AFITA2014/


Development of Internet of things
See: http://www.ebbits-project.eu/news.php


A low-cost, hand-held, and non-invasive optical sensor for multiparametric field analysis of grapes and leaves in vineyards
See: http://www.premivm.eu


Certify your Open Data [1]
The Open Data Institute (ODI [2]) is today launching Open Data Certificates [3]to help everyone find, understand and use open data that is being released.

The certificates have been created in response to business, government, and citizen needs to bring rigour to the publication, dissemination and usage of open data. Over the last six months, ODI has been collaborating with dozens of organisations around the world to define the certificates. Today sees their first Beta release.

>>> Certificates made up of two components

1) a visual mark that shows the quality level of the data
2) a human and machine-readable description of the data being released

>>> Four levels of certificates

* Raw: A great start at the basics of publishing open data.
* Pilot: Data users receive extra support from, and provide feedback to the publisher.
* Standard: Regularly published open data with robust support that people can rely on.
* Expert: An exceptional example of information infrastructure.

>>> Benefits of the certificates*

* publishers of data understand how they can better connect with their users;
* users of data to understand its quality, licensing, structure, and its usability;
* businesses, entrepreneurs and innovators have confidence that the data has value to them;
* policy-makers benchmark and compare the progress and quality of the data released.

See: New certificates launched to help everyone discover, understand, and use open data [4] and Open Data Certificates [5]

[1] http://aims.fao.org/community/open-access/blogs/certify-your-open-data
[2] http://www.theodi.org/
[3] https://certificates.theodi.org/
[4] http://www.theodi.org/news/new-certificates-launched-help-everyone-discover-understand-and-use-open-data
[5] https://certificates.theodi.org/

A definition of globalisation that I can understand and to which I now can relate

Question: What is the truest definition of Globalisation?

Answer: Princess Diana's Death.

Question: How come?





Answer:

An English princess

With an Egyptian boyfriend

Crashes In a French tunnel,

Riding in a German Car

With a Dutch engine,

Driven By a Belgian

Who was Drunk

On Scottish whisky (check the bottle before you change the spelling),

Followed closely by

Italian Paparazzi,

On Japanese motorcycles,

Treated by an American doctor,

Using Brazilian medicines.

This is sent to you by a New Zealander

Using American Bill Gates' technology,

And you're probably reading this on your computer,

That uses Taiwanese chips,

And a Korean monitor,

Assembled by Bangladeshi workers

In a Singapore plant,

Transported by Indian truck drivers...

That, my friends, is Globalisation!

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