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Châtenay-Malabry (FR - 92290), 19 October, 2020

EFITA newsletter / 955 - European Federation for Information Technology in Agriculture, Food and the Environment


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The U.S. National Arboretum: Where Science Meets Beauty

Now is a good time to take a virtual trip to the U.S. National Arboretum (USNA). If you have ever visited the Arboretum, you know it’s truly where science meets beauty.
See tellus.ars.usda.gov


The last word


Challenges Australian agriculture can be met by new technologies

New technologies can bring about both incremental and transformational changes to increase the profitability, sustainability and productivity of Australia’s agriculture industry, says the Australian Council of Learned Academies (ACOLA).
See futurefarming.com


Artificial Intelligence without prior knowledge

Intelligent cameras pave the way for future-oriented image processing tasks such as plant growth monitoring, weed detection or checking whether certain object conditions are met. The user-friendly end-to-end AI solution IDS NXT ocean requires neither special knowledge in deep learning nor camera programming.
Learn how it works...


Good old days (?????): A Golden Harvest by Gregory Frank Harris (b.1953)

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Robots: Homemade robot sprays strawberries autonomously

A Dutch grower built his own spraying robot for autonomous spraying in strawberry tunnels.
See futurefarming.com


Irrigation: Ceres Imaging measures water stress at plant level

The feature elevates irrigation strategies in fruit and nut tree management.
See futurefarming.com


Good old days (?????): Colheita - Ceifeiras - António de Carvalho da Silva Porto


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How did we the future yesterday??

See the incredible collection developed by Alain Fraval


Archives of our newsletters in French and English
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Machine Vision for Agriculture Solutions
This is today’s agriculture: Tractors drive autonomously and the cultivation of fields can be carried out precisely and plant-specifically. Drones record the condition of the soil and crops from the air. Robots assist in milking, feeding, and monitoring animals. MVTec software makes this possible.
Learn how it works...


Robots: Got a robot for 2021? Show us and we’ll showcase yours!

Future Farming is creating an overview of field and harvest robots that are available in 2021.
See futurefarming.com


Good old days (?????): Bergère et moutons par Camille Pissarro, 1887

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Crop science: Crop diversity key to increased profits in Brazil

Researchers tested crop diversification practices to help farmers produce more and grow their profits. See futurefarming.com


Irrigation: InSAR remote sensing improves groundwater monitoring

Satellite data reveals variability in intensity of groundwater use for different crops.
See futurefarming.com


Good old days (?????): Les Botteleurs de foin par Jean-François Millet

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USA: Want To Know What’s In Your Soil? There’s An App For That!

The LandPKS mobile app can be used to identify soil and monitor vegetation in fields and in suburban yards.
.../...
LandPKS is not just for farmers and ranchers; anyone can use it. It's a handy tool for gardeners, who can use it to help determine the soil type of their garden. Teachers are also using a curriculum unit based on the app that aligns with Next Generation Science Standards used by many states by promoting an understanding of how soils and topography determine the land's potential to support crop production.
.../...
See tellus.ars.usda.gov



NIFA Invests Over $7 Million in Big Data, Artificial Intelligence, and Other Cyberinformatics Research

USDA’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture has awarded 12 grants totaling over $7 million to initiate research on big data analytics, machine learning, artificial intelligence, and predictive technologies needed to keep U.S. agriculture on the leading edge of food and agricultural production. These grants are awarded through the USDA-NIFA Agriculture and Food Research Initiative (AFRI) Food and Agriculture Cyberinformatics and Tools (FACT).

“Big data and artificial intelligence will increasingly play a vital role in the future of agricultural technologies,” said Parag Chitnis, acting director of USDA-NIFA. “As we work to realize precision nutrition for consumers and enhance farmer profitability and agricultural sustainability, these predictive technologies will keep research and development moving quickly to provide the tools needed for success.”

Chitnis added, “Undoubtedly, the work of these scientists will deliver data-driven solutions to help farmers and ranchers across the nation approach today’s challenges, but will also contribute to the growing body of science that will lead us to future technological advances not yet imagined to meet both current and future challenges.”
See content.govdelivery.com


Good old days (?????): Bergères regardant un vol d'oies sauvages (1866) par Jean-François Millet

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Carbon harvest: Indigo Ag, Nori announce first corporate carbon credit buyers, AFN, by Lauren Stine

Indigo Ag has revealed a long list of corporate buyers for its carbon credits, including finance giants Barclays and JPMorgan Chase, e-commerce enabler Shopify, and tech veteran IBM.

Boston Consulting Group, Dogfish Head Craft Brewery, Givewith, and New Belgium Brewing are also among the companies committed to purchasing the Boston-based startup’s “verified agricultural carbon credits.”

Each credit is priced at $20 per tonne of carbon dioxide equivalent sequestered in the 2020 growing season. To generate credits, Indigo is implementing what it describes as two novel methods for measuring and verifying the net on-farm GHG emissions impact of management practice changes.
…/…
See agfundernews.com


Good old days (?????): La Becquée par Jean-François Millet (Lille, Palais des Beaux-Arts)

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Pontifax AgTech closes latest fund at $302m, AFN, by Jack Ellis

…/…
The portfolio built out of Fund I includes ag biotech companies such as AgBiome, Anuvia, Caribou Biosciences, Concentric, and Tropic Biosciences; farm management software provider Conservis; traceability and tracking platform; FoodLogiq, and flower delivery startup Bouqs.

Consistent with its predecessor, Fund II will focus on investing in disruptive tech providers in food and agriculture production, health and nutrition, life sciences, and the post-harvest supply chain, according to co-founder and managing partner Ben Belldegrun.

The firm sees “particularly exciting opportunities in biological crop inputs, trait development, biotech, automation, food distribution, foodservice, and supply chain efficiency” going forward, he told AFN.
…/…
See agfundernews.com


Good old days (?????): O Gadanheiro por Júlio Pomar (1945)

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McKinsey: European online farming market could exceed $12bn by 2025, AFN, by Richard Martyn-Hemphill

Covid-19 is having a huge impact on farmers’ purchasing practices, according to new research from consultancy firm McKinsey & Company.

The survey of financial decision-makers at farms across Europe reveals that 95% of farms are considering adjusting purchasing behaviour to minimize physical interactions in response to the global pandemic.

Digital purchasing may provide the answer, with McKinsey uncovering a 36% increase in both farmers’ desire to use digital channels to make product-purchase decisions (up from 51% in 2019 to 87% post-Covid-19) and their desire to use digital channels to make actual purchases (up from 33% to 69%). Across Europe, that adds up to almost 4 million more farmers who say they are ready to use online channels as their main sources of ordering.
.../...
See agfundernews.com

 
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Google Alphabet's latest X project is a crop-sniffing plant buggy, The Verge, by Nick Statt 

Alphabet’s X lab, the former Google division that launched the Waymo self-driving car unit and other ambitious projects, has taken the wraps off its latest “moonshot”: a computational agriculture project the company is calling Mineral.

The project is focused on sustainable food production and farming at large scales, with a focus on “developing and testing a range of software and hardware prototypes based on breakthroughs in artificial intelligence, simulation, sensors, robotics and more,” according to project lead Elliott Grant.

A blog post outlining the project’s vision says Mineral, which now has an official name but was formally announced back in 2019, will try and aim technology toward solving issues around sustainability. Those include feeding of Earth’s growing population, and producing crops more efficiently by understanding growth cycles and weather patterns. The project will also hope to manage land and plant life as the effects of climate change complicate ecosystems.
…/…
See theverge.com


Good old days (?????): Grazing sheep by Francois Pieter ter Meulen


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Tuberculosis deaths 1990 - 2016

Vaccines can help dramatically reduce the incidence of deadly diseases. For instance, tuberculosis death rates have declined in different countries in Africa as vaccination rates have risen.

Explore the data on tuberculosis deaths in various countries…

   

Every hungry mouth comes a pair of hands and a brain capable of thought, planning, and innovation… Revisiting the Simon-Ehrlich Wager 40 Years On, by Marian L. Tupy & Gale Pooley

It is 1980, and you are getting married. Your parents decide to celebrate your nuptials by inviting 100 guests to a wedding reception. The reception cost them $100 per person or $10,000 in total. Fast forward to 2018. Now it is you who is throwing a wedding reception for your child. The guest list has increased by 72 percent (some of the old folk are no longer around, but the cousins have exploded in number). That means that you are now catering to 172 people. The price per guest remained the same (suspend your disbelief and ignore inflation for now), and you expect to get a bill for $17,200. Instead, the bill comes to $4,816, which is less than half of what your parents paid for you. How is that possible, you ask the caterer? The caterer responds that for every one percent increase in attendance, the bill fell by one percent. And so, while the number of guests rose by 72 percent, your bill declined by 72 percent. Surely, things like that don’t happen in real life, or do they?
.../...
See humanprogress.org


Good old days (?????): Les Moissonneurs, vers 1898 par René Seyssaud (1867-1952)

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Could enriched crops be key to improving diets in the wake of Covid-19? By Arun Baral And Simon Heck

As the impact of Covid-19 deepens across the globe and many families struggle to afford nutritious foods, prioritizing research to develop and deliver biofortified crops is not only a moral imperative; it is a sound investment.
See europeanscientist.com

 

A woman gets on a bus with her baby

The driver says “Ugh – that’s the ugliest baby I’ve ever seen!”

The woman walks to the back of the bus and sits down.

She says to the man next to her: “The driver just insulted me!”

The man says: “You go up there and tell him off. Go on. I’ll hold your monkey for you.”


Good old days (?????): In the Fields in June by Sir George Clausen

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Contact: Guy WAKSMAN
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