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Châtenay-Malabry (FR - 92290), 5 April, 2021

EFITA newsletter / 979 - European Federation for Information Technology in Agriculture, Food and the Environment


Do not miss the Virus Jokes in English and French

Blagues de janvier – février 2021
Coronavirus 1 
Coronavirus 3
Ant joke

Virus 1
Virus 3
Virus 5 
Histoires drôles de l'oncle Paul (Jamet)
Dernières histoires de Michel Gil-Antoli
Et encore... 

Coronavirus 2
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Virus et autres sujets
Virus 2
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Histoires drôles de Georges Larroque
Les dernières histoires de Jean Pinon
Et encore, encore
Blagues de mars 2021 Nouveau


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Journal d'agriculture pratique

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Weekly newsletters about ICT in Agriculture in English and French
Both newsletters have around 14000 subscribers.

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Nothing is more responsible for the good old days than a bad memory: Le forestier, par Vassili Maksimov, Musée des Beaux-Arts d’Odessa

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Japan's 2011 tsunami, then and now - in pictures

Then and now photographs show the extent of the destruction of the 2011 tsunami in Japan, and the enormity of the reconstruction work
See theguardian.com

En 1899, 1900, 1901 et 1910, un groupe d'artistes, dont notamment Jean-Marc Côté, a réalisé une série de cartes et de dessins d'anticipation sur le thème de l'an 2000 (Bibliothèque Nationale de France).


Un hélicoptère / Advance Sentinel in a Helicopter
In 1899, 1900, 1901 and 1910, a group of artists, including notably Jean-Marc Côté, produced a series of anticipatory drawings on the theme of the year 2000 (BNF).

3rd European Conference & Expo Biogas PowerON 2021

1-2 September 2021, Copenhagen, Denmark
Recently implemented European regulations aim at making Europe carbon neutral until 2050. A vital component for reaching the 2050 goal is to promote green energy across all the industries. Gases like biomethane, bio-LNG, bio-CNG and syngas have increased potential for becoming the main drivers for greener future. Thus, this year we would like to emphasize their role in decarbonisation of transport and energy sectors.
The event is set to bring industry stakeholders, unique content, workshop style discussions and networking. Gives an opportunity to showcase your products and services in the networking area and hold meetings with leaders from the industry.
See Biogas-PowerON-2021


agROBOfood Newsletter
See agrobofood.eu


AgROBOfood kicks in March with the announcement of the 2nd Open Call on Innovation Experiments. Get more information on the call in the relative section.

On this newsletter we also host an interview with Ms Dimitra Perperidou from DRAXIS commenting on the project’s communication activities.

In focus presents I-CATCH, one of agROBOfood’s selected innovation experiments of the 1st Open Call.

Switch to the frequencies of Our radar and agROBOfood TV to catch some of the latest industry news and videos.

Finally, check out some interesting Forthcoming events that caught our attention.
See agROBOfood.H2020


Nothing is more responsible for the good old days than a bad memory: Bûcheron canadien, 1900, par Robert J. Wickenden, Musée national des Beaux-Arts de Québec

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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
Voir Afia
Voir Efita

 

Software Solutions Integrated

For almost 40 years, SSI has been a leading developer of agribusiness software with over 3200 customer locations throughout the US and Canada.
See precisionag.com


Grain Contract Completion Anywhere, Anytime with Electronic Signatures
See agvance.net


Nothing is more responsible for the good old days than a bad memory: Schlitteurs dans les Vosges, par Honoré-Louis Umbricht (1860 - 1943), Musée Pierre-Noël de Saint-Dié-des-Vosges

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AgVend

AgVend is your digital partner for serving the producer of tomorrow. We give ag retailers the ability to meet customers wherever, whenever, and however they choose to do business.

AgVend-powered Grower Portals are designed to strengthen the relationship between ag retailers and their grower customers. This white-labelled, fully integrated mobile application and website allows producers to do business directly with their retailer of choice, but in a more digitally enabled way. The Grower Portal seamlessly integrates with the ways retailers interact with growers today, providing an elevated level of customer service for producers.
See precisionag.com


The Only Dirty Thing



Produce traceability startup Fusionware on being acquired & digitalizing the industry with blockchain, AFN, by Lauren Manning

One of the biggest takeaways from Covid-19 is the fragility of our supply chains, particularly in the food system. For some of the more antiquated segments of agriculture like produce, the pandemic has created an opportunity to reconsider and accelerate tech adoption. Fortunately, a number of startups are waiting in the wings to help producers, suppliers, and buyers digitalize.

Among them is Heber City, Utah-based Fusionware.

“The pandemic was a little nerve-wracking for about four to six weeks because we just didn’t know where it was going to go.” Fusionware chief technology officer Creg Fielding told AFN.

“But then it just took off and 2020 turned out to be a pretty good year for us.”

The startup was recently acquired by AgTech.io, which is owned and managed by Iowan investment firm C9 Capital, for an undisclosed amount.
.../…
See agfundernews.com


Chinese e-grocer Nice Tuan raises $750m in Alibaba, DST-led round, AFN, by Jack Ellis

Chinese e-grocery platform Nice Tuan — also known as Shi Hui Tuan — has raised $750 million funding in a round co-led by tech giant Alibaba and internet investment firm DST Global.

Other investors to participate in the round include DE Shaw & Co, Anatole Investment, Jeneration Capital, Dragoneer, CDH Investments, GGV Capital, Kunlun Capital, Franchise Capital, and Cygnus Equity.

The Beijing-based app allows shoppers to form groups via its WeChat mini-program, enabling them to collectively buy farm produce and other groceries in bulk at competitive prices.
.../…
See agfundernews.com


Nothing is more responsible for the good old days than a bad memory: Charroi tiré par deux bœufs, par Honoré-Louis Umbricht, Musée Pierre-Noël de Saint-Dié-des-Vosges


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Startup Spotlight: How Agrograph plans to transform agricultural lending, AFN, by Lauren Manning

There are plenty of startups working on improving food production methodologies or connecting new supply chain points. But what about the financial mechanisms that help farmers bankroll their operations? According to Jim O’Brien, CEO at Wisconsin-based Agrograph, the agricultural lending industry is overdue for a makeover.

“The agricultural lending process is slow, manual, and opaque,” he told AFN. “It begins at a lender’s office, takes days to weeks to complete, and is based largely on personal reputation. There are no analytical tools or processes to rate a farm, its soil, or yield production against a regional benchmark.”

Instead, ag lenders rely on anecdotal appraisal reports, US Department of Agriculture estimates, and personal experience, he said.

“The result is a slow process with mismatched price versus risk that neither benefits the farmer nor the bank.”

Agrograph’s fintech offering aims to streamline this procedure while providing enhanced transparency and standardization for all parties.
.../…
See agfundernews.com



Climate Adaptation: World’s top agriculture traders gear up for green diesel boom, Bloomberg, by Isis Almeida (seen in AFN)

The world’s biggest agricultural commodities traders are gearing up to profit from a boom in the American renewable diesel industry.

As President Joe Biden presses ahead with his green agenda, Cargill Inc. is investing $475 million to boost its capacity to process soybeans, key in producing the cooking oils used in renewable diesel. Rivals Archer-Daniels-Midland Co. and Bunge Ltd. are working on making plants more efficient, and Andersons Inc. set up a desk to trade feedstocks for the green fuel.
.../…
See bloomberg.com


Celebrating the Leaders of Ag Technology

For decades, agriculture technology has advanced toward broader adoption in the crop production channel through the efforts of passionate, driven individuals and organizations. Their inspirational stories of success and achievement were the impetus behind the creation of the PrecisionAg Awards of Excellence program.

Nominations are being accepted for the 2021 PrecisionAg Awards of Excellence through June 1.
See precisionag.com


Nothing is more responsible for the good old days than a bad memory: Une flotte et une coupe de bois, par Nicolas de Mirbeck, Mairie de Raon-l’Étape (Vosges)

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Digital Farming Platform Climate FieldView Launches in South Africa

This new addition marks a major milestone for the company as its first expansion onto the African continent.
See precisionag.com


Sirrus Mobile App Update Expands Collaboration Features

With the new Sirrus functionality, the app now supports the journey, for farmers and agronomists, from pre-season plans to completed work.

Proagrica’s new version of the Sirrus app for iOS allows agronomists and farmers to work together to plan and execute in-season work and interpret the outcomes to create an ongoing, living record.

The Sirrus app currently allows agronomists to collect and manage data for soil sampling and scouting with or without wireless connectivity. It syncs this with the agX platform to combine the information with in-season satellite imagery and allow agronomists to develop crop protection, fertilizer, planting, and tillage recommendations based on field-level data.
See precisionag.com



Cerescon takes 6 asparagus harvesting robots to the fields

Martens Asparagus and Teboza, both in the Netherlands, officially took delivery of their Sparter harvesting robots by Cerescon. In the coming asparagus season, six Sparters will be operational in the field.
See futurefarming.com


Making crop nutrient management convenient

Ensuring your crops get the right nutrients at the right time is essential. xarvioTM FIELD MANAGER’s nutrient management feature makes this possible. It uses field-zone specific application maps for nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium to conveniently calculate the demands of your crops including the best nutrient timing with alerts advising when to act.
See xarvio.com


Nothing is more responsible for the good old days than a bad memory (?????): Une flotte et une coupe de bois, par Nicolas de Mirbeck, Mairie de Raon-l’Étape

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TIM: TIM makes operations easier and reduces stress

What effect does TIM have on drivers and why is TIM indispensable for autonomous operations?
See futurefarming.com


Drones: Brazilian "superdrone" certified for 30 km BVLOS flights

The XMobots Echar 20D can perform various agricultural tasks and cover up till 7,100 hectares per flight.
See futurefarming.com


Drift reduction: John Deere sprayers certified for Wingssprayer

Wingssprayer low-emission spraying technology achieves drift reduction of 95% to 99%.
See futurefarming.com


Nothing is more responsible for the good old days than a bad memory: Moines abattant un arbre, Moralia in Job de Grégoire le Grand, Scriptorium de l'abbaye de Cîteaux, Bibliothèque Municipale de Dijon

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Combine harvesters: AGCO AutoDock connects combine header in 5 seconds

AGCO AutoDock key first step on the way to totally automating the harvesting process in the future.
See futurefarming.com


Drone spraying: Drone Volt launches autonomous spraying system for drones

The sprayer tool is compatible with the Hercules 20 drone for autonomous spraying.
See futurefarming.com


Soil monitoring: NASA and CropX partner in soil monitoring

Combining in-soil insights and satellite observations to improve global agricultural monitoring.
See futurefarming.com


Case IH launches significant precision ag update, by Willie Vogt

AFS Connect system gains new features and rolls out a new mobile app, allowing farmers easier access to their farm's information.
See farmprogress.com


Digital farm service adds long-range weather forecasts, by Willie Vogt

BASF and Salient Predictions have entered an agreement to provide weather info for xarvio users.
See farmprogress.com

 
The Efita newsletter is sponsored by:
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RNA molecules and future crop protection advancements, by Jack DeWitt
See agdaily.com


Genome engineering for crop improvement and future agriculture, by Caixia Gao

Feeding the ever-growing population is a major challenge, especially in light of rapidly changing climate conditions. Genome editing is set to revolutionize plant breeding and could help secure the global food supply. Here, I review the development and application of genome editing tools in plants while highlighting newly developed techniques. I describe new plant breeding strategies based on genome editing and discuss their impact on crop production, with an emphasis on recent advancements in genome editing-based plant improvements that could not be achieved by conventional breeding. I also discuss challenges facing genome editing that must be overcome before realizing the full potential of this technology toward future crops and food production.
See cell.com


Defining Organic: 50 Shades of Green, By David Zaruk

As the term “organic” is merely a marketing tool, carrying no real added value to consumer health or the environment, we need to rethink how food production is considered. There are some organic practices that are beneficial, but there are also conventional technologies and synthetic substances that better improve yields and protect the environment. With the challenges facing agriculture, we need pragmatism and ingenuity, not blind, cultish ideology and fear-driven marketing campaigns. My next column will look at an alternative to this organic/conventional polarity by introducing a concept called “better farming”.
See european-seed.com


Nothing is more responsible for the good old days than a bad memory: Train de planches dans les Vosges, passage d'un pertuis. Dans Théophile Schuler, Les bûcherons et les schlitteurs des Vosges, 1878 - flottage des planches

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USA: The middle class has been shrinking for decades...

...but that's because many families have been getting richer, thus moving up to a higher income bracket.

Even better, the share of low-income families fell to an all-time low in 2019.

See Distribution of U.S. households by income level
See humanprogress.org
 

Heroes of Progress: Paul Hermann Müller, a 20th-century Swiss scientist who discovered that DDT could be used as an insecticide

DDT has been a boon to humanity ever since. Not only was it used to eradicate malaria in the United States and most of Southern Europe, but it also played a crucial role in protecting Allied troops in the Pacific theater.

Thanks to Müller's work, billions of people have avoided exposure to insect-born diseases that have plagued humanity since the dawn of our species.

See video
See full article about Paul Hermann Müller

 

Joe Biden is giving left parties the world over a masterclass in how to use power, by Jonathan Freedland

He ran as a moderate but is governing as a transforming radical. That’s not a paradox – it’s a winning method.
…/…
This is the first lesson that Biden is teaching would-be reformers. If you want to be radical in office, first reassure in opposition. If your goal is to win power, then in societies where people tend to be small-c conservative, your initial task is to persuade them that they have nothing to fear from you – that your concerns are their concerns. Remember Biden’s campaign: no gestures, no striking of radical poses, no indulgence of either. He was not campaigning to be a Twitter darling, nor to be president of the student union. He wanted to be president of the United States.

And that’s the second key lesson from Biden, one as old as politics. The true radical is not the fiery deliverer of revolutionary speeches or writer of maximalist manifestos. The true radical is the one who wins power and uses it for good. Biden has achieved more in two months than those who like to trumpet their radicalism manage in a lifetime. And he’s done it because he understands something that eludes so many. He understands that the greatest hope is power.
See The Guardian


Steven Pinker: ‘Evolution Has Saddled Our Species With Many Irrational And Destructive Psychological Traits’, interview by Rainer Zitelmann (2020)

Q. by Rainer Zitelmann: In your opinion, why do most people underestimate positive developments and so dramatically overstate negative developments?

A. by Steven Pinker: One reason is an interaction between the nature of cognition and the nature of journalism. People estimate risk and probability by the anecdotes, narratives, and images that come to mind–the mental operation that Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky call the Availability Heuristic. Journalism focuses on sudden events, and events are more often bad than good—a shooting, a terrorist act, a battle, an epidemic. Good things unfold gradually, a few percentage points at a time, and can transform the world without ever creating a headline. On top of this built-in bias, journalism has added two conscious biases: the programming policy “If it bleeds it leads,” an attempt to parlay our morbid interest in disasters into commercial advantage, and a moralistic commitment to raking the muck and exposing scandal and corruption in the belief that this is the only route to social progress.

There is another reason, though, and that is competition among social groups, particularly elites. To acknowledge progress is to endorse some of the institutions of the status quo—democratic government, science, experts, international organizations—and members of other elites may execrate the state of the world as a way of attacking their rivals. It’s a way for businesspeople to discredit governments, academics to discredit business, religious spokespeople to discredit secular organizations, and so on.
See forbes.com


Nothing is more responsible for the good old days than a bad memory: Village, 1869, par Fedor Vasiliev (RU)

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Penguins

A man was driving down the road when a policeman stopped him. The officer looked in the back of the man’s truck and said, “Why are these penguins in your truck?”

The man replied, “These are my penguins. They belong to me.”

“You need to take them to the zoo,” the policeman said.

The next day, the officer saw the same guy driving down the road. He pulled him over again. He saw the penguins were still in the truck, but they were wearing sunglasses this time. “I thought I told you to take these penguins to the zoo!” the officer said.

“I did,” the man replied. “And today I’m taking them to the beach."


Nothing is more responsible for the good old days than a bad memory: Le bucheron de JJ Millet

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Contact: Guy WAKSMAN
E-mail: guy.waksman(a)laposte.net


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