Digital Agriculture Digital Agriculture The year is 2050. Farmer Meyer inspects his fields. A drone flies above him and measures the biomass on his fields. The data advise him on the optimal time to harvest. Field robots clear the weeds between the turnips which are growing in a hollow. Other autonomous machines fertilize the wheat standing on an adjoining small slope. Prior to this, they used sensitive sensors to determine exactly which nutrients the plants are lacking. The farmer is satisfied. All the plants look healthy and strong. In late summer, he will reap a good harvest. Meyer is now able to grow up to five crops on a single field. He has also created an ecological conservation area, in order to contribute to nature conservation. From the perspective of the drone, the field looks like a colorful patchwork carpet. But behind this apparent chaos there is a sophisticated system. Every plant grows exactly in the place where its needs are best met. Farmer Meyer has used a part of his field, where crops were always stunted in recent years due to sandy and nutrient-poor soil, to plant a wildflower strip. Insects hum between the daisies , lupins and mallows. The farmer drew up the plan for his crop cultivation this year using a digital system. PROTECTION THROUGH DIGITAL MANAGEMENT Back to the year 2018. Overfertilization, soil erosion, insect decline or huge monocultures – these are some of the problems modern agriculture is facing. Climate change and extreme weather events add to these problems. At the same time, global population is growing rapidly. In the next 40 years, agriculture needs to produce as much food as it has produced in total in the past 8000 years. To meet this challenge, researchers from ten scientific institutions under the leadership of the Leibniz Centre for Agricultural Landscape Research (ZALF) are working on a new concept to revolutionize agriculture. The project is called the “Digital Agricultural Knowledge and Information System” (DAKIS) and is funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research. Its launch is planned for spring 2019. Digitization is at the heart of DAKIS: Robotics, sensors and computer models will be used to produce in a manner that is more economically efficient and at the same time more environmentally sustainable. This requires a shift in thinking. Up until now, the primary goal of agriculture has been to achieve the highest possible yields. With the machinery, pesticides and fertilizers at their disposal today, farms are maximizing the output from their fields. Ultimately, the yield level determines their income. However, the fact that soils, biodiversity and climate are suffering under this economic pressure can no longer be ignored. If the agriculture of the future is Farms must be able to help shape the future, otherwise we will end up with a system that nobody wants. PROF. DR. SONOKO DOROTHEA BELLINGRATH-KIMURA to feed nine billion people or more, the course must be set today for a resourcefriendly, efficient and flexible cultivation. DAKIS aims to bundle and make available the necessary knowledge to achieve this. “Our goal is to create a decision-making and support tool for the farms”, explains Prof. Sonoko Bellingrath-Kimura, coordinator of the project and agricultural scientist at ZALF. “In the future, agriculture will have to address many more aspects than it does today”, explains the researcher. The industry is confronted with far-reaching decisions. “Many farmers are aware that they must not only cultivate the land, but also preserve it”, the scientist points out. They also see soil erosion, extreme thunderstorms or species extinction as signals that need a response. “Farms may do more, but often lack the knowledge of the best method, which at the end of the day must also be economically viable.” This is precisely where DAKIS comes into play. “Digitization makes it possible to describe and solve very complex problems. We must make use of these opportunities now”, urges Bellingrath-Kimura. Agricultural research, economics, sociology, computer science but also legal studies– more than 30 researchers are working closely together in order to implement this vision of the future. They have already spent three years collecting ideas and fine-tuning their research plan. 04 05
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