The term of Farming Intelligence is introduced in Greece by Ecodevelopment. In cooperation with the companies Geosense and Agrostis it organised an event focusing on Farming Intelligence, Agriculture-Technology-Innovation on Friday 29 January 2016 within the context of Agrotica 2016. The companies that were present on the occasion at the stand 2 of the exhibition, presented a new concept for precision farming, which, as the President of Ecodevelopment Dr. Spiros Mourelatos noted, despite its rapid technological progress, has not yet been adopted by the producers either in Greece or abroad. At the moment there is a great amount of accessible and of high resolution analysis information for use in precision farming that it does not represent in adopting respective applications. This is due to the fact that the agricultural practice which so far it is called Precision Farming “treated” by many scientific and technological fields that are necessary for the collection, processing, mapping, transmission and application of the information to the farming land. Though the result is for the time being that this information is being applied fragmentary through products or/and services which are not directly viable, to the extent that there is not an integrated concept-strategy which incorporates all these scientific and technological fields under the umbrella the production of one accessible and integrated product for the farmer operator-producer.
Mr. Vasilis Polychronos (Geosense) focused on the role of unmanned aircrafts (Drones) in the applications of Precision Farming. «The drones at the service of agriculture are beyond the present and future perhaps one-way route ». He mentioned « we are able to show accurately to 3-4cm the natural environments and study hypsometry, bottom slopes, water catch /drainage basins, plant height, foliar volume, flowering, number of plants etc. Beyond visible spectrum, we can detect and study information relating to the most significant biochemical process on planet, the photosynthesis and consequently the health of the plans. The following day will bring drones which are spraying the cultivations precisely and particularly effectively where conventional means cannot operate».
Mr. Vaggelis Vasiliadis and Mr. Thanasis Sapounas (Agrostis), presented the farming and greenhouse cultivation management systems, ifarma and GreenSim respectively. «Central role in collection, saving and processing of all data so as to be achieved the best use of resources and agricultural practices on the basis of both space and time variability of the cultivation, therefore in application of Precision Farming, plays the Farm Management Information Systems, i.e. the farming management systems» Mr. V. Vasiliadis noted. «The ifarma is such an integrated information system that offers potentials as: Farm features management, Data basis, Management, planning and recording of farming activities, Work programme standards, farming log books, Financial management. The main characteristic of ifarma is that it provides open communication architecture with services of Precision Farming, incorporating maps of variability and recommended actions by external services in function of farming management».
As it concerns the decision-making software for greenhouse cultivation GreenSim, Mr. Th. Sapounas mentioned that the investments in greenhouse cultivation are usually investments of high cost fixed-capital equipment. False decisions when designing greenhouse could lead to even more irreversible negative economic effects. GreenSim software opens up the opportunity to examine all the parameters of our investment so as to choose the appropriate greenhouse. It constitutes a calculation tool with which we can simulate the greenhouse environment for a whole year. GreenSim software is a unique calculation tool for maximising the return of an investment in greenhouse cultivation and it is already used successfully in elaboration of dedicated studies. At the same time, it is designed in such a way that could develop into commercial software.Lastly, Dr. Zois Zartaloudis (AGROECOSYSTEM) referred to the detection mechanisms of the ripening stage and also stress through remote sensing instruments, but to the production of innovative bio-natural plant growth assistive products. «The translation of spectral characteristics of stress in field and its geographical mapping in apical vegetation (spectrum signature) is detected at specific wavelengths by air-borne vehicles. The multispectral cameras are able to distinguish indexes’ changes, as of carotenoids, for example the relevant increase of carotenoids during ripening process. Hence we can give answers to the following questions: How healthy my plants are? Or when should they be harvested? »
In additional Mr. Zartaloudis referred to the innovative bionatural products BIOSHELL that “AgroEcoSystem” produces and are based on the creation of crystalline complexes with natural organic agents. «They succeed to manage plant protection problems which are hard to resolve such as verticillium in olive and esca disease of grapevine, they are nutrition balancers through physiological process of plants, they constitute natural potassium source, and at the same time they increase plant energy in a physicochemical way.»