This is the main future challenge of the European Union (EU) regarding the Agriculture sector. It is worth noting that the most recent UE investments in the sector, alongside a bigger and better future investment, will contribute to the realisation of the following European Commission goals:

- better nutrition for the population, leading to a better quality of life;

- a greater and better rural economy;

- more green spaces and better air quality;

- more self-sustaining and local production economies in each member state.

INESC TEC makes Robots, Farmers, and Forestry Producers come together

INESC TEC has had, since 2014, a strategy and a plan to tackle this challenge. It has been strongly investing in technological development and research in the agriculture, agro-food and forestry sectors. The goal of this strategy is to help accomplish European and national objectives, increasing the country’s ability to make the most of its farming areas, increasing national production.

Many ideas can contribute to these objectives. The path now is to invest in innovative projects that provide new technological tools to the human activities of agriculture and forestry exploration, thus reinforcing, improving and increasing production.

Agriculture and Forestry with great growth potential

To face these challenges, INESC TEC created TEC4AGRO-FOOD, its area of innovation for the Agriculture, Agro-food and Forestry sectors, whose goal is to carry out and boost research and technology in order to meet the needs and desires of final users, in partnership with “Technology Takers” capable of endogenising the technologies developed by INESC TEC and creating innovative products and/or services.

Through TEC4AGRO-FOOD, INESC TEC wants to be seen as the technological partner of choice in the agriculture, agro-food and forestry sectors in Portugal, and as a role model at an international level. By investing in specific technologies for Precision Agriculture and Forestry and for the Agro-food Industry 4.0, it provides lines of research followed by the scientific community that aim to meet the needs of the social and economic activities.

Projects in Spain, Brazil and Portugal

INESC TEC has been participating in national and international events that focus on the development of these areas of activity in order to inform about the projects in which it participates, to find partners and to boost synergies between the main players of these sectors.

The last meeting of the team composing the BIOTECFOR – “Biobusiness and Technology for the efficient valorisation of endogenous forest resources in the North of Portugal and Galicia” project took place in Spain. The goal of this project is to develop smart robotic systems capable of easing the cleaning of forests in Northern Portugal and Galicia, thus reducing the effort required from operators and making those operations safer. Another goal of the project is to develop a planning system capable of reducing the logistic costs of biomass transportation and storage. This way, it is possible to contribute to the development of the bioeconomy and circular economy in this cross-border space. The partnership is headed by Forestis - Portuguese Forestry Association and includes INESC TEC, AFG - Galicia Forestry Association and the Automotive Technology Centre of Galicia.

This October, in Brazil, INESC TEC participated in SBIAgro - Brazilian Congress of Agri-Informatics, which focused on theme “Data Science in the Age of Digital Farming” and whose goal was to gather groups working in agricultural informatics and to assist in their growth. Current themes regarding the application of new technologies in agriculture and the integration between the market and academia were discussed. Once again, the INESC TEC projects linked to these areas were presented, namely RoMoVi - Modular and Cooperative Robot for Hillside Vineyards; Water4Ever - Optimising water use in agriculture to preserve soil and water resources; Slopebot - Autonomous precision spraying for high-value crops in rough outdoor terrain; and SmartFarming - advanced tool for operationalisation of precision agriculture.

Agri Innovation Summit was a joint initiative of the Portuguese Government, the Agricultural European Innovation Partnership (EIP-AGRI) and the European Network for Rural Development, which took place in October, in Oeiras. INESC TEC was one of the premium sponsors of this event and its participation included the presentation of projects like RoMoVi - Modular and Cooperative Robot for Hillside Vineyards, and the AGROB V16 platform, an innovative technology developed in a modular way that focuses on sensorisation, monitoring and variability measurement tasks, and that aims to test actuation technologies, such as precision spraying and robotic manipulators for pruning and harvesting.

Faced with the challenges of agriculture in today’s society, INESC TEC seeks to show that robotics and mechanisation can greatly contribute to defining trends and to success stories in the area of research and development

Other ongoing projects

Besides all activities already mentioned, the TEC4AGRO-FOOD initiative includes other projects, which involve multidisciplinary teams from different centres and areas of INESC TEC.

INESC TEC led the European project FOCUS in the area of planning and control of operations in the forest supply chains (2014-2016), a project involving 12 partners. This project included the development of technologies of automation and integration with operation planning systems for four fields of study - wood production, pulp and paper, biomass, and cork.

This line of work has continued in the new Easyflow – “A Collaborative Platform for coordinating the logistics in the forest-based supply chain towards sustainability (2015-2018)” project, which also studies sustainability issues in supply chains.

Among other projects, special focus goes to AgriSensus - Integrated Monitoring and Control of Water, Nutrients and Plant Protection Products Towards a Sustainable Agricultural Sector; HERCULANO 4 – Technical Support in DPA System for Manure Spreader (without ISOBUS) + DPA System and Chemical Analysis (NIR sensor) for Cistern in ISOBUS Environment; and GOTECFOR - Technology for the mobilisation and use of Forest Biomass in Agro-industry;

INESC TEC challenges itself for the future

To gather information about existing conditions and means. To increase the efficiency of forest resources. To intensify the treatment and the growth of the territory. To contribute to the circular economy. To discover new biomaterials. To share knowledge. To develop innovative technological tools for agriculture and forestry. To strengthen human activities with the use of new technologies. To intensify the national agricultural production and self-sustainability. To stimulate new business areas. To contribute to the construction of a robust economy and of a high-quality society.

There are many challenges for the players involved in this framework. Productivity and sustainability are now the keywords in a sector that will likely be essential for the economic development of Portugal. As one of the oldest livelihood activities, the strategy must be to plan, to develop and to innovate.

The national economy is changing and INESC TEC was, is, and wants to keep being one of the players in this transformation.

The researcher mentioned in this news piece is associated with INESC TEC.