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Impression of the Boerderij van de Toekomst, the Future Farm. This is what an arable farm using strip cropping might look like in future.


has been studying alternative cultivation sys- tems, including strip cropping, for several years now.


Robots hard at work Robots will also play an important role. It is now time for Wageningen UR’s autonomous tool carrier Agrointelli Robotti, which has been taken back and forth to show off its skills at demo events, to be put through its paces. “Now comes the hard work,” says Bram Velthui- sen, one of the three young researchers jointly responsible for the day-to-day running of the Farm of the Future. “That will certainly involve hoeing and weeding, but we need to be able to do more with robots: soil cultivation, sow- ing, crop care and also harvesting, if possible.”


High-end technology must also be made ready for practical application to allow not only ro- bots, but also drones to demonstrate their use- fulness. For years now, Wageningen UR has been working on AI in laboratory settings to au- tomatically identify diseases and pests, and then to weed or spray them. This requires vast quantities of images to be sent, read elsewhere


and converted into instructions to be sent to the robot. All this has to happen in a matter of milliseconds, and for these enormous quantities of data, a 5G network will be required.


“Everything is essentially already in place, but we still need to develop our system further and make it ready for practical application,” ex- plains De Visser. “It involves a very high level of data traffic. The drone spots something odd in the field, and in response, the farmer sends the robot out. The AI used for image recognition and harvest time determination is advancing significantly. This technology also needs to be very simple to use. Growers must be able to control their robot or drone manually by speaking to it using just a smartphone.”


Prospect of returns At the Farm of the Future, Wageningen UR is studying the extent to which strip cropping and the use of the field robot can help to re- duce soil compaction, make crops more resist- ant, deal with climate change, increase biodi- versity, improve perception of the landscape and increase the operator’s income. The notion


of ‘reflecting current practice’ means that something should generate a return, or that the system at least has the prospect of gener- ating a return. “We will be monitoring costs and returns closely. On balance, some outlay will be required initially,” notes Chris de Visser. “You could see it as a kind of tuition fee. When we switch over, the first job will be to invest and learn. And the robot will initially still needs someone to supervise it. But what we would like to test first is whether a system of integrat- ed sustainability can work. It’s a thought experiment that we are now realising.”


De Visser also recognises that the Farm of the Future will create innovation for suppliers. “Even firms on the periphery can support the transition to a different kind of agriculture. If it just remains a project for Wageningen-UR, then we haven’t succeeded.”


But De Visser is optimistic: “There is a great deal of interest in strip cropping and robot applica- tions. It would be fantastic if the sector snatched it out of our hands. I have certainly noticed how much demand there is for solutions.”


▶ FUTURE FARMING | 22 May 2020 29


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