Over the last 30 months, RECAP intensively researched and worked on how the use of open satellite & user-generated data can support the implementation of CAP, enable the transition towards a guidance-based system, supporting farmers to understand CAP rules & comply with them, instead of penalizing them for non-compliance, while at the same time reduce the administrative cost for PA. Throughout the project lifetime, users had a central role being the cornerstone of the overall development. RECAP followed the principle of “creating with the users, for the users” allowing the capitalisation of existing knowledge of the beneficiaries into the innovative solution developed. Based on these consultations &on partners’ test cases feedback, adaptations have been performed in the RECAP platform. Thus, five different technologies have been developed facilitating the full exploitation of the RECAP solution & matching the needs of all involved stakeholders: a web & mobile application; the Spatial & Remote Sensing (RS) components; the Application Programming Interface (API) & the Software Development Kit (SDK). All aforementioned RECAP technologies have been tested & validated through the 2nd reporting period of the project, in operational environments of five different pilot cases, delivering the final RECAP solution. During the pilot implementation more than 750 farmers were involved declaring that through the RECAP solution the necessary time for preparing their BPS application was reduced by 64% as well as the time for preparing the documents for the inspection was reduced by 79%. Moreover, they stated that the RECAP solution is a useful tool for their compliance, disregarding any irrelevant CC requirement, increasing their understanding of CC rules, & therefore decreasing the likelihood of breaking any CC rule. In total, 455 inspections have been undertaken by the authorised personnel, with 123 of them being on the spot checks, in order to test whether the information gathered & generated through the RECAP platform was accurate & representative. The rest of the inspections have been performed remotely, mainly making use of & validating the RECAP RS component. Therefore, using the RECAP solution for the inspections, both on the spot and remotely, on the one hand, they managed to reduce the time needed to inspect a farmer’s compliance & on the other hand, to increase the number of parcels inspected. 470 agricultural consultants participated in the pilot implementation declared that the RECAP solution offered them with added value services such as the ability to view multiple farmer BPS, list of crop codes & parcels through the SDK. Moreover, they stated that using the RECAP solution the necessary time for preparing farmer’s BPS application & the documents for the imminent inspection was reduced approximately by 75%. They also indicated that the RECAP solution enables them to store CC rule documents, especially geotagged photos, for multiple farmers & reuse them at any given point.
Within the project implementation specific activities focused on the development of exploitation strategy for the sustainability of the RECAP solutions after the end of the project. RECAP has structured a well-established Network of Interest (NoI) with more than 8,000 stakeholders from various domains (e.g. paying agencies, agricultural consultants, researchers, official bodies, etc.) from all over Europe. Furthermore, more than 12,000 farmers & more than 1,400 agricultural consultants were informed about the project. Special attention was also paid in the development of a concrete & detailed Business plan, mapping the competitors & identifying further possibilities for its use and development after the end of the project.
