EU agricultural sector is faced with critical issues: enormous costs of protecting crops against diseases and pests, permanent pesticide pollution of soil and groundwater, toxic residues in fruit sold for direct consumption, toxicological risks for people working in orchards. In commercial orchards it is a common practice to perform 20-25 phytosanitary sprays every season only against fungal pathogens. Each year this translates into a heavy environmental burden, with over 200-250 kg of toxic chemicals per hectare and heavy economic burden for producers, starting at approx. 1550 EUR per hectare. In face of these challenges, there is a growing demand for advisory platforms and decision support systems (DSS) to aid producers in regard to chemical protection of crops.
CITRUS-PORT is a disruptive innovation project for crop protection sector - digital tool for citrus growers that calculates and signals the right time to apply treatments to protect orchards against pests and diseases. It has potential to become the first global digital advisory platform for citrus fruit segment, as market is currently missing any comprehensive solution for this crop. It will provide citrus growers with personalized advice on when and how to treat their orchards against diseases and pests, in order to increase efficiency and decrease pesticide use by cca. 30-40%.
Enabling our customers to conserve resources, while minimizing negative environmental consequences, significantly contributes to sustainability. Decrease in pesticide use goes hand in hand with lower toxicological and health risks for farmers as well as public. The quality of produced fruits increases, as the toxic chemical residues are reduced by cca. 60%, contributing to safety of food we all consume.
The overall target of the Innovation Project is to finalize CITRUS-PORT platform by 2022 and its launch to the global market of intelligent agriculture solutions.
