smartakis

European Agricultural Knowledge and Innovation Systems (AKIS) towards innovation-driven research in Smart Farming Technology

Start date: 1 March 2016

End date: 31 August 2018

In a nutshell:

Smart-AKIS is the thematic network focusing on the dissemination of Smart Farming Technologies (SFT) in Europe, backed up by EIP-AGRI and funded by Horizon 2020 programme. The Network is coordinated by the Agricultural University of Athens and involves 12 other partners representing farmers, agricultural advisors, researchers and the farm equipment industry. The Smart-AKIS project was selected for funding by the European Commission (EC) under the Sustainable Agriculture and Forestry H2020 Call for proposals 2014 - 2015. The project is one of the 21 Thematic Networks funded by the EC from 2014 onwards. Smart AKIS started in March 2016 and will run until August 2018 (30 months in total). The Agricultural University of Athens coordinates the overall project as well as the contributions from the 13 partners from 8 EU countries where different cropping systems (arable crops, tree crops, open field vegetables, vineyards) will be covered.

Project objectives:

Smart-AKIS is aimed at examining the suitability and use of Smart Farming Technologies in EU Agriculture involving farmers, the agricultural machinery industry, academia, research centres, ag engineering, extension and public bodies.

The project’s main objective is to disseminate direct applicable research and commercial solutions and capture grassroots level needs and innovative ideas focusing on: Information Management systems, Precision Agriculture, and Automation & Robots.

More specifically:

  • Smart-AKIS has established an inventory of the most suitable Smart Farming technologies available for European agriculture, screening results from research-based EU projects and commercial applications already available on the market developed – inter alia – by the ag machinery industry. The Smart-AKIS platform is accessible through this LINK.
  • Farmers, ag advisors and other practitioners have been consulted and involved so as to identify their specific needs and the reasons why some of the latest technologies are not more widely picked up in European agriculture.
  • The project aims to identify a range of Smart Farming Solutions that should more actively be encouraged by agricultural policies to increase innovation and technology uptake in European Agriculture.

All the reports produced are available at the project website, as well as Smart Farming Platform.

Consortium:

DLG (DE), University of Wageningen (NL), Leibiniz Centre for Ag Landscape Research (DE), BioSense Institute (Serbia), ACTA (FR), Navarra Institute for Agri-food Technologies and Infrastructures (ES), DLV Plant (NL), Regional Gov of Vojvodina (Serbia), Iniciativas Innovadoras (ES), CEMA (BE), CUMA (FR), EurAgEng (UK). Coordinator: Agricultural University of Athens

CEMA role & contributions:

CEMA has been a proactive Smart-AKIS partner since the project beginning in 2016, with the role of:

  • Liaising with the agricultural machinery industry, facilitating the participation of industry representatives at the events organized by the project, as well as for their involvement in the Smart-AKIS platform.
  • Contributing to the dissemination activities through the different CEMA channels (newsletter, website, social media, individual contacts, etc.) as well as presenting the project progress in different EU and National events, and during internal CEMA meetings.
  • Participating in European and National meetings and workshops organized by the project.
  • Supporting the drafting of the policy recommendations and leading the preparation of the policy briefs; accessible HERE.
  • Organizing the Project Final Conference together with the Agricultural University of Athens and Iniciativas Innovadoras.

 Check more on this unique project:

https://www.smart-akis.com

CORDIS

 

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This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement no. 696294