Identifying agricultural practices, technologies and business models in Gorenjska region
I was identifying existing agricultural practices, technologies and business models in Gorenjska region, Slovenia on the bases of the survey prepared by the University of Newcastle upon Tyne.
Browsing the web I found out that I can order a basket of vegetables and fruit of my choice on line, locally grown in an integrated way. Even better, my own basket of greens will be brought to me at the required time. Since I never have enough time to go to the open market and I therefore buy food in supermarkets, usually imported from other EU or non EU countries, I thought that this could be a smart solution to my weekly problem. Then I thought well, how do I know it’s produced locally and in an integrated way?
A very noticeable link invited me to another page showing me a list of local regional farmers who could deliver their produce into my basket. That is nice, I thought. Still are they certified? Moving the mouse on the page, I clicked on the name of the farm and another page opened, confirming to me that this farmer had a Slovenian certification for integrated food production. However, not all farmers have this certification and I could not find one based in the Gorenjska region with it within this list. Most of them don’t even provide links to their own webpage or any other additional information.
Hence, I guess there is room for improvement, even though it is a good start. I browsed the web further and saw that there is one on-line platform for delivery of organically produced food and several others for integrated. However there was no proof of the necessary traceability and certification.
Being excited on my find, obviously not only for my project activity, I told about this to my co-worker. “Ah” she said, “this is not news to me. I order from them few times every month.” “And?”, I responded. “Are they as good as they look on the web?”
http://www.zelenjava-pikapolonica.si/dostava-zelenjave-in-drugih-domacih-izdelkov.html
This was only the start of my desk research. In continuation I sent an e-mail to Agricultural and Forestry Institute in Kranj asking them for information about precision agriculture, crop resistance systems, novel crops, smart meters and internet of things. After ten minutes a phone rang. Answering the phone, the voice on the other side spoke:
“Good afternoon, Tomaz here, you’ve mailed me few minutes ago about the INNOGROW project and innovative production technologies and technologies supporting products’ safety. I have some additional remarks and in any case it is much easier to answer interactively, don’t you think?”
“Yes of course, please go ahead.”
“Well you see the thing is that, to apply precision agriculture, farmers use sensors, electronics, software that provide insightful data and remote monitoring. For example, we are talking about a pest trap system that gives you data on your computer immediately when the pests occur and then the farmer can act accordingly; or monitoring of rain fall and temperature, humidity and nutrition of soil so that farmers can know when to sow or plant or rip or water and similar.”
Is that good enough to mention?”
“Yes of course, please go on.”
http://www.agricorner.com/focus-on-precision-farming/
