The United Kingdom is investing £68 million (€87 million) in the launch of three new Centres for Agricultural Innovation, focusing on crop health and protection, agricultural engineering and precision farming, and excellence in livestock production. The three new centres will collaborate with the first Centre for Agricultural Innovation, launched late last year, which is called Agrimetrics and deals with data science and modelling.
These centres are designed to create capacity in the UK to translate agricultural innovations into commercial opportunities, stimulate inward investment and help to revolutionise future farming practices. The government funding will finance laboratory equipment, IT hardware and software, and facilities to test and develop new agricultural technologies and products.
Each of the new centres combines a mix of research institutes and universities with various industry partners, including retailers, food processors, equipment manufacturers and plant protection product manufacturers. For example, ENDURE partner Rothamsted Research has a key role in Agrimetrics and is also a partner in the £21.3m (€27m) Centre for Crop Health and Protection (CHAP).
CHAP is aiming to bring together the best expertise, knowledge and insight from leading research organisations and industries in order to develop solutions for the global challenges facing agriculture. ADAS, the UK’s largest independent agricultural consultancy providers, reports: “ This collaboration between academia and industry will, for the first time, give farmers access to the best and most sustainable technologies, strategies and protocols to improve crop performance, making a real difference at the farm gate.”
Interim CHAP chief executive officer, Dr Andrew Swift, said: “CHAP will establish the UK as a world-leader in agri-technology, innovation and sustainability. It will create an environment that encourages the exchange of leading edge knowledge, resulting in greater innovation and wider access to the best available technologies and solutions. By taking science to the farm, CHAP will help farmers, growers and the food industry to improve yield, reduce costs and meet the need for sustainable solutions to present and future challenges.”
The £17.5m (€22.5m) Agricultural Engineering Precision Innovation Centre (Agri-EPI Centre) is aiming to be a global hub for agricultural engineering and precision agriculture. Core members, including Scotland’s Rural College (SRUC), Harper Adams University and Cranfield University, will provide expertise and work alongside industry partners, including Harbro, AgSpace Agriculture and Kingshay Farming. In total, 76 institutions and companies throughout the food chain will be working together, including notable retailers such as Marks & Spencer and Morrisons.
SRUC reports: “Amidst the new revolution in information technologies and engineering science, the Centre will explore how to optimise the performance of the highly complex production and processing systems in agriculture. This will include key drivers of profitability and sustainability, such as livestock and plant growth rates, nutrient efficiency, product quality, and health.
“Initial areas of interest will include cutting edge technologies such as automated vehicles, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs or ‘drones’), new instrumentation to monitor both operations and in-field performance of cropping systems, as well as sensing and imaging technologies to monitor livestock production in areas such as product quality and health.”
A central feature of the Centre will be a series of farms and processing facilities equipped with the latest sensing and imaging equipment. These sites will enable the Centre to identify issues for research, and also provide locations to develop and demonstrate technologies to UK producers, supporting the rapidly expanding global market for these technologies.
Willie Thomson of Harbro said: “In five years’ time this quickly growing sector will be worth £2.3 billion globally and Agri-EPI intends to help drive that growth, supporting innovative ideas which will help farmers and business owners become sustainable in this exciting and challenging time.”
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