Robs4Crops Trials

Crop Rotation in Potato Farming Systems

Requirements and challenges

In the Netherlands, ROBS4CROPS will establish a pilot in a potato crop rotation. Netherlands is the 4th largest producer of potatoes and seeds in European Union, with more than 6 million tonnes each year. In this pilot, the Robotti robot produced by AgroIntelli, will be used in a pilot farm where the potato area is up to 50 ha. Presently, heavy conventional tractors are used in combination with various implements to perform most of the field operations which leads to soil structure damage.

How Robs4Crops approaches the challenge

The robot used by Robs4Crops weighs 1/3 of the traditional machinery and can be used to perform several operations including early seeding of the main crop, mechanical weeding, hilling, and harvest potato with single-row harvester while minimizing damage to the soil structure. An additional benefits due to the small size of the robot is that can perform mechanical weeding in two directions. The pilot will use the Robotti robot and a smart weeder. The camera-based weeder will be used to weed in sugar beet in the crop rotation.

Country: Netherlands

Crop Rotation in Potato Farming

Technology: Robotti robot, Camera based smart weeder

Partners: AgroIntelli, Stichting Wageningen Research, Abemec, Smart Agri Technology B.V., Agricultural University of Athens

R4C Crop Rotation in Potato Farming Systems

Via trials in four countries – the Netherlands, France, Spain and Greece — Robs4Cros hopes to create a robotic farming solution consisting of three elements: smart implements, autonomous vehicles, and the farming controller. Development and testing willtake place in practice, under real operating conditions.

Towards large-scale implementation of robotics & automation in European farming​

Targeted Spraying In Apple Orchards

Addressing the labour challenge of the apple sector by automating the complex task of orchard spraying. 

Mechanical weeding in vineyards

With the help of Ceol robot, ROBS4CROPS will reduce chemical use and labor costs, and evaluate the modularity of the platform.

Mechanical Weed Control in Vegetable Production

High precision inter and intra row weeding of vegetables using the Ceol robot and several different mechanical weeding implements attached.

Table Grape Spraying

Direct comparison of both retrofit tractor and Ceol robot, under the same scenarios.