Addressing the Adoption of Sustainable Practices Through Multi-criteria Assessment: Farmtopia’s 10th Practice Abstract
This is the tenth Practice Abstract developed within the scope of the Farmtopia project, authored by Camille Harel from ARVALIS, Technical Institute.
Traditional farming practices often overuse inputs, such as herbicides, treating with a global treatment approach. This results in higher environmental impact and increased costs for farmers. Advanced resource-efficient methods such as spot spraying technology are on the market, but they are not yet widely used by small and medium sized farms.
Solution
A multi-criteria evaluation framework calculates a wide range of indicators, to provide an assessment of new resource-efficient methods like spot spraying technologies. For example, Systerre®, a web-based tool, calculates technical, economic, and environmental indicators. Spot spraying, powered by advanced AI and sensors, applies herbicides only where weeds are detected, significantly reducing inputs. By combining practical evaluation tools with digital technologies, farmers can obtain reliable data to support sustainable practices. This method will be carried out as part of case study 8 of the Farmtopia project to assess the performance of spot spraying on maize and wheat and to provide recommendations for making the technology accessible to SMEs.
Practical Implementation
Multi-criteria assessment has several advantages:
• Gathering useful information about the farm.
• Measuring post-performance of a system: it allows farmers to assess the overall impact of their cropping system and the practices that can or may affect their farm, based on solid indicators.
• Prior assessment of evolution scenarios.
Results expected in SIP8
- ≥30% reduction in the herbicide usage,
- ≥30% reduction in input costs,
- Stable net margins
Discover nine more Practice Abstracts in other blog posts available in the Newsroom section.