You versas consultants is the only Spanish company that participates in the project

The company will bring its experience in the development of GIS Versas, a system that allows you to geographically locate the company's resources and access to information generated by the same through an interface integrated with Google Earth.

Thanks to the development of this project will be a new and advanced system which will cover aspects in the management of agricultural holdings which otherwise would be nearly impossible to control (especially when the farmer manages large areas of terrain and distant each other). It is therefore one of the most ambitious projects sponsored by the EU for the modernization of European agriculture, protection of the environment and the promotion of innovation and competitiveness.

3D Mosaic involve 18 partners and 12 observers from 10 countries by establishing a network of international work to create and maintain necessary contributions within the framework of the project, which aims to provide, through the use of new technologies (GIS, telecommunications)(, robots and sensors) a new platform advanced for the obtaining of information directly in field that allows farmers to take more appropriate decisions for their plantations, looking for as a final objective the increase of the performance, quality and competitiveness of the European agricultural sector.

The relation of companies and organisms participants in this project is the following:

• Leibniz Institute for Agricultural Engineering Potsdam-Bornim (ATB), Germany

• University of Copenhagen, Faculty of Life Sciences, Department of Agriculture and Ecology, (KU), Denmark

• Technical University of Denmark, Dept. of Electrical Engineering (DTU), Denmark

• University of Cukurova, Agriculture Structure and Irrigation Department, (CU), Turkey

• Agricultural Research Organization, Environmental Physics and Irrigation, Gilat Research Center, (RING), Israel

• Politecnico gave Milano - Dipartimento gave Fisica (PoliMi), Italia

• Sintéleia S.r.l., Italia

• Zurich University of Applied Sciences (ZHAW), Switzerland

• Agroscope Reckenholz Tänikon Research Station ART (Agroscope), Switzerland

• University of Kassel, Department of Agricultural Engineering (Uni Kassel), Germany

• Versas Consultores (Versas), Spain

The system obtained thanks to 3D Mosaic will be based on the use of a series of robots who, at foot of exploitation, will analyse on cultivation aspects such as (leaf surface, estimated production, degree of maturity, quality of the fruta…), information that will be transferred to a control center to subsequently be dumped into the system through the system GIS developed by you Versas, allowing this farms appear in your exact location, properly tagged and with its perimeter well delimited, making it possible to obtain a distribution of the fully colored land of each farm plots, numbered and bounded in this and that can show or hide a relationship of cultivation units.

The resulting commercial viability is indisputable and will cover the urgent needs of the European fruit and vegetable sector of ICT-based solutions and Robotics are virtually non-existent until now. Have a first solution of these features enables companies in the agricultural sector to work with a level of agility, reliability and unprecedented security, allowing an improvement in performance in their crops, an improvement in the quality of their products andTherefore, an improvement in competitiveness. Once completed the developments you will get a set of modular (and flexible) solutions that will allow the marketing of products thereby laying the foundations for a technological revolution in the fruit and vegetable sector at the international level.

Interview to José Espinosa, general director of Versas Consultores

“The only form to compete is to optimise/optimize the use of water, abonos, phytosanitary and hand of work”

Versas is the only Spanish company that participates in the project 3D-Mosaic, where predominates the participation of the world of investigation and teaching, How were the beginnings? How they happen to form part of this project and of which form contributes Versas to the investigation?

The project 3D-Mosaic needed an expert partner in technology GIS (Geographic Information System). The application arrived to the INFO and CENTIC through the European network of technological transfer, those who, knowing the experience of Versas in this sector contacted with our company to see if we were interested in the project. Versas Provides the interface GIS for the rest of partners of the project, as well as all the system of management in database to store and analyse/analyze the information from robots instrumented with sensors, artificial vision, positioning GPS... By means of the DSS (Decision Support System) that will create Versas, will be able to take better decisions based in the information of the system.

The aim is the modernisation/modernization of the agriculture, of which form will contribute the project to that the fields modernicen?

By a part, automates the estimate of the production (quantity, quality…) and by another generate the maps of fertirrigación suitable to optimise/optimize the production (based in measurements automated of humidity of the floor, surface foliar, planned production...).

Explain to the detail the system that will result of the project... Of what treats ?

3D Mosaic (proposal for the announcement ICT-Agri) pretends to contribute, by means of the use of new technologies (GIS, telecommunications, robots and sensors) a new platform advanced for the obtaining of information directly in field and in real time that allow to the agriculturalists take the most adapted decisions for his plants, looking for like final aim the increase of the performance, the quality and the competitiveness of the agricultural sector European.

In the actuality any company or association of agriculturalists of the EU has of a similar technology to the described and, nowadays, the level of automation reached in the field is low, being in the majority of the cases the information obtained little and the possibility to take decisions a priori with low or invalid guarantees. This fact supposes an important competitive disadvantage of the companies of the European surroundings and therefore a problem that strategically has to obtain solution to short/half term.

Which data will allow to obtain to the agriculturalist? They were not sufficient the current tools?

At present in the best agricultural stages Europeans, the information collected by the little technology implanted or collected manualmente does not use, had to mainly to problems of logistics of data and to a big fault of integration. The cost in necessary time to administer and analyse/analyze the data collected is, in the majority of the cases, upper to the economic profits obtained.

It is necessary to take into account, of face to look for the most suitable solution, that the data of plants neither are sufficient to support the construction of a system that help to the agriculturalist to take good decisions to obtain harvests of success year after year: it is necessary to incorporate also geographic information on floors and irrigations for afterwards can correlacionar and analyse/analyze the data or results obtained.

How will help these systems of monitoring to the Spanish agriculturalist and European?

Will help him to manage of form more reliable the orchards of

Thinks that the Spanish agriculturalist is prepared to implant this type of systems and robotic?

For the moment is a project of R&D, that has to end in the obtaining of commercial products that can implant to a cost asumible for the Spanish agriculturalists. The improvement in the management of the water and abonos (and the consistent saving in costs) will allow to amortise/amortize the investment in technology.

Considers that the competitiveness goes through the automation of the field?

Europe has to compete in costs with countries that have a hand of work until 10 cheaper times. Besides, the quality and controls that demand to the European products do not demand to the third countries, although this does not reflect in the price paid. The only form to compete is optimising/optimizing the use of water, abonos, phytosanitary and hand of necessary work to cultivate these products. The project 3D Mosaic will allow to optimise/optimize the resources in the crop.

Perhaps have seen some similar system in the viñedos, by means of sensors, is an alike technology?

In viñedos exist sensors that measure the variation of the trunk of the vineyard, to see when it is necessary to irrigate it, with the end to cause a stress hídrico controlled that it allow to obtain the best quality of grape (by the expense of quantity) to realise/realize wine of excellent quality. In this project, there is multiple sensors that evaluate distinct parameters (of similar form to the sensor of the vineyard) with the end to analyse/analyze of multidimensional form the crop. Besides, all the information analyses/analyzes and presents in some surroundings GIS with a system DSS.

Exist similar systems in Spain?

Do not exist systems that integrate all the variety of data collected of the crop (floor, production, quality, surface foliar…) and less integrated in a system GIS.

Define the activity of Versas Consultores

Versas Consultores is a company centred/centered in offering services of consulting and implantation of software to the main companies of the sector hortofrutícola, from finals of the year 1997. At present, it forms part of the business group Software Quality Assurance & Versas Consultores. Our consultores have a deep knowledge of the sector, what helps in the tasks of organisation/organization and implantation of new processes, supported in our software.

The product software Versas, of own production, incorporates the best practical of our customers, what allows a big adaptation in new implantations. From this consulting are conscious of the need of our customers for having of a flexible software, that adapt to his specific needs. Thus, our methodology of implantation loans special attention to the process of consulting. This allows us determine in which degree it is necessary to adapt Versas to the needs of the customer and which standard processes of Versas have to be incorporated in the new processes of the customer.