PAFiC: Precision Agriculture for Family-farms in China

Rapid advances in fertiliser use and other inputs to crops have dramatically improved Chinese crop production over recent decades, but this has not been done in a sustainable manner and it is estimated that >10M t of synthetic nitrogen fertiliser is wasted annually in China. The number of small to medium-sized commercial family farms is increasing from a merging of smaller, non-commercial family plots. It is desirable to support these farms to maintain rural populations and economies. These family-farmers also need technological assistance to manage larger areas that they have no historical connection to. Precision agriculture, allowing for fine-scale within-field management of crops based on detailed spatial data collection, has an essential role to play in increasing fertiliser and resource use efficiency on farms. This will increase production efficiency (profitability) as well as reduce the environmental footprint of agricultural practices linked to fertilizer use. However, in China there are fundamental barriers to uptake of precision agriculture methods and technology, including high costs relative to income and unquantified financial benefits, a lack of data and services and a lack of awareness and acceptance by growers, communities and administrative agencies.
This joint UK-China collaboration aims to improve the use efficiency of nutrients and agri-chemicals in crop production in China, by addressing key technological, agricultural and social or economic barriers to the use of precision agriculture methods in commercial family farms. The project will develop new technology and data sources for agricultural decision making, including the application of advanced hyperspectral cameras, able to measure many wavelengths of light and provide detailed information on crop health, and improved technology for precise spatial positioning within fields. Improved methods to utilise satellite imagery, especially from radar sensors systems, to provide accessible data on crop nutrient levels and growth will also be developed and the advantages of combining data from multiple sources (satellites, airborne sensors and ground monitoring) will be assessed. These improved data layers, providing frequent and detailed spatial information on crop growth, crop health and soils, will then be combined with models of crop growth to provide a system for agricultural decision making that is applicable to family farms in China. This will promote the optimal use of agricultural resources, such as fertiliser. Developed methods will be tested on exemplar farms in China, covering a range of geographic regions and crop systems that have been established in previous research projects. To facilitate both the maximum engagement from a diversity of community and industry members, and the maximum usage of the agri-technologies and precision agriculture methods by farmers, it is critical to incorporate both scientific and local (community and practitioner) expertise into the project. This is critical to understanding and addressing issues specific to these farming system. An integral aspect of the project is to therefore undertake focussed research on the societal and economic barriers to uptake and to use of these technologies. This research will identify and address these barriers via the mode of development and the delivery of the project outputs onto family-farms. This work will also form the basis for wide-reaching and effective public engagement, knowledge exchange and policy translation to ensure the latest methods are adopted in China. Activities will include the development of a data information portal for crop management, stakeholder workshops and technical training for local growers and agricultural specialists.

We have identified and engaged with a wide range of end users of our research, which will have wide reaching economic and societal impact in several key areas:

1. PA Community: A range of advanced agri-technologies and agri-methodologies will be developed to make them work for family farms in China, and the PA community will be keen to learn the appropriate and affordable technologies. The PA community includes local farms and agronomists and the wider academic community. It also includes small companies that specialise in PA. In this project, a thorough social-economic assessment on PA implementation will be conducted, which will help research partners to direct resources into the right domains to convince the PA community and in turn promote PA to a wider community.

2. Geospatial Service Providers: The state-of-the-art, high-resolution products we will derive from satellite optical and radar imagery, including soil brightness maps, vegetation indices and crop health maps have considerable commercial and societal values. We will be engaging with geospatial service providers in the NE UK through the North East Satellite Applications Catapult Centre of Excellence. We will include two industry members in the Advisory Group, through which our research activities will be promoted in the industry. Although we plan to provide satellite derived products free of charge via a web interface, we will work with SMEs and geospatial service providers to help them develop bespoke geospatial services directly tailored to agronomic end users in both the public and private sector.

3. Agricultural Service Providers: In China, agronomic services direct to growers are normally delivered via government agencies, and the project needs to engage with these 'on-ground' service providers. Local agronomic service providers and growers will be engaged through a series of local workshops. Workshops will disseminate information as well as garner feedback for the social science components of the project. Dedicated web services will provide another level support for agronomists and growers to promote acceptance and the conversion of the geospatial outputs into spatial agronomic products.

4. Government Institutions responsible for agriculture: One of the most significant outputs of our research will be improved knowledge the socio-economic barriers to agri-technologies and services. This will have significant societal and economic value to government institutions responsible for agriculture. We plan to exploit networks across the consortia partnership to ensure widespread uptake of the outputs of our proposed research. The involvement of a MoA senior officer, as well as the strong presence of social scientists in this project, will facilitate the delivery of the right information to policy makers.

5. Public understanding of PA: PA with Remote Sensing provides a compelling subject with which to engage with the public in science and technology through radio and television broadcasts, popular articles and public lectures. In addition to the investigator's ongoing public communication work, we plan, specifically, to exhibit at Xiaotangshan Open Day in Year 2 in China and the Royal Society Summer Science Exhibition in Year 3 in the UK. Furthermore, we plan to engage with the public through development of web-based materials, blogs and social media.

6. Academic: Academic impact will be achieved by ensuring the prompt publication of project outcomes within high quality academic journals and at National and International conferences in both the Agriculture and Geospatial domains. This will be facilitated by the use of writing workshops (writeshops) appended to project science meetings. Where possible, PDRAs will deliver conference presentations, supported by supervisors.