Digital watering of vegetables
As part of its EIP-Agri funding programme, the EU is supporting two projects at Bingen University of Applied Sciences that focus on innovation in agriculture – including a project that aims to digitally control irrigation in vegetable cultivation.
Innovative solutions that are used in agricultural practice have been promoted by the European Union for years through the European Innovation Partnership for Agricultural Productivity and Sustainability programme, or EIP-Agri for short. In what is now the third round of funding, Bingen University of Applied Sciences has succeeded with two projects and secured funding totalling 1.5 million euros.
From digital irrigation to chicken feed made from insects
Around €1 million has been allocated to the DigiBob project. Researchers want to use this funding to develop an open-source platform that can be used to digitally control irrigation in vegetable cultivation. The team behind the LARF-Pick project will receive a further €527,000. Here, researchers want to establish insect larvae as a regional feed for chickens, with a particular focus on regional cycles.
Practical solutions for agriculture
‘With EIP-Agri, we are bringing together practice, research and consulting to jointly develop sustainable and practical solutions for our agriculture,’ says Daniela Schmitt, Minister of Agriculture in Rhineland-Palatinate. ‘The projects show how diverse the paths to competitive and resource-efficient agriculture can be, and in this call, digital agriculture is also increasingly being emphasised.’
The European Innovation Partnership for Agricultural Productivity and Sustainability aims to create incentives for project-based collaboration between science, innovation-ready companies in agriculture and other innovation actors. In addition to developing practical solutions, the aim is to accelerate innovation processes through knowledge exchange.
EIP-Agri is part of the German government's national strategic plan for implementing the EU's Common Agricultural Policy (CAP). The programme is implemented with funds from the European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development (EAFRD) and national co-financing. For the current funding period from 2023 to 2027, the federal state of Rhineland-Palatinate alone has around €15 million at its disposal.
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