Welcome to the first edition of our DEMETER newsletter.
I hope you are keeping well during these turbulent times.
The aim of this newsletter is to keep you informed of the project’s progress, recent achievements and important activities as we seek to digitally transform the European agri-food sector. In this edition, we take a look at the objectives of DEMETER, introduce the pilot clusters and outline some recent news and events from the first six months of the project. We also talk to one of the project partners to learn more about their role in DEMETER. More information is available on our website at http://h2020-demeter.eu/ and across our social media channels Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook
I hope you find the newsletter informative and look forward to keeping you up to date with DEMETER’s activities across the project duration.
Project Coordinator
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The DEMETER project is a large-scale deployment of farmer-driven, inter-operable smart farming-IoT (Internet of Things) based platforms, delivered through a series of 20 pilots across 18 countries (15 EU countries).
Involving 60 partners, DEMETER adopts a multi-actor approach across the value chain (demand and supply), with 25 deployment sites, 6,000 farmers and over 38,000 devices and sensors being deployed.
Find out more here. |
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DEMETER’s goal is to lead the digital transformation of Europe’s agri-food sector through the rapid adoption of advanced IoT technologies, data science and smart farming, ensuring its long-term viability and sustainability.
Our key objective is to empower farmers and farmers' organisations and cooperatives to a) use their existing platforms and machinery to extract new knowledge to improve their decision making and b) ease the acquisition, evolution and updating of their platforms, machinery and sensors by focusing their investments where these are needed.
Click here to learn more about the DEMETER objectives. |
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DEMETER pilots cover 14 European countries and a wide spectrum of sub-sectors. These pilots will be used to demonstrate and evaluate how innovations and extended capabilities benefit from the interoperability mechanisms.
The pilots are divided into 5 clusters:
- Arable crops: Focusing on an efficient, integrated management of water and energy, from sources to end users to optimise both the quality and quantity of the resources in irrigation systems.
- Precision farming: Focusing on arable crops but specifically on the usage of agricultural machinery and the establishment of precision farming.
- Fruit and vegetables: Focusing on supporting farmers in protecting the health and the quality of production, focusing on several fruit and vegetables crops in several European countries.
- Livestock: Focusing on supporting farmers for livestock animal health and high-quality production of animal products using farmers’ dashboards with AI-based prediction and decision support for animal health and animal products.
- Supply Chain: Focusing on running pilots across several sectors (fruit, vineyards, cattle, poultry) and to address both supply and demand sides of the supply chain.
More information about the pilot clusters can be found here. |
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Since the project started in September 2019, DEMETER has had a number of deliverables completed to date. In particular from our piloting work package we have created a comprehensive list of requirements for our pilots, covering all aspects and stakeholders. This is an excellent reflection of the multi-actor approach that DEMETER has adopted.
We've created the communication and dissemination strategy to maximise the impact of the project. An initial Data Management plan is complete, and we have had the first release of the DEMETER reference architecture.
Over the next few months, we will launch our first phase of cascade funding, which aims to attract new participants to our already substantial stakeholder base. This open call is for interested farmers, technology solution providers and other interested parties and is currently scheduled to launch in September 2020. The goal of this open call is to enlarge the pool of agro-interoperable technologies by engaging tech SMEs to integrate their solutions within the DEMETER ecosystem.
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Interview with Project Partner - DNET Labs
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In this edition, we catch up with Senka Gajinov, product manager at DNETLabs, one of our pilot partners, to learn more about their involvement in the DEMETER project.
Can you tell us a bit about your organisation and your involvement with the DEMETER project?
DNET Labs company is focusing on designing solutions for digital transformation of the food production chain, from farm to consumer, enabling more efficient and transparent production and the supply chain overall. In DEMETER, we are involved in architecture design, implementation of various enablers, and, of course, piloting.
What pilot cluster and pilot project are you involved in?
We are leading Cluster 5, focusing on piloting solutions for food supply chain transparency in two domains: vineyards & orchards and poultry farms, across four countries (Georgia, Montenegro, Slovenia and Serbia). Additionally, we are responsible for the pilot focusing on chicken farm management in the Pilot Cluster 4.
What is the objective of the pilot project?
The objective is to address both supply and demand sides of the supply chain and to validate interoperability of platforms used for management of on-farm and post-farm (supply chain) activities, both in grape/apple production and poultry production. Initially, we will be relying on the solutions provided by our company and Origin Trail to create a trustable and verifiable trail of information about the food production supply chain. Then, we will be looking to implement interfaces and interoperability mechanisms which will allow efficient exchange of modules between DEMETER partners, thus enabling more rapid expansion and creation of additional revenue streams. Last, but not the least, we are eager to validate all features from the perspective of end users (farmers), taking into account regional specifics.
Click here to read more of the interview with Senka.
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