Development of a digital support tool for improved vineyard management
Abstract
The Platfarm project was designed to create a Minimum Viable Product app that enables the wine sector to carry out work on vineyards with greater precision, using low cost smart phones and tablets.
Developed in collaboration with growers, contractors, input suppliers and viticulturists, the project has identified a number of vineyard tasks which would benefit from targeted management. The project has identified the current practical challenges of using standard smart phones and tablets to carry out precision viticulture and has delivered solutions to help overcome them.
Summary
The Platfarm project was initiated due to the lack of cost effective viticulturally focused tools to enable grapegrowers to carry out work on their vineyards with greater precision. Their previous choices were either to manually mark a work area with tape to communicate where to start/stop, or to make significant investment in the precision agriculture technology that is primarily used in the broadacre sector.
The aims of the project were to create a Minimum Viable Product ‘MVP’ version of Platfarm which can be published on the app stores (Google Play / iTunes) for users to download for free, to use on standard consumer smart devices.
The Platfarm project includes the core functionality to:
- Import geo-referenced imagery (aerial vine vigour or EM38 soil maps) to show the variability of the vineyard.
- Import an external prescription map to indicate where work needs to be carried out or use Platfarm tools to create it.
- Geo-locate the user accurately along the correct grapevine row using the GPS in the smart device, track the position of a user as work is being carried out, provide a visual display and audibly communicate with the user to tell them when to start/stop work or change the application rate.
The MVP has been developed and iterated with the input and feedback from the core user groups of grapegrowers, contractors, input suppliers and viticulturists. Platfarm was initially trialled and tested by over a dozen vineyards in McLaren Vale, and the Clare and Barossa Valleys, with the following key results:
- Due to the current accuracy limitations of GPS signals, Platfarm has developed a tool to enable users to calibrate their current position against a known location in the vineyard before they start a task (e.g. the start of row 1 and 2), this then places them on the correct vine row, with actions such as starting/stopping spreading typically being executed within an accuracy of 0-2 vines of the original target point along the row.
- Platfarm also created a technical solution to overcome the other main challenge of the external layers of imaging not lining up with the base layer satellite imagery.
- Platfarm was successfully demonstrated to work without the need for internet connectivity when carrying out work in the vineyard.
- Users who trialled Platfarm also suggested a number of tasks (other than application rates) that it could direct. These included mid row ripping, planting alternative mid row cover crops in higher/lower vigour rows, split picking, shoot thinning and leaf plucking. Tracking spray application to ensure that no rows are missed and facilitating more efficient tractor operation to optimise travel time.
The project also raised a number of recommendations for how the wine sector can maximise the opportunity of AgTech start-ups:
- By having a number of common building blocks that would be beneficial for AgTech companies in the wine sector to have in place: Vineyard block boundary files and high resolution aerial imagery of Australia’s wine regions. It is suggested that Wine Australia would be best placed to store and update this information, and make it conditionally available to accredited third parties.
- For Wine Australia to continue to support promising start-ups with small pre-seed level grants, to demonstrate ‘proof of concept’ for new technologies.
- For Wine Australia to further collaborate with the various Australian start-up accelerators (SproutX, Cultiv8, GrowLab) to co-invest in early stage ideas that have the potential to deliver the greatest benefit to the sector.