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This opportunity provides funding to European teams who would like to develop a service related to Connected Agriculture. Funding will be provided by the European Space Agency (ESA) for 6-month projects called ‘Kick-Starts’, which can lead to larger scale Demonstration Projects and Feasibility Studies. Kick-Starts are 75% funded by ESA for a maximum of €60K per contract. Proposed services must use satellite data or space-based technologies. Please see the ‘Authorisation of Funding’ section below to check whether your team is eligible for funding.
THE CHALLENGE
The agriculture sector is facing many challenges including the environmental pressure related to climate change and loss of biodiversity, sustainable and efficient management of resources such as water, soil and energy, an aging farming population in some countries and the shortage of farm labour. The lack of a digitally-skilled workforce is also slowing down the modernisation of the sector.
In March 2022 the German government classified the agricultural and food sector as a systemically important infrastructure. Responding to this decision, the German Federal Office of Agriculture and Food (BLE) stated that a functioning agriculture infrastructure, including logistics and communication facilities, must ensure short- and long-term food supplies. Reliable communications and digital technologies are key elements in supporting the sustainable transformation of the agriculture sector.
There are still many European rural households which have only limited or unreliable internet connectivity. This connectivity gap is unlikely to be solved in the near future by terrestrial networks as these infrastructure projects require a significant leadtime and are expensive. The digital divide between connected and disconnected farms and economically small and large farms must be addressed quickly to unleash the potential of new innovative solutions in the agricultural sector, including irrigation, chemical spraying, seeding, or weeding and their full or partial automation.
TOPICS OF RELEVANCE
Below are some relevant topics that have been identified for this Kick-Start.
NEXT GENERATION FARM MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS
SMART LIVESTOCK AND STABLE MONITORING
PRECISION FARMING AND AUTOMATION
FARM MACHINERY MAINTENANCE MANAGEMENT
VALUE OF SPACE
Proposed services must use one or more space assets. Some examples of space assets are provided below.
- Satellite Communications (satcom) will provide broadband connectivity to farms which are not served by terrestrial means or where the Satellite Internet Service Providers (S-ISP) offer is more attractive. Satellite communications will provide the link required to monitor and manage remote cattle stables and perform remote farming equipment maintenance of with bandwidth requirements that may vary. Such links can be also utilised for autonomous automations such as farming robots or drones as primary or redundant communication means and in Beyond Visual Line of Sight (BVLOS) scenarios. Satellite narrow-band services and Satellite Internet of Things (S-IoT) are currently providing affordable and efficient data transfer solutions for various needs such RTK and other position augmentation techniques for guiding tractors and machines and collecting data from in situ field sensors (e.g. soil salinity, moisture, local rain). The use of satellite communications is highly encouraged for this call.
- Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) use in the farming sector can be increased from its current application in modern farming machines – for seeding, ploughing, harvesting – to become an enabler of autonomous or semi-autonomous machines. This is particularly true for tasks that require high precision treatments, journeys between parcels and farmhouse and safety concerns.
- Satellite Earth Observation (satEO), and in particular the Sentinel data, provide a wealth of information that has been stimulating the emergence of Smart Agriculture as a viable alternative to intensive practices. There is still untapped satEO potential that can be harnessed to serve Connected Farmers, such as the use of Satellite Radar Data (SAR) to monitor biomass, the monitoring of air pollution levels that may be caused by or affect the sector and the monitoring and management of new farming practices such as carbon sequestration, organic farming and agroforestry.
WHAT WE LOOK FOR
Kick-Start activities explore the business opportunity and the technical viability of new applications and services that exploit one or more space assets (e.g. Satellite Communications, Satellite Navigation, Earth Observation, Human Spaceflight Technology).
This call for Kick-Start activities is dedicated to the theme of ‘Connected Agriculture’, which means that the call is open to companies that intend to develop space-enabled applications and services relating to the digitalisation and sustainability of the agricultural sector, mostly in Europe but also beyond.
AUTHORISATION OF FUNDING
ESA Space Solutions can provide funding to carry out Kick-Start activities to any company (economic operator) residing in the following Member States: Belgium, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Lithuania, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Sweden and the United Kingdom. Germany and Luxembourg have pre-authorised the funding to this call
For more information and to apply please visit this website. Applications close 31st August 2023.
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