Since animal production becomes more and more intensive in order to provide enough protein for human nutrition, livestock is getting more susceptible to diseases. These diseases are today still cured by use of antibiotics. Since the occurrence of antimicrobial cross resistance by use of antibiotics increases significantly the last years, prudent use of antibiotics or other functional feed ingredients is needed in order to safeguard future human health. Technology can support in that.  

It is estimated that between 2010 and 2030, the global consumption of antimicrobials will increase by 67%, from 63,2 ± 1,56 tons to 105,6 ± 3,61 tons. This rise is likely to be driven by the growth in consumer demand for livestock products in middle-income countries and a shift to large-scale farms where antimicrobials are used routinely. These findings call for initiatives to preserve antibiotic effectiveness. In general, it is considered that reduction of the use of antibiotics and responsible antibiotic use will result in a decrease of the occurrence of antimicrobial resistance. 

All partners within Flagship Innovation Experiment 12 were actively involved in previous initiatives, such as the national project LESSantibiotics and European project EU-PLF, that already demonstrated the lowering of antibiotic use by selective early detection of diseases in animals within stables, enables to maintain the production numbers of the farms. In Belgium, sound-based technology in pig farming could detect upcoming health problems up to 10 days before any visual detection of the diseases. 

As with humans, diseased animals also show changes in behaviour, have a fever and encounter problems with respiration. The technology applied in Flagship Innovation Experiment 12 is designed to recognise these changes. For example, the cough monitor (from partner SoundTalks) recognises suspicious sounds of pigs, while the Chicken Boy (from partner Syntesa) recognises changes in body temperature and behaviour. Comparing the data with normal herds or flocks, they can early predict where and when to use medication of other functional feed ingredients. 
 
Flagship Innovation Experiment 12 has a portfolio of hardware platforms with corresponding unique algorithms available to detect upcoming problems in livestock production. Today, this portfolio is highly developed for pigs and poultry. Veterinarians and other farm actors can protect better their livestock against diseases and intervene in a responsible way. This results in more proud farming and gives more assurance to farmers to cope with animal health and welfare. This results in more inclusive farming approaches, together with consumers and citizens. 

 
A typical day in our project looks like the following. For example, in the pig trial, the farmers inspect the barn every day, and link their personal observations – based on decades of professional experience – on the technology dashboard. Most of the time these observations are in line with their expectations, however sometimes the dashboard warns them for a potential problem they did not observe. This dashboard gives the farmer confidence that they can predict upcoming problems by means of technology and treat the barns very selective based on the warnings of the technology. And because the disease is not fully elaborated yet, the farmer can treat the animals with lower doses of antibiotics or even with substitutes of antibiotics, such as organic acids, plant extract or herbs.  
 
Of course, we work together on our project with our Digital Innovation Hub and Competence Centre. The Digital Innovation Hub and Competence Centre advised on how to further demonstrate and disseminate the outcomes of the flagships to a broader audience. This way, they contribute to the demonstration days and give the possibility to showcase technologies at different events, including social media platforms. This already resulted in interests from parties in countries within Europe, such as Spain and Turkey, and outside Europe, like Saudi Arabia and South Africa. 

The main chalanges in farms relate to performing correct and precise monitoring of fields during vegetation, field damages, quick plants revision or performing treatments in high plants. Farmers are looking for new technologies and solutions for their production. One of these are drones. But existing services are available mainly for the biggest farms and are difficult to understand, especially their results. There are many companies on the market that offer services using drones in agriculture, 89% of them only offer photos and maps.  

This Flagship Innovation Experiment will run and implement an e-services advisory system for agriculture with the use of drones. It will consist of four services, especially tailored to small and medium-sized farms.  

Drones can be used for many things, they can assess plant and field damage, but they can also perform treatments. In this FIE we combine the technology with consulting and provide recommendations and advice. Our services are available via the internet on the web and via mobile applications. The consulting services are planned for both individuals and groups, and also for small and large farms.

To give you an example of how are technology is used: One of the farmers that is involved in project, has 160,000 bushes of blueberry. The farmer wants to have information about the condition of each of them. Such information can be obtained by using drones on a single flight in just 1 day. The farmer himself would have to walk 80 kilometres which would take him about 4 days!

So to explain it in simple terms, the drones can determine the greenness of plants, i.e. the intensity of photosynthesis. This allows it to determine the needs of plants in nutrients. It is particularly useful in farms because of the large areas. In addition, drones can carry various loads, for example, useful insects to destroy pests. 

For us a typical day in the office consists of analysing available photos. Finding details on the NDVI images and comparing them with images in visible light. What’s more, there is a strong emphasis on developing software for advisors and farmers to communicate in the context of the services process.  

Smaller dairy farms face more difficulties than larger farms when it comes to staying competitive in the dairy market. Starting from a local condition (the average size of a dairy farm in Galicia is small compared to Northern European standards), we focus on providing a range of technology-aided tools that are suitable for smaller farmers (whether in Galicia, Italy or Poland) to increase their business sustainability through resource optimization, environmental compliance, improved profitability and quality of life at the farm. 
 
Our Flagship Innovation Experiment works on a combination of solutions that, together, allow small or mid-sized farms to improve milk quality, production efficiency and sustainability across the dairy production chain. We are working on the combination of multispectral images with sensors to predict feed crop performance, quality and detect stress situations. Besides, we are looking into the optimization of cattle diets to achieve greater efficiency in milk production. A robotic prototype will be developed for remote monitoring of barns, and an ERP-type software will simplify much of the technical-economic management and decisions at farm level. 
 
Currently, small farmers are not aware, nor using much of the valuable data generated during the dairy production process. The aim is to improve the efficiency in the use of resources through the adequate exploitation of the available data throughout the dairy production cycle in all its stages. By this, we are contributing to a better performance, a greater sustainability of the process and an improvement in the intake of decisions of the farmer or the technical advisor. 

 
The technology of our project works as follows. The multispectral images collected by a drone or satellite allow to predict the production, quality of the harvest or stress situations, due to the algorithms obtained from the data of environmental, soil and aerial sensors. A mixer car optimizes food mixes and integrates multiple farm data, while a robot monitors all process parameters. All this technical-economic information is shown in a single device for making the most efficient and profitable decisions. 
 
Our end-users are mainly small or mid-sized farmers and their technical advisors. The application of disruptive technologies in this sector has made it possible to consider all stages of the production chain: fodder cultivation and harvesting, processing of raw materials, precision feeding, obtaining milk and its quality. In this way the value chain becomes more efficient and more profitable both in the practice and in terms of technical-economic information and production costs. 

 
A typical day in our project looks like the following. Various crops are continuously monitored with environmental sensors, soil sensors, etcetera. Different parameters are measured periodically in the plants and samples are analysed in our laboratories at key moments of growth and harvest. Throughout the different periods of these phases we fly drones to collect multispectral images and correlate them with the rest of our data to produce predictive algorithms of each crop, both in small plot trials and in large plot crops. The feed is processed with an adjustable mixing cart. The optimization of the fibre size is sought to achieve the highest digestibility and finally to be able to correlate it with the quality of the milk. In parallel, we work on the design and assembly of a robot that will allow us to monitor all the measurable parameters in the barn, and in a software tool that allows integrating all the technical and economic information of the operation in an automated manner. 

CIAM-AGACAL offers its facilities and a large number of plots with different crops and two levels of testing to optimize prediction algorithms. It provides support with field and laboratory determinations, as well as on-site monitoring by specialized technicians throughout the process and also tests an optimized mixer carriage in its experimental herd. Gradiant brings its experience in ICTs and USC will provide access to infrastructure and demonstration equipment.