SmartAgriHubs is dedicated to accelerate the digital transformation of the European agri-food sector. It will consolidate, activate and extend the current ecosystem by building a network of Digital Innovation Hubs (DIHs) that will boost the uptake of digital solutions by the farming sector. This will be achieved by integrating technology and business support in a local one-stop-shop approach involving all regions and all relevant players in Europe. The heart of the project is formed by 28 flagship innovation experiments demonstrating digital innovations in agriculture, facilitated by DIHs from 9 Regional Clusters including all European member states. Concurrently, SmartAgriHubs will improve the maturity of innovation services of DIHs so that digital innovations will be replicated across Europe and widely adopted by European farmers. A lean multi-actor approach focusing on user acceptability, stakeholder engagement and sustainable business models will boost technology and market readiness levels and bring user adoption to the next level. This will be enhanced by synergetic effects between SmartAgriHubs and RIS3, since SmartAgriHubs will work in lock step with European regions to maximize the return of European investments, including regional structural funds and private capital. Open Calls with a total budget of ±6 M€ will expand the network and ensure that technological developments and emerging challenges of the agri-food sector are incorporated in the DIH service portfolio. SmartAgriHubs’ inclusive structure and ambitious targets will bring the entire European ecosystem together, connecting the dots to ensure global leadership for Europe in the AgTech market. The consortium, led by Wageningen Research and other partners of previous key projects such as IoF2020, FIWARE, S3P Agri-Food and I4MS, will leverage the existing ecosystem and guarantee a maximum ROI for European taxpayers and a vital agri-food sector producing adequate and safe food for future generations.

SARMENTI develops a multisensor, low power IoT secure node to provide decision support to farmers by monitoring in real-time and in situ soil nutrients and gaseous emission. From this data measured on a daily basis over crop lifecycles, the farmer will timely perform appropriate actions regarding fertilisation, with direct impact on crop growth, soil & water quality and farmer income. The SARMENTI system will embed electrochemical sensors to measure e.g. NOx, POx, NH4, K, urea, pH, moisture, temperature. They will stay ideally during the crop lifecycle in the soil with packaging issues to protect them from their environment. A hygroscopic membrane will attract water from the soil, avoiding integration of a power hungry active pump usually used to exact water from a soil sample. SARMENTI will also monitor N2O (may appear in the nitrate cycle) and CH4 (generated by decomposition of manure under anaerobic conditions) just above the ground. These gases are greenhouse ones with higher warming potential than CO2. SARMENTI is part of the IoT (e.g. LoRa, BLE connexion). Data integrity is guaranteed by developing a secure node via combination of attack detection and automatic countermeasures application. Partners bring SoA prototypes of electrochemical and gas sensors and communication submodules, know-how in security for IoT nodes, and expertise in Agriculture. SARMENTI will further improve the prototypes (power, usage duration, hygroscopic membrane, packaging, sensitivity, selectivity) and integrate them with advanced processing in a connected secured device. Cloud Decisions support will allow evaluate the overall solution, SARMENTI demonstrator being tested in real fields. SARMENTI directly addresses ICT-7 challenge: “develop and validate new generation of cost-effective ESS ...”, RIA aim: “demonstrate ESS bringing intelligence ... integration of sensor systems, processors, computing and networking elements..." and “verification", "exploitation... clearly identified".

The overall goal of DiverIMPACTS is to achieve the full potential of diversification of cropping systems for improved productivity, delivery of ecosystem services and resource-efficient and sustainable value chains by (i) assessing performances of crop diversification through rotation, intercropping and multiple cropping, (ii) providing rural areas actors with those key enablers and innovations that would remove existing barriers and ensure actual uptake of benefits of crop diversification at farm, value chain and territory levels and (iii) make recommendations to policy-makers to facilitate the coordination of all relevant actors within the value chain. DiverIMPACTS will build on existing experiences of crop diversification by networking and expanding 10 existing field experiments to quantify impacts of crop diversification and by accompanying 25 multi-actor case studies in their dynamic transition. DiverIMPACTS will propose a range of technical and organisational innovations to remove lock-ins from farmers to consumers as well as strategies and recommendations to sustain crop diversification. The consortium gathers a wide range of actors (farmers and farmer organisations, advisory services, cooperatives, logistic providers, scientists, industry, representatives of civil society and of rural areas). Through a multi-actor approach, DiverIMPACTS will accompany and support innovation groups in their dynamic process to develop sustainable value chain systems characterised by a high level of crop diversification and new market products. The consortium involves pioneer actors of crop diversification and has strong experience in both the design and multi-criteria assessment of innovative systems and the analysis of barriers that impede the transition towards sustainable diversified systems that contribute to the Rural Renaissance objectives.