Developing a decision support system to improve crop management, yield forecasting and resource use efficiency in UK soft fruit production

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

The UK soft fruit industry is a vital part of the UK's rural economy with annual sales of strawberries and raspberries of 111 Kt, worth c. £452M at retail sales value. The soft fruit sector has invested heavily in the development of new technology and higher-yielding varieties over the last 15 years and strawberry Class 1 yield/ha has risen from 8 t to 21 t (Defra). However, commercial yields of 38 t/ha are possible if crop agronomy is optimised. The yield gap is due in part to changeable environmental factors within the polytunnels, and the operational decisions made by growers in response to these variables. Over-irrigation and high fertiliser inputs during changeable weather can increase disease susceptibility, lower marketable yields and reduce organoleptic quality. Consequently, 33% of all harvested soft fruit is wasted each year, due to disorders such as rots, bruising and poor textural quality. A 30% reduction in soft fruit waste would stem UK imports and generate extra income for BGG growers of c. £5M p.a. Furthermore, inaccurate predictions of Class 1 yields by BGG growers resulted in lost revenue of £1M in just one two-week period in 2013 and improving the accuracy of yield forecasts could be expected to increase revenue by £3-4M p.a.To achieve this, the consortium will develop a Decision Support System (DSS) that will enable growers to improve operational decision making and reduce the impact of changeable weather on crop yield, quality and wastage. Growers, retailers and consumers will benefit from more accurate yield forecasts leading to better pricing, greater resource use efficiency leading to cost savings and improved environmental performance, lower waste during production leading to increased tonnage to sell, improved consistency of supply of high quality fresh fruit with an assured shelf-life leading to reduced wastage in store.The consortium has expertise in soft fruit agronomy and husbandry, crop physiology and nutrition, substrate science, food quality science, engineering, modelling, IT and meteorology, and has a strong track record of delivering and exploiting publicly-funded R&D. The consortium will: 1) develop, test and deploy innovative technological, scientific, and meteorological solutions to reduce the impact of changeable weather on yield and quality; 2) improve consistency of the supply of high quality, phytonutritious fruit with an assured shelf-life; 3) reduce pre- and post-harvest waste leading to greater profitability and resource use efficiency; 4) improve accuracy of crop yield and timing forecasts to assure higher product pricing and improved grower margins; 5) develop and deploy a DSS to help growers improve the economic and environmental sustainability of their businesses; 6) increase resilience of UK soft fruit production to the impacts of weather and climate variability.Proof-of-concept of these novel technologies will be tested in scientific experiments using proprietary varieties of strawberry and raspberry at East Malling Research (EMR). The DSS will then be deployed and developed further on BGG grower sites to quantify the potential to deliver a greater efficiency in the use of resources, improved productivity from waste reduction, and improved grower margins from more accurate yield forecasts. We anticipate revenue gains of £15-17M p. a. arising from the adoption of the outputs. The route to market will be via commercial roll-out to BGG's 60 UK soft fruit growers and overseas partners in the first instance. The DSS will be transferable to BGG's stone fruit growers, to other UK tree fruit sectors and to other protected and unprotected high-value horticultural production systems in the UK and overseas where improved farming precision is needed to advance sustainable intensification and deliver economic impact.