(1)Chairman of the Board of ADVID and head of the Viticulture at Douro Sogrape Vinhos
WHY
It's broadly known and acknowledged that vineyards and wine are ancient realities, a result of the high resilience of an activity with a strong regional and national identity, which has characterised, until today, the territories and cultures where it thrives; a good is example is the recognition of the Douro region as a World Heritage Site, similarly to other world wine landscapes.
However, the "novelty" in terms of speed and intensity of current events, particularly regarding climate change, demographic and consumer behavioural issues, as well as market developments, put an unprecedented added pressure on the sector's economic agents. The technology tools stemming from scientific progress, also characterised by unprecedented "speed" and intensity, are one of the most effective and appealing training solutions for this purpose.
Nowadays, global threats like climate change, geopolitical instability, fierce competition between countries and regions, or local threats like low population density and consequent lack of workforce or poorly developed socio-economic fabric with insufficient capacities force this economy sector to evolve and transform to improve the retention and attraction of workforce and maximise productivity. In this sense, the use of current and developing technology solutions is the most logical approach - even if it's not the most immediate.
PLF technologies have many potential areas of application: feeding strategies, welfare, health and reproduction management. Genetic selection also has much to gain from this high throughput information, with genotyping being much less limiting today than large-scale phenotyping of traits of husbandry interest. However, most technologies focus on intensive farming systems and are still relatively rare in extensive farming.
Hence, the constant search for optimisation of technology by small and large producers (regardless of their dimension), towards improving social, environmental and economic sustainability and, consequently, competitiveness and resilience comes as no surprise. This is the way to ensure the sustainability of the growth sought by the economic and social cluster of the wine industry.
WHAT
The notion and acknowledgement of the existence of a Vine and Wine Cluster in this economic sector - even if partially in a less structured form - allows to promote multi-actor approaches with the involvement of the State, R&D entities, associations, companies, cooperatives, and individuals, all playing an active role in the process.
The CoLAB Vines & Wines, as an interface entity, is one of the preferred means for the development of interactive processes that start by signalling needs and directing technological development to address them; this is followed by cycles of consultation with companies in terms of demonstrated or developed solutions, generation of "critical mass" to leverage the development of solutions by tech providers, and their democratisation - through cost reduction and the application of technology and technical knowledge, thus ensuring the fast assimilation among all economic agents, and narrowing the gap between companies and the research, innovation and development ecosystem.
HOW
Technologies represent both direct and indirect/cross-cutting solutions to most problems since they promote the retention and valorisation of skilled professionals and the creation of specific training capacities. One the one hand, this is crucial to advance the short-term implementation of technologies, thus fully benefiting from them. On the other hand, it allows retaining young and specialised professionals, leading to a valorisation in terms of wages, in line with the increase in productivity.
This "environment" that we designate as Smart Agriculture - and specify as Precision Viticulture concerning vines - will stem from three factors combined, explained below:
In fact, the solution lies in how to make it happen, exploring and boosting the multi-actor approach through interface structures such as the CoLab Vines & Wine. This will allow maximising its benefits - which should (rather, must) be leveraged by the decision-making power by actively supporting this approach, assuming the scientific knowledge with another "speed" and applying it to the legislation. This way, there will be fewer barriers to the introduction of new solutions while acknowledging the importance of the involvement of all economic agents, including the companies' drive and leadership role in this process.