News

VISCA Final e-Conference and the Way Forward

On 15th December 2020, VISCA Final Conference was held virtually to present the results of the project and the way forward. The conference attracted around 60 participants with a variety of profiles: viticulturists, wine producers, scientists, agricultural communities, software providers, entrepreneurs, media, among others who connected to the e-conference from 10 countries: Belgium, France, Greece, Italy, Israel, Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Tunisia and the UK.

The e-conference started with a welcoming statement from the project coordinator (METEOSIM) by Josep Sole Maria and the CEO of METEOSIM Oriol de Tera who opened the floor to the two guest speakers from the European Commission: Sasa Zavadlav (VISCA project Officer) and Marjan Van Meerloo, Directorate General for Research & Innovation. They both presented 'R&I contribution to the Green Deal objectives: Climate Action'.

After that, a session on VISCA presentation and results was organized. A short presentation of VISCA was made by the project Coordinator Josep Maria Solé. Then, Claudio Rossi from LINKS  Foundation made a short live demo of the VISCA Decision Support System (DSS) & its added value. The DSS is a Progressive Web Application which integrates climate and agricultural models with farmers’ management specifications to design short practices, medium- and long-term adaptation strategies to climate change. The live demo showed the integrated dashboard of the DSS with its 3 main widgets (phenology, sugar accumulation, irrigation and weather forecasts) as well as the features in relation to the map-based visualization. Later, the key results of the validation of the DSS and the climate services as well as the outcomes from the agronomic techniques: crop forcing and shoot trimming were illustrated by Omar Garcia from IRTA. VISCA solutions were demonstrated in 3 sites in ItalyPortugal and Spain . An interactive round table with end-users representing Codorniu (Xavier Bordes), Symington (Fernando Alves) and Mastroberardino (Antonio Dente) was part of this session where they shared their feedback from the implementation of VISCA solutions.

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Reliability of VISCA DSS on Predicting Extreme Events

The weather conditions have an important role in the development of many social and economic activities. Forecasting of weather conditions can be useful to plan activities especially during extreme events as such information can help to react in time and, consequently, support businesses which are weather-sensitive. This is the case of the wine sector; whose production and crop quality highly depend on the weather conditions.

In this context, weather forecasting becomes of a paramount importance and provides added-value to the end-users to manage their resources and in-field activities and to anticipate potential extreme events.

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Supporting Decisions on Canopy Management in the Italian Demo Site with VISCA DSS

VISCA DSS is integrating climate and agricultural models with farmers’ management specifications in order to design short practices, medium- and long-term adaptation strategies to climate change.

In the Irpinia Valley, located in south of Italy (about 60 km from Naples), a very warm winter influenced the precocity of the budbreak that occurred one week earlier than average. Also, blooming advanced earlier followed by a rainy month of June with some problems of downy mildew. However, with the predictions supplied by VISCA DSS, the Mastroberardino viticulture team was able to contain the disease by increasing the number of treatments sprays, anticipating the action as the prediction of several days of rainfall was given.

VISCA DSS showing that bud break and blooming have been achieved and earlier than normal (July 2020)

 

Blooming observed in the field - Italian Demo Site (July 2020)

This summer, VISCA DSS, in particular the short-term and mid-term climate forecasts, has predicted lower precipitation than normal and higher temperature than normal in Mirabella Eclano estate in the Campania region, where our Italian demonstration site is located. Before the phenological phase of blooming, the DSS, through the seasonal forecast, predicted a dry and hotter summer than normal, followed by the months of September and October with the same trend. Aglianico is the grapevine under the VISCA experimental plot and it is extremely sensible to powdery mildew disease. The dry season usually influences the development of the fungus directly on the grapes. Therefore, such useful predictions allowed the Mastroberardino vinegrowers to take decisions about the canopy and vineyards management in advance. First of all they programmed:

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This project has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 730253.