NEO does a lot of research in precision agriculture. Precision agriculture helps farmers treat and manage plants in the fields. Using increasingly accurate satellite data, it is possible to track fields with a spatial resolution of 50cm. This means differences can be detected and treated within a field. Ultimately, this leads to optimisation of production in a more sustainable way.
In the August 2020 newsletter, NEO revealed that it will conduct research on yellowing disease in sugar beet plants this year. This is one of the precision agriculture research projects NEO is working on.
Comparison disease
Yellowing disease is a virus that affects sugar beet plants and is becoming increasingly common in the Netherlands. NEO has investigated the possibility of detecting yellowing disease spots in sugar beet plots using Superview satellite data. The images below are an example of a plot where yellowing disease is present.
Training data was collected from the comparison spots in the plot, see Figure 2. Then the plots were classified with a supervised classification algorithm on mapping the yellowing spots. The results show that it is possible to detect yellowing disease. However, minor improvements are still needed. The algorithm now also detects the shade of trees and dry spots at the edge of the plot as yellowing (see Figure 3). NEO expects to use deep-learning to also make these improvements to get the best possible picture of the amount of affected plants.
