GO PECUS: Maintenance and improvement of extensive livestock farming through the development of digital tools to support decision-making by livestock farmers, forest owners and specialist technicians
- Type Grupo operativo
- Status In progress
- Execution 2024 -2027
- Scope Supraautonómico
- Autonomous community Castilla y León; Madrid, Comunidad de
- Main source of financing PEPAC 2023-2027
To address the sustainable use of silvopastoral spaces, mitigate the abandonment of land use and improve the economic sustainability of extensive farms, a series of innovative digital tools integrated into the PECUS platform are developed:
- Providing farmers with a tool for selecting pastures according to the time of year, phenology and productivity, controlling the number of pastures and applied loads, facilitating livestock mobility and reducing the need for supplementary feeding.
- By making it easier for landowners to characterize pastures, identifying the needs for improvement of the plots, providing them with security in the management is adequate with the control of the grazing load. It will be possible to improve the management of already grazed farms and overcome the reluctance of owners to allow grazing due to this lack of control.
- Facilitating the advisory work of technicians and administrations to farmers and owners and directing public support more precisely.
Development of a platform that connects livestock farmers, landowners, technicians and administrations and optimizes the use of land by livestock, promotes the management of underused land and rejuvenation of the sector.
The platform architecture will be designed to include the 3 modules: livestock owner and technician. Establish at least 2 basic algorithms for characterization, evolution and quantification for the main pastures of the Iberian System and Central System, monitoring of livestock load from data taken in situ, remote sensors and other data. With this, a web viewer for livestock farmers will be developed that will be integrated into the platform.
Establishment of at least 2 characterization and quantification algorithms to determine the suitability of forest farms for silvopastoral use and monitoring of livestock load, developing the module for owners. Calculate at least 5 indicators of compliance with pasture and sustainability of extensive silvopastoral farms, integrating them into the platform, as an aid to technicians and administrative controls.
- Development of the ARCHITECTURE of the PECUS platform by defining its requirements and functionalities for each agent (livestock farmer, forest owner, technician), establishing communication protocols and information integration, the cloud design of the PECUS platform and analysis of its commercial exploitation.
- Development of the PASTURES ALGORITHM by collecting cartography, remote data and management data, delimiting the area of interest, taking ground truth and generating remote variables in situ and combined. Training, validation and generalization of AI models for classification and quantification of grasslands based on remote, in situ and combined information.
- Development of a PASTURE VIEWER for livestock farmers for the classification, characterization, evolution and quantification of the main pastures of the Iberian System and the Central System, monitoring of the recommended livestock load to identify the best livestock management systems.
- Development of the OWNERS ALGORITHM, through a viewer with the administrative and environmental suitability of forest farms for silvopastoral use and the basic management tasks for such use, development of recommendation generation modules and integration into the platform.
- Development of FARMS INDICATORS for compliance with pastureability and sustainability for silvopastoral farms.
- Development of the CONSULTANCY MODULE, development of a viewer with indicators of compliance with pasture and sustainability of silvopastoral farms, development of modules of recommendations and notifications for technicians and integration of the module into the Communication and dissemination platform.
Spain is the European Union country with the largest area of land and the greatest diversity of extensive livestock farming systems, based on the use of pastures where the presence of trees and shrubs is common, but in recent years we have found ourselves in a scenario of uncertainty that compromises viability and generational change, accentuated by its need to adapt to climate change.
Climate change is one of the biggest threats to this activity. Extensive livestock farming, particularly sheep farming, is burdened by a series of structural problems: less and less meat is consumed, the price of livestock at the source is low, farms use archaic management practices and the opportunities of digitalisation have not been taken advantage of, circumstances that translate into the disappearance of farms due to the abandonment of their owners, the lack of generational change and new incorporations. However, extensive livestock farming constitutes a great opportunity for the production of ecosystem services and is not taking advantage of the opportunities that digitalisation can offer it.
The GO PECUS aims to generate digital tools that allow improving the economic, social and environmental sustainability of extensive livestock farming, characterizing silvopastoral ecosystems on a large scale, offering tools for monitoring management in real time to livestock farmers and contributing to the rapprochement with landowners and technicians.
Develop a digital tool to support decision-making for the promotion of extensive livestock farming by improving pastures and the resilience of farms. For livestock farmers, a digital tool to decide where and when to use pastures. For forest owners, a digital tool to decide how these pastures can be leased. For agricultural sector specialists, a digital tool that offers indicators of compliance with pasture and sustainability of silvopastoral farms.
- Coordinator name: UPA: Union of Small Farmers and Ranchers
- Postal address: C/Agustin de Betancourt, 17
- Coordinator email: upa@upa.es
- Telephone: 91 5541870
The scope of work of GO PECUS is the Iberian System and the Central System, an area of strategic interest for our country in the development and promotion of this livestock activity.
- Unión de Pequeños Agricultores y Ganaderos (UPA)
- Digitanimal S.L
- Fora Forest Technoligyes
- Asociacion Forestal de Soria
- Unión de Pequeños Agricultores y Ganaderos (UPA)
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