Non-chemical autonomous weed control, crop thinning and digital phenotyping

Within Rijk Zwaan we want to reduce the use of synthetic plant protection products. To reduce the use of herbicides we are searching for non-chemical alternatives. In addition, labour availability is one of our main challenges. For this reason, alternatives for weed control are preferably autonomous operating machinery.

Another challenges is thinning of directly sown vegetables in the open field (e.g. spinach and leek). A dot on our horizon is to have a machine operating for weeding and simultaneously crop thinning.

For breeding purposes we are working on digital phenotyping. It would be great if we make use of autonomous machinery for weeding in combination we in-situ digital phenotyping.