Seven years ago, when the common citizen was still unaware of the impact of Artificial Intelligence on their daily lives, an innovative initiative called Nax Solutions won the Impulso award from the University of Alicante. It offered a “precision agriculture” service to the agricultural sector, making available to the user a system to monitor, through an application, the evolution and status of crops.
Yesterday, one of the founders of the Alicante company, Beatriz Sanchís, explained to three hundred farmers from the province summoned by Asaja, concerned about the uncertain future of their farms, how it is possible to increase agricultural profitability through the use of Artificial Intelligence.
“We tell the producer where to water, how much to water, which areas need more fertilizer or where there could be a problem with some type of pest or disease,” explained the CFO of Nax, the firm she created with Aaron and Caleb. De Bernardis and serves farmers in 16 countries, many of them in Latin America.
And the low profitability, together with the drought and the lack of generational change, constitutes the core of the problems that threaten the Alicante countryside, as stated by the president of ASAJA Alicante and convener of the day, José Vicente Andreu.
“If the countryside is not profitable,” Andreu assured, “there will be a decline in agricultural and livestock activity and in the end, indirectly and silently, what is known as the revenge of the countryside will occur: we will pay the consequences and lose food sovereignty. ”
The City of Light hosted the second edition of the ASAJA Young Woman Conference. A panel of experts discussed the most fashionable issues, such as the bureaucratic obstacles of the European Union, out-of-control imports that do not meet the same requirements or the consequences of the drought, but they also analyzed innovative experiences that are already being applied, such as the one proposed by Nax Solutions that allows you to optimize irrigation, the use of fertilizers or the fight against pests through the use of high-resolution satellite images and advanced data processing.
Regarding the lack of generational change, Andreu stressed that “agrarian associations have the duty to promote the incorporation of young people and women into the sector, we must inform and encourage training to support the transition of the traditional farmer into an agricultural entrepreneur, that is, in a professional who not only knows the field but also knows how and where they are going to market their products, optimizing each of the processes.”
The national president of ASAJA, Pedro Barato, participated in the round table; the regional secretary of Agriculture, Livestock and Fisheries, Javier Bartolomé and the president of ASAJA Joven of Alicante, Hugo Quintanilla. The debate on youth and agriculture left conclusions on the table such as that success lies in seeking new market spaces instead of competing in existing markets that are already saturated, through the differentiation of the products offered. The regional secretary declared that for the Department of Agriculture “the priority is that farmers have a decent salary.”
In the presence of the president of the Provincial Council, Toni Pérez, and the president of the Generalitat, Carlos Mazón, who closed the day, Asaja presented his main demands: to increase the budget and the amounts of aid, since the current ones are insufficient to obtain a profitable agricultural exploitation; reduce the bureaucratic burden and eliminate scales, that is, all application files should be attended to with a sufficient budget and without scales: “whoever meets the aid requirements should not also need to meet a series of points,” they say.