New soil management software developed by a team in NUI Galway aims to use soil tests to provide a digital overview of soil fertility in Ireland.
“A huge amount of data is collected on farms and much of that is either lost or misused," company CEO Dr Eoghan Finneran said.
"For example, half a million soil tests have been taken over the past 10 years and the vast majority of those reports are buried in biscuit tins or lie forgotten in filing cabinets.”
It cuts out much of the manual data entry and human error
The software, called Farmeye, has received funding from Entreprise Ireland and has gained Department of Agriculture approval to be used as an alternative to the Teagasc system for preparation of farm nutrient management plans (NMPs).
This will allow independent agricultural consultants to use Farmeye to prepare NMPs and fertiliser plans for derogation farms, according to the Farmeye team.
“Soil management is just the first step in this process.
"We have a development plan in Farmeye to become the foremost provider of IT for monitoring and managing sustainability metrics at farm level,” company co-founder and business manager Brendan Allen said.
Dr Chaozheng Zhang, NUI Galway, and Dr Eoghan Finneran, Farmeye. \ Andrew Downes
GPS and barcode technology has also been incorporated into a Farmeye SoilMate app, which allows agricultural consultants to trace every soil test by GPS to the field of origin.
“It cuts out much of the manual data entry and human error involved in soil sampling and drawing up an NMP.
"Because we are employing various GIS map layers, including European Sentinel satellite and real-time weather data on our system, we can easily identify regions and periods of high risk for groundwater pollution,” company CTO and software engineer Joe Desbonnet explained.
The new software is available to agricultural consultants and agronomists.
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New soil management software developed by a team in NUI Galway aims to use soil tests to provide a digital overview of soil fertility in Ireland.
“A huge amount of data is collected on farms and much of that is either lost or misused," company CEO Dr Eoghan Finneran said.
"For example, half a million soil tests have been taken over the past 10 years and the vast majority of those reports are buried in biscuit tins or lie forgotten in filing cabinets.”
It cuts out much of the manual data entry and human error
The software, called Farmeye, has received funding from Entreprise Ireland and has gained Department of Agriculture approval to be used as an alternative to the Teagasc system for preparation of farm nutrient management plans (NMPs).
This will allow independent agricultural consultants to use Farmeye to prepare NMPs and fertiliser plans for derogation farms, according to the Farmeye team.
“Soil management is just the first step in this process.
"We have a development plan in Farmeye to become the foremost provider of IT for monitoring and managing sustainability metrics at farm level,” company co-founder and business manager Brendan Allen said.
Dr Chaozheng Zhang, NUI Galway, and Dr Eoghan Finneran, Farmeye. \ Andrew Downes
GPS and barcode technology has also been incorporated into a Farmeye SoilMate app, which allows agricultural consultants to trace every soil test by GPS to the field of origin.
“It cuts out much of the manual data entry and human error involved in soil sampling and drawing up an NMP.
"Because we are employing various GIS map layers, including European Sentinel satellite and real-time weather data on our system, we can easily identify regions and periods of high risk for groundwater pollution,” company CTO and software engineer Joe Desbonnet explained.
The new software is available to agricultural consultants and agronomists.
Read more
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Beef Plan Movement meets breed societies
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