Grant: Industrial Research Chairs for Colleges Grants

Ontario is the leading corn producer in Canada; with 28,000 grain farmers generating $2.5 billion in farm-gatereceipts and more than $9 billion in economic output, providing more than 40,000 jobs in the province.Ontario is also the Canadian leader of grape and wine production, providing 14,000 jobs and approximately$3.3 billion in economic impact; there are over 500 grape growers in Ontario, growing over 53,252 tons ofgrapes. Hazelnuts are a new crop to Ontario, but promise to be a lucrative one, bringing up to $2,800 per acrefor mature trees. The Ferrero plant in Brantford consumes 10,000 tons of shelled hazelnuts per year; atapproximately 1 ton per acre of production, a goal for Ontario would be to plant 10,000 to 30,000 acres.Dr. Mike Duncan is the NSERC Industrial Research Chair for Colleges (IRCC) in Precision Agriculture &Environmental Technologies. Precision Agriculture involves using data gathered through sensors to informdecisions on a farm to maximize profitability and environmental stewardship. Knowing early when adangerous frost threatens grapes and deploying mitigating measures can save a valuable crop; detecting where ablight could develop ahead of time will stop its propagation; managing how fertilizer is spread in a field savesmoney and reduces run-offs into the waterways. These are all ways in which precision agriculture helps farmsbecome more profitable, more competitive, and more environmentally responsible.This proposal seeks to renew for another 5 years Dr. Duncan's NSERC IRCC funding. As in previous years,the focus of the Chair's research will remain on Cash Crops (corn, wheat, soy), Vineyards (grapes), and TreeCrops (Hazelnuts), with a view to push much farther the use of precision agriculture for each of these sectors.Technologically, the research will center on the development of remote static (micrometeorology tower) andkinetic (ground rovers, unmanned aerial vehicles) measurement tools gathering field data and transmitting itthrough the internet to a cloud-based server with decision-support tools.