About the Project
IT for interconnection of social, economic and environmental aspects in agribusiness
Project: Erasmus+
KA220-ADU
Duration: since 01-01-2022 till 30 01-07-2024
There is a common agreement among the agricultural society that feeding an extra two billion people by 2050 will require solutions relying heavily on innovative use of information and communication technologies (ICT). A commonly used term for the use of technological advances in the agriculture is “Agriculture 4.0” – sometimes considered to be the fourth agricultural revolution.
The European Commission’s Digital Transformation Monitor (EC-DTM) concludes that ´Agriculture 4.0´ represents a process that will have a revolutionary effect on all of agriculture and even the global economy.
Similar terms often used for this concept of ´Agriculture 4.0´ are ‘Smart Agriculture’, ‘Digital Farming’ or ´Digital Agriculture´, ICT4AG, ´Precision Agriculture´, ´Smart Farming´. Agriculture 4.0 is one of the lines of action set out in the Declaration and Action Plan of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS). Implementation of Smart ICT technologies is basically the way to strengthen the green economy: the low carbon industry, renewable energy resources, climate changes and handling the wastewater. Project “Future IT for farms” (ITFARM) promotes the idea that the Fourth Industrial Revolution has the power to change things across a broad spectrum of the society and schools and other executives need to be ready.
The old way of doing things is not enough anymore, and (for both young and adult) will be the first embracing all facets of ´Industry 4.0´ and all the opportunities it will bring. Providing education for family farm entrepreneurship based on integrated digitization of business production processes following challenges of the ´Agriculture 4.0´ revolution is an opportunity of a great benefit. These are opportunities addressing the goal of the ITFARM project:
Based on the survey, ITFARM will develop study materials and provide courses, tailor-made for family farms owners, managers and employees, to involve the newest ICT technologies and the concepts into daily farm practices. The study portfolio will consist of curriculum and pedagogical guide, syllabi, study modules developed in the form of study units, study supports and tool kits, cases, exercises, hand-outs. ITFARM will speak the language of farmers, SMEs and is user-friendly for them.
Support of VET teachers focused to education of future employees and owners of family farms and to seeking talents. The project will strengthen the green components in existing VET education programs. Information for decision makers and other relevant stakeholders, who will participate directly and indirectly in the transformation of the production process of the family farms. The project’s aim is also to harmonize the needs of all involved targets and bring effective solutions that can help them to be more prepared and open to each other.
The project results will be available and accessible for free on the e-learning portal Moodle and the project websites where will be possible to either to use them online and/or download. All developed study materials and courses will be fully available VET teachers and interested bodies. Support of VET teachers will be focused to education of future employees and owners of family farms and to seeking talents. In addition to economic effects, the implications of ´Agriculture 4.0´ can be much further impacting social and environmental issues in the farming industry, life in regions and in the society in general.