Our nature is undergoing change. We can debate how we humans have an impact on this, but we have to accept that certain landscape change is simply happening. We cannot measure the impact of climate change on the soil of our farmers, but we are already smelling some, especially as we pay more and more for vegetables or dairy products in the shop. We cannot blame the farmers. They are merely reacting to how their fields are changing and what Czech and European legislation is asking them to do. It is one of the culprits of the current state of Czech agriculture. Farmers must constantly comply with the new decrees and naturally do not have time for their work. A related problem is also the significant shortage of people in the field, so we are in a situation where farmers have to meet various bureaucratic requirements and then they have no time left to work in the field themselves. As a result, physical and psychological overload. How to get out of this vicious spiral?
One of the tools to make work easier is the digitalisation of agriculture. The Czech farmer has many possibilities to modernize his fields or meadows in order to have less work with their administration and administration, but unfortunately he does not use them, so he is still lagging behind on a European scale. At present, the state is becoming interested in digitization, and even great academic projects at the Czech University of Agriculture such as "Smart Landscape" are being created, but it is important that farmers themselves consistently start digitizing and not be afraid of news that can make their work much easier, save money and, above all, time.
The Czech Republic still lacks a coherent government strategy that educates farmers sufficiently and at the same time encourages them to use digital technologies, for example, in the form of a subsidy policy. We are currently registering important regulatory measures for water retention in the landscape. Some may argue that this is not enough and the government should do more, but let us see this more as a first step by the Ministry of Agriculture and the Environment to finally give Czech farmers comprehensive and operational leadership. A smart subsidy policy could change the current situation where farmers are reliating on complex EU mechanisms, on which they are not sufficient in capacity and, at best, have to hire expensive external agencies.
Yet the situation does not look as bad as it might seem. The Czech Republic has ideal conditions for fully digitizing land intended for agriculture and could become a digital primer throughout the European Union, which would certainly help domestic farmers. And really, little is enough. To persuade farmers to give the green light to modern technologies, while continuing the state's continuous policy of providing farmers with sufficient information service and helping them with a suitably chosen subsidy policy. The necessary probes or spacehouses are already available today and the installation itself is not particularly demanding.
Jiri Musil
This would give us a flexible response to changes in the landscape. For example, a media-mediated drought in the landscape is certainly a problem, but certainly not the only one. Farmers have to deal with harvest thlims or new pests. However, if they had a better overview of their soil thanks to probes or sensors, they could take steps to prevent more damage. Likewise, modern technology can help them with bureaucracy and calculate, for example, what part of the land they need to revitalise to meet the latest requirements. After all, no one can ask a farmer to walk the subway in his field and count intricately where to break it with a draw or a continuous tree. Even such little things can save farmers time and energy, which they can then invest elsewhere. Digitising agriculture will not save nature on its own, and we will not avoid climate change anyway, but it can certainly help farmers to respond more effectively to new conditions and mitigate the effects of adverse effects. To do this, it is enough to start using the available infrastructure, which, unfortunately, they often have no idea about and do not know that a sophisticated system can perform various activities for them. We already have that, so why not use it?
Jiri Musil, CEO of Agdata