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About SWSOIP Project

The main goal of the SWSOIP Project: ‘Smart Watering System for Optimising Irrigation Process’ aims to provide ‘new’ irrigation data based on the indirect estimation of evapotranspiration using both satellite and meteorological inputs. This data can be used to inform the producers and the decision–makers for the water demand of their crops aiming to better and more rational management of irrigation water. The ‘Smart Watering System’ will automatically estimate the water demand for irrigation purposes and will release automatically the optimum water quantity for each crop-type through the ‘Smart CropWATER Valve’ without any human intervention.

SWSOIP platform consists from the frontend and backend system. The SWSOIP frontend aims to communicate with the farmers in order to collect inputs related to the farmers and their crops such as farmers’ id; crop type; cultivation date; plot area; etc and provide outputs to the farmers related to the water needs of their crops. The SWSOIP backend aims to gather and process all the data such as satellite; meteorological and in-situ (spectroradiometric; LAI; CH) based on the inputs of the farmers. Then the backend system will be able to estimate the irrigation demand for each farmer and plot and will communicate this output both with the frontend system to inform the farmer and the WISENSE Platform which will transfer this information to the CropWATER Valve to provide automatically the estimated water quantity to the crops without any human intervention.

The proposed product is expected to contribute and have an effective impact on water saving and smart management of water resources since lack of water is one of the most serious problems that Cyprus has been facing for centuries and agriculture accounts for about 69% of the total water consumption.

Partners

Prime Contractor: Cyprus University of Technology (CUT) is a public university that was founded in Limassol in 2003 and consists of six faculties. The Remote Sensing and Geo-Environment Research Laboratory (RS Lab) is part of the Department of Civil Engineering and Geomatics of CUT. The RS Lab is member of the ‘Eratosthenis Research Centre’ and member of EARSEL, ACTRIS, EARLINET. The Lab has strong links with NASA, ESA, DLR and GEO. Recently, the Lab has become as COPERNICUS Network member. The Lab’s main research goal is the advance understanding of the Earth system sciences using remote sensing methods and engineering techniques. The mission of the group is to conduct both basic and applied research towards improved understanding, management, and monitoring of natural resources and infrastructures and to offer expert services and products of excellent qualities in line with the latest development remote sensing and related geospatial technologies or other high-tech tools.

 

The RS Lab with its significant experience in the field of Earth Observation, Remote Sensing and GIS has participated in more than 55 projects funded from EC, national and industrial sources. The RS lab coordinates more than 15 projects. More specifically, it has participated in several research projects funded by Horizon 2020 (Twinning, RISE etc), FP6, FP7, INTERREG, LIFE+, MED, MARIE-CURIE (ITN), EUREKA, ERASMUS+, Cyprus Research Promotion Foundation (CRPF), etc. Its research is focused in the following thematic areas: Remote Sensing, Geographic Information Systems (GIS), Sustainability, Natural Hazards, Risk assessment, Climate change, Water Resources Management, Atmospheric sciences, Agriculture, Cultural Heritage / Archaeology, Earthquake Engineering, Geology, Urban design, Civil Engineering, Transport Planning/Modeling, Construction Innovation

Sub-Contractor 1: Agricultural Research Institute (ARI) is a Department under the Ministry of Agriculture, Rural Development and Environment, of the Republic of Cyprus. The ARI was founded in 1962, after the independence of Cyprus, in cooperation with the Special Development Fund of the United Nations and the Food and Agriculture and became the property of the Government of Cyprus in 1967.  The vision of the Agricultural Research Institute is to be a model center of knowledge and innovation, and lead Cyprus to a better future by strengthening rural development, improving the quality of life, and ensuring the sustainable use of natural resources. The Agricultural Research Institute conducts research aiming to create and transfer knowledge for the development of the primary sector and to solve problems at the farmer’s level. The research results are transferred to stakeholders through modern educational programs and dissemination tools. Its research activity strengthens rural development and contributes to the adoption of a sustainable rural policy and innovation offer.

Sub-Contractor 2: SignalGeneriX Ltd is creatively using its expertise in Digital Signal Processing and Communications to develop state-of-the-art solutions and to add value to its clients’ products and processes through the development of strong Intellectual Property. The company’s highly competent team of researchers and engineers is working closely with the clients to turn great ideas into innovative electronic products. SignalGeneriX has established a solid reputation for providing breakthrough thinking and innovative solutions and is proud that its client and collaborator network include some of the world’s top industrial players and academic institutions. SignalGeneriX is dedicated in providing its clients with state-of-the-art technology and assisting them in every step of the development of innovative electronic solutions. The company offers a complete set of services ranging from definition of requirements, system design, algorithmic design, hardware design and fabrication to prototype development, field deployment, testing and evaluation. The company’s ultra-low-powered hardware, novel smart antenna components and other DSP intellectual property products are incorporated in systems and processes for modern high-tech industries such as the Communication, Medical, Health, Security, Military and Environmental Monitoring as well as more traditional industries such as Agriculture and Farming. Results from the company’s on-going research and development have placed SignalGeneriX in such a position so as to now own a widely-based portfolio of Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) in the areas of core DSP Algorithms, Communication Networks, Wireless and Generic Applications. The company, through its dedicated technical team, continuously researches and develops innovative applications to provide groundbreaking DSP solutions to industry.Since its establishment, SignalGeneriX is actively participating in local (Cyprus) and European (EU) research calls with great success. The company has established collaborations and partnerships with major EU industrial and academic organisations in the field of DSP, electronics and communications and regularly participates in multi-million Euro research and development projects of the European Commission.