Technology now affects many production sectors. Agriculture has seen major growth in innovations and technologies in recent decades. This is why today we talk about Agriculture 4.0. In fact, viticulture was one of the first sectors to develop innovative techniques to simplify field work.
Starting with the use of GIS for positioning rows, supports, and plants, this has led to the development of technologies dedicated to all stages of vine production.
Precision viticulture immediately used satellite systems to detect vegetation conditions and plant water contents.
Decision Support Systems (DSS) were introduced for pathogen monitoring, advanced sensor technology for point detection of certain parameters, and innovative foliar analysis systems, all of which were managed remotely through connectivity and digitization of systems.
Pre-plant surveys
First and foremost, one must start with the planting. Current digital systems make it possible to analyze with very high precision the soils where we can go to plant our vineyard.
Thanks to Geographical Information Systems, it is possible to create very specific maps of our soils by integrating planimetric information with soil information such as exposure, elevation, and orography to intrinsic soil information thanks to innovative analytical systems that allow punctual and systematic soil analysis.
In addition, with GIS it is possible to simply draw the positioning of our rows.
Management software
For field and winery work, management software is essential. They allow us to have in one program all the information related to our vineyard, summarized as a digital field notebook enriched with information and data recorded by sensors and weather stations, for example, arranged in the field.
This simplicity of recording and reading data allows for a reduction in work thanks also to remote management.
The tech tools
We can say that agricultural tools are not what they used to be. Today, many tools are operated from digital platforms remotely. In fact, today’s tools feature geolocation and automated guidance systems that manage to simplify all field operations. Drones, robots, and advanced sensor technology are used to collect data in the field that are then sent to the main software, where, guided by teams of 4.0 agronomists and through automated systems, they are processed and analyzed.
Speaking of fertilization, for example, some systems involve the use of images from a drone or satellite, remote sensing, or with optical (sensor) systems in the field, proximal sensing. These images are sent precisely to software that processes the data and creates prescription maps, i.e., maps where areas with nutritional problems are indicated and the interventions to be performed, often with preset doses of fertilizer already in place. Variable-rate fertilization is thus performed: thus associating specific areas of the field with the most suitable doses of fertilizer.
Winery
Precision viticulture systems are also used in the winery.
More specifically, there are remote control systems that make it possible, for example, to monitor wine storage temperatures, temperature, and humidity in the barrique cellar, and to follow individual processes such as micro-oxygenation.
But the real revolution is the ability to intervene remotely; in fact, many 4.0 systems aim to minimize human intervention, thus improving management and thus product quality. As far as winemaking is concerned, corrections can be made by telling interconnected systems to set certain interventions such as correcting temperature or humidity in the barrique cellar.
Obviously, direct contact with the wine remains of utmost importance; these systems are not intended to completely replace the winemaker, but to help him in the decision-making process.
Labels and traceability
Product marketing has also seen digitization; indeed, in the Agri 4.0 world, traceability is one of the most developed areas and one of the most adopted solutions by companies.
First of all, there are now automatic labeling systems that extremely speed up this phase. But the real innovation lies in product traceability. In fact, thanks to the affixing of a QR Code, or an NFC tag, on the label it is possible to trace back a series of information about the wine.
This is very useful in reducing fraud and giving more value to one’s product, making the consumer feel closer to the producer.
