UC5/US4 Access soil data on agricultural land

[pvgenuchten]

As a:

• agro-supply actor
• processor or trader of agricultural commodities
• business intermediary bringing together suppliers and buyers of ecosystem services

I want to find & access soil data on predicted soil property distribution (soil health, soil fertility) in grid format (max 100m grid cell) clustered to 5 year periods, with for each grid cell an estimate of its uncertainty

So:

• to develop/produce new products and services for the landowner/land manager or farmer;
• to develop/produce sustainable and healthy food products for the consumer;
• to distribute them (wholesale and retail channels) in a sustainable way;
• to offer ecosystem services to potential buyers (consumers, (impact) investors, public authorities, etc).

Extended user story

1. As agro-supply actor I currently collect all soil information through my clients (landowner, land manager or farmer), but to accelerate my developments of products and services, I need access to a wider database of data, obviously respecting ownership and privacy. As a supplier to the farming-business I would greatly benefit from being able to retrieve soil data quickly and user-friendly.
2. As processor, trader I currently collect all soil information through my landowner, land manager or farmer and/or my commodity wholesaler. The parcel sheet is often used, but it is usually incomplete. Moreover, I am also interested to benchmark individual results, as it drives my requirements to the agricultural commodities purchased. As a buyer of the output or as an investor in the farming business I would greatly benefit from being able to retrieve soil data quickly and user-friendly.
3. As retailer, I currently collect all soil information through my processors and wholesalers (and sometimes through some individual landowners, land managers or farmers) as it drives my strive for sustainable, healthy food products while reducing my scope 3 emissions. As a retailer I would greatly benefit from being able to retrieve soil data quickly and user-friendly in order to check/verify/analyse PEF (product sheet) calculations.
4. As business intermediary, the collection and analysis of data often is a barrier to develop a market for ecosystem services.

Acceptance criteria

• [ ] metadata of predicted soil property distribution products should include scale, spatial & temporal extent, usage constraints (max CC-BY), indication of availability of uncertainty, provenance

[DajanaSnopkova]

Comment from meeting on 4th March:

• we should focus on the data intermediary perspective and in this sense, this US is similar to UC05-US05.

• demonstrability: Belgian company dealing with frozen vegetables and fruits (ARDO) ?

• [ ] Request to Eva, Isidora and other intermediaries providing data services to farmers: ask your data team on their experiences with finding/purchasing/downloading soil data from external sources. Which aspects could be improved (findability, accessibility, interoperability, reusability) and how could Soilwise/EUSO play a role.

• [ ] Request to Eva and Isidora: draft a user story on intermediaries advertising their data services via the Soilwise platform