Recommendation system of assisted pollination with matching between supply and demand

• Grant number: 18/01103-1
• Support Opportunities: Research Grants - Innovative Research in Small Business - PIPE
• Start date: April 01, 2019
• End date: December 31, 2019
• Field of knowledge: Interdisciplinary Subjects
• Principal Investigator: Wilian França Costa
• Grantee: Wilian França Costa
• Company: Apiagri Desenvolvimento de Software Ltda
• CNAE: Atividades de apoio à agricultura ; Atividades de apoio à pecuária ; Portais, provedores de conteúdo e outros serviços de informação na internet
• City: Sorocaba
• Associated researchers: Antonio Mauro Saraiva ; Betina Blochtein ; Bruno de Carvalho Albertini ; Celso Barbiéri Júnior ; Charles Fernando dos Santos ; Kayna Agostini ; Murillo Fernando de Souza Jesus ; Patrícia Nunes Silva
• Associated scholarship(s): 19/14843-6 - Modeling and implementation of a location based social network: BackEnd development and design, BP.TT; 19/17190-3 - Insertion of pollinating bees and pollination efficiency in crops, BP.TT; 19/08803-1 - Insertion of pollinating bees and pollination efficiency in crops, BP.TT

Abstract

Brazil is one of the largest agricultural powers in the world. Despite this fact and considering that these crops have the dependence of 60% on pollination by animals, particularly bees, our country has not been systematically using pollination to improve our agricultural production. The recent scientific research has demonstrated that introducing strategic management of pollinators for the improvement of agricultural pollination can increase agricultural productivity (quality and quantity). This kind of management reflects in the income increase of beekeepers, mainly due to bee production increase. However, the use of these multiple and mutual benefits has not been observed in Brazil, except in some isolated cases. Two main factors can be identified as causes: (i) the lack of a structured market, which establishes the link between farmers and the beekeepers for safe contracting of this type of service, and (ii) the lack of farmers knowledge about the benefits of pollination for some crops. This proposal aims to evaluate the technical and scientific feasibility of a computational system to support the decision and commercialization of assisted agricultural pollination services. Such a system should be the link between farmers and beekeepers, enabling, disseminating and scaling up the commercialization of assisted agricultural pollination services. The result can be the generation of reciprocal benefits for farmers and beekeepers, for the environment and the increase of biodiversity conservation. With such an established system, it is feasible to establish a structured market, enabling in future phases (PIPE phases 2 and 3) to disseminate the benefits of pollination through marketing strategies, replicating the knowledge already disseminated among apple, strawberry and canola producers in the states of RS and SP. The increasing availability of internet access by the Brazilian rural population (especially by mobile telephony) makes it possible to use digital means to bring these two public closer. Based on information from the profiles provided by farmers and beekeepers, a recommendation system should be developed using Location Based Social Networking (LBSN) to: i) generate personalized recommendations to users based on matching of their profiles and; ii) apply scientific knowledge organized in databases over polygon coverage methods to generate recommendations for assisted pollination, considering geospatial, biological, environmental, economic, and legal aspects. With matching between farmers' profiles and beekeepers, recommendations should be generated in order to satisfy the offerings and demands for pollination services and bee products, according to preferences and history of activities of the users. With the success of our project, we envisage the possibility of structuring a market of assisted agricultural pollination in Brazil, based on the concepts of shared economy by allowing peer-to-peer transactions between actors in this market. (AU)