1. Description of the Challenge
Integrated Crop Management (ICM) aims to help farmers improve crop yield and quality by using resources such as water, fertilizers, and crop protection products more efficiently and sustainably.
At the same time, agriculture is changing rapidly. Farms are increasingly specializing in specific crops and scaling up their operations. While these developments can increase efficiency, they may also influence how easily farmers can apply ICM in practice.
This raises an important question: Do specialization and farm scaling support or hinder the adoption of ICM? And how can farmers be better supported in applying ICM within this changing agricultural landscape?
challenge
Investigate how ICM has developed over time and make future projections considering current trends in agriculture. How can ICM become more practical and accessible for farmers?
2. Expected Outcome
Your work should include:
1. Identify bottlenecks
- What challenges do farmers face when applying ICM?
- Which steps are complex or time-consuming?
- How do specialization and farm scaling influence the use of ICM?
2. Explore trends
- Is ICM adoption increasing or decreasing?
- Does this differ between different ICM practices?
- Can you outline a simple ICM timeline or development trend?
3. Develop a practical solution
Design a concept that helps farmers apply ICM more effectively.
This could be a tool, platform, advisory concept, communication strategy, or support system.
Final Deliverable
Present a clear and practical concept that:
- addresses real farmer challenges
- fits modern farming systems
- helps farmers implement ICM more successfully.