Composition of phytopathogens – causal agents of “black point” was studied in 2018-2019. Investigations were carried out at Institute of Plant Protection of National Academy of Agrarian Sciences of Ukraine. Seed samples were taken from different locations in Forest-Steppe and Forest zones of Ukraine.

The results obtained showed that fungi from genus Alternaria Nees dominated in the pathogen complex. They were isolated from 76.5-83.1% of seeds from Forest-Steppe of Ukraine. Less often they were found in samples from Forest zone (59.0-69.4%). Alternaria tenuissima та Alternaria infectoria were isolated in the almost equal proportion.

Also seeds with “black point” were colonized by fungi from genera Fusarium Link, Curvularia Boed, Bipolaris Shoem., Aspergillus P.Micheli, Nigrospora Zimm., Cladosporium Link, Аcremoniella Sacc., Stemphillium Walr., Sordaria Ces. & De Not, Epicoccum Link, Aureobasidium Viala at Boy. It should be noted that causal agent of nigrospora dry rot of maize Nigrospora oryzae (Berk & Broom) Petch was isolated from nearly 6% of seeds from Forest zone. Also saprophitic fungi Stemphillium spp. and Sordaria spp. were found.

The majority of isolated fungi produce mycotoxins which are harmful for people and animals. Thus, monitoring of species composition of pathogens on wheat seeds, in particular causal agents of “black point”, is essential for obtaining a high quality wheat grain.

The fast development of world population in the past few decades has forced the agricultural sector to increase crop productivity to satisfy the needs of billions of people, especially in developing countries. This situation creates serious challenges such as producing enough food for the world’s increasing population. This situation requires the use of new technologies in the crop fertilization. The increasing production efficiency, the requirements of food safety and environmental protection should be provided. Nanotechnology offers potential solution. Nanofertilizers may be the solution for improving the efficiency and safety of fertilization.

The aim of this study is to develop a new method of soil fertilization with the use of nano zinc oxide (nano-ZnO). The main assumption of this research is the examination and comparison of the influence of certain concentration of nano-ZnO (50mg/L, 150mg/L, 250mg/L) on seedling and growth of tomatoes. Firstly, the parameters crucial for the process of seedling were examined after conducting the research on the influence of nano-ZnO (nanoparticles <100nm and <50nm) on different tomatoes cultivars. Moreover, the other parameter that will be taken under the consideration is the improvement of plants ability of macroelements assimilation from conventional bulks fertilizers. The solutions of nanoparticles were applied into the soil or by foliar spraying. Additionally, the parameters such as antioxidant activity, the content of sugars and allergens in tomato fruits will be tested. Preliminary observation indicates that solutions of nano-ZnO have significant influence on tomato germination and growth.

Tomato (Solanum lycopersicum) is an important crop and is consumed worldwide. This vegetable is an excellent source of natural compounds (i.e antioxidants including vitamins C and E, lycopene, b-carotene, lutein and flavonoids) and minerals useful for human health. Several studies have shown the correlation between tomato consumption and the prevention of some types of cancer and chronic cardiovascular diseases. In this study, the improvement of nutritional value of tomato, by using beneficial microorganisms, including selected strains of Streptomyces, Bacillus and Trichoderma, has been investigated. These microbes were applied on tomato plants in a field trial either as single inoculants or as microbial consortia. After the treatments, plants were subjected to a metabolomic analysis by LC-MS qTOF and led to the identification of sixteen metabolites, including tomatine and its derivatives, solafloridine, apo-13-zeaxanthinone, deoxy phytoprostane and L-phenylalanine. Results showed a significant difference in relative abundance of these metabolites among treatments. Bacillus application, alone or in combination with T22, induced the production of tomatine, while Trichoderma alone or in combination with Streptomyces or Bacillus and combination between Streptomyces and Bacillus, induced the production of solafloridine. The combination of Streptomyces and Trichoderma increased the accumulation of solafloridine, apo-13-zeaxanthinone, deoxy phytoprostane and L-phenylalanine, compared with the single treatments. In conclusion, field applications of Streptomyces, Bacillus and Trichoderma significantly induced metabolic profile change of tomato and the accumulation of metabolites with nutraceutical value.

The growth and productivity of plants mainly depend on the available nutrients and its uptake by plant roots. Bio-stimulants could amend plant’s physiological processes to improve the nutrient absorption and optimize its consumption. Research on the potential new sources of plant bio-stimulants to increase crop yield and quality despite of environmental stresses has gained wide attention recently. This research is aimed to explore natural and organic sources of plant bio-stimulants such as moringa leaves extract (MLE) and endophytic bacteria isolated from moringa roots to promote seed germination and seedling growth of chili. Various extraction methods using methanol, ethanol and distilled water were compared to select the best extraction method of active components in moringa leaves that could enhance chili growth along with phytochemical properties such as polyphenols, flavonoids and antioxidants that could help to alleviate abiotic stresses. Pre-screened endophytic bacteria with plant growth promoting traits were also tested for its ability to increase the growth of chili seedlings. The effects of moringa leaves extract and endophytic bacteria as a bio-stimulant on chili were determined using analyses such as nutrient content, chlorophyll content, root length, leaf area, root biomass and aboveground biomass of the seedlings. Plant bio-stimulants that boosts nutrient absorption and nutrient use efficiency could also help to reduce the wastage of mineral fertilizers. Hence, organic plant bio-stimulant plays a vital role in the advancement of safe and sustainable crop cultivation.

Weather monitoring is essential for implementing sustainable agricultural practices. It can be used as an input in various tasks such as crop simulation and yield forecasting to name a few. Currently, weather data can be collected with high temporal resolution thanks to advances in technologies such as remote sensing and the Internet of Things (IoT) that enable low-cost and simple design and deployment of real-time weather data sensors. This data is not useful in its raw form. And generating it, without having the proper infrastructure and tools to process it, makes no sense. To this end, we developed a smart weather data management system powered by state-of-the-art machine learning and deep learning models, that offers several ways to derive actionable insights from this data. This cloud-based system consists of three layers: the data acquisition layer, the data storage layer, and the application layer. The data can be sourced from real-time IoT sensors, third-party services, or manually imported from files. It is then checked for errors such as temporal resolution correction and missing values before being stored using the MongoDB NoSQL database, known for its ability to deal with large quantities of complex and diverse real-world big data. The system provides several services related to weather data: i) forecast univariate time series ii) perform advanced analysis and visualization and study different relationships between meteorological data iii) use machine learning to estimate and model important climatic parameters and vi) scheduling early alert warnings by sending SMS or emails as an automatic trigger event. This system was first tested using data from meteorological stations from 2013 to 2020, collected in our study area, located 40 km east of Marrakech city in Morocco.

Recently, the EU Commission promoted the opening and reusing of administrative data managed within the Integrated Administration and Control Systems (IACS) from European paying agencies as useful tool for monitoring Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) performances (Directive (EU) 2019/1024). In this scenario, the Open IACS project aims to process these data to compute statistical indicators for agri-environmental analysis, assess the CAP performances and support farmer activities and decision making.

This work shows processing and harmonization steps required to generate statistical data and geographical layers of the Utilized Agricultural Area (UAA) and share of UAA by land use types in Italy. The latter are defined as context indicators within the EU framework for assessing CAP performances and are generally computed with statistical surveys from Eurostat. We used the Land Parcel Information System (LPIS) dataset from the Italian Paying Agency (AGEA) consisting of homogeneous land use/cover areas of Italian territory digitized from ortho-imagery with high spatial resolution and with a full update every three years. In particular, LPIS provides detailed information about spatial location, identification and quantification of agricultural, natural and artificial land. It represents a huge step forward land use studies capable of making in-depth analyses from national to municipality scale, even to the agricultural parcel. Moreover, the availability of land use maps with a high spatial resolution of crops types meets the need to guarantee a more accurate view about the complexity of landscapes useful to carry out different agri-environmental analyses (crop production, eco-hydrological modelling, soil consumption, surface runoff, etc.). Lastly, the results of indicators can be compared to agricultural statistical survey of National Institutes and greatly improving European current land data with lower spatial-temporal resolution and oversimplification of land use classes (e.g. Corine Land Cover – CLC).

Wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) is one of the most important raw material for food industry. Since the wheat market is more and more demanding in all aspects related to quality, improvement of wheat grain quality without decreasing the production level represents a constant objective for breeders. Because bread-baking quality parameters of wheat flours are of great importance for processors, these were targeted in this research, Romanian wheat varieties being tested using near infrared reflectance spectroscopy (NIRS) as a convenient, fast, robust, easy to use, precise and environmentally-friendly technique. During the last decades, NIRS is more and more used in food industry for characterizing the quality of raw materials and food products. The main objective of this research was to test several commercial Romanian wheat genotypes in order to find both the bread-baking quality attributes and the best candidates for developing new varieties in breeding programs. Wheat grains originating from the Research & Development Station for Agriculture Turda were analyzed using a Tango spectrometer (Bruker, Germany), calibrated to provide data for intact grains on moisture, proteins, ash, gluten, Zeleny sedimentation value, as well as rheological parameters (tenacity, extensibility and deformation energy). Data were further subjected to principal component analysis, which was accomplished using Matlab (MathWorks Inc., USA), reveling both the genotypes with the best quality attributes and similarities between the studied ones. This non-destructive approach provides a faster alternative for obtaining relevant data, comparing with classic methods, a more convenient tool for farmers and processors to assess the quality of their products, being especially advantageous for breeders since the analyzed seeds can be used further.

Rice (Oryza sativa L.) is the most consumed food crop around the globe. Bacterial blight caused by Xanthomonas oryzae pv oryzae (Xoo) is the most destructive bacterial disease in rice. The cross CB 87 R × (CB 87 R × IRBB 60) was screened for three bacterial blight resistance genes Xa21, xa13 and xa5 with the help of molecular markers. This study revealed 15 individuals found to have resistance genes with different combinations. Furthermore, three individuals had all three genes in heterozygous conditions which was further surveyed for restoration of the fertility gene. The identified heterozygous plants with Rf gene were considered as an important criterion in the high yielding background individuals tagged and selfed and backcrossed with the recurrent parent to attain homozygosity. Once, these individuals stabilized, they could be used as genetic stocks for disease resistance breeding program in rice.

The objective of this study was to compare the effects of biochar and straw applications on rice yield and soil fertility during a three-year period. The three treatment conditions were: BC (barley straw biochar 2,000 kg ha^-1), BS (barley straw 2,000 kg ha^-1), and BC+BS (barley straw biochar 1,000 kg ha^-1 + barley straw 1,000 kg ha^-1, respectively). Each treatment area was separated by an untreated control (CN) area. During the study, rice yields for CN, BC, BS, and BC+BS treatments ranged on average from 473 to 515, 497 to 532, 516 to 528, and 583 to 602 g m^-2, respectively. Among the treatments, the BC+BS treatment produced the highest average rice yield and the BC+BS rice yield was stable during the three-year study. The soil changes after the final rice harvesting were different in the BC and BS application areas. Soil bulk density and pH were improved in all treatments except the CN treatment when compared to those of raw soil. The SOC and TN content after BC application increased by 0.56 and 0.08 g kg^-1, respectively, compared to those of the CN soil, while those after BS and BC+BS application increased by 0.89-1.36 and 0.16-0.3 g kg^-1, respectively. The soil CEC values after BC, BS, and BC+BS treatment were 0.55, 0.37, and 0.49 cmol_c kg^-1 higher than those in the CN, respectively. Therefore, such an approach can reduce the application of inorganic fertilizer, thereby encouraging the development of sustainable organic agriculture.

Consumers are increasingly demanding transparency in food labelling as they want more and better information about what they are eating and where their food comes from. Several food indexes have been developed in the last decades to promote healthy eating with the aim to reduce certain diseases such as obesity, cancer, diabetes. The Mediterranean diet is known to be one of the healthiest dietary patterns and it is associated with a lower incidence of mortality from all-causes, and it is also related to lower incidence of cardiovascular diseases, type 2 diabetes, certain types of cancer, and neurodegenerative diseases, but a comprehensive index that quantifies the Mediteraneaness of foods is still missing. The real European challenge is to identify a uniform labelling system for the whole of Europe which promotes a healthy lifestyle. This article describes the development of the Mediterranean Index (MI), which aims to accurately measure the degree of food Mediterraneaness. The MI simultaneously integrates nutritional and sustainability characteristics of foods. The MI may provide an objective basis for the use of the “Mediterraneaness” label on food products, which can ultimately to promote adherence to the Mediterranean diet encouraging producers to make healthier and more sustainable food products. Growing consumer concern to-ward health foods for better health can be a factor useful to promote the applicability of the precision nutrition principles by means conscious choice.