The Swedish Board of Agriculture has granted project funding
Cercospora is a leaf fungal disease that causes major yield losses in sugar beet cultivation around the world. In Sweden, the disease has so far been relatively limited, but in leaf disease monitoring in recent years we have seen an increase in symptoms and that the first spots appear slightly earlier.
We wish to work proactively to find solutions that can effectively control the disease when it becomes a more concrete problem.
Within the granted project funding, we will:
The results of this project will enable us to reliably test the tolerance of varieties to the fungus as well as evaluate the efficacy of different products.
Future plant protection methods.
In 2024, NBR carried out two sub-projects within the project “Reduced amounts of plant protection products through greater precision”, which was co-financed by the Swedish Board of Agriculture and the European Union.
One part included a test of spot treatment using a Farmdroid robot, which both sows and controls weeds in sugar beet—primarily mechanically, but also chemically with high precision around each beet. This effort saves approximately 90% of the amount of herbicides compared with conventional broadcast spraying.
In addition, a field day was held in early June with approximately 200 participants, focusing on increased precision and ensured effect within spraying technology.
Among other things, the spot-treatment technique on the Farmdroid, band spraying with conventional field sprayers, and trials on optimal spraying technique for weed control in sugar beet were demonstrated.
