Lessons from Athens for Five Provinces: Precision Farming's Field Report Card

The technical visit to Athens on 9–12 June 2026, organised under the "Precision Farming for a Greener Tomorrow: Advocating for Sustainable Agriculture" project, offered an opportunity to see at first hand the concrete gains of precision farming in the field. Coordinated by the Green Development Association and TARIMKON, a delegation of farmers, agricultural engineers and technical staff spent three days visiting academic research centres, innovative production sites and civil society organisations, hosted by the Greek partner KEAN. The key observations from the visit showed that data-driven farming is not merely a technology choice but a measurable tool for productivity and sustainability.

Artificial intelligence: a tool, not an end in itself

At the Agricultural University of Athens, the first stop of the visit, the delegation attended a presentation given at an international conference by Dr Philipp Wree, Head of the Smart Farming Department at the Fraunhofer Institute. Dr Wree's main message was clear: in agriculture, artificial intelligence is not an end in itself but a tool that transfers the expert's eye into tireless, consistent systems. The examples presented, ranging from systems that recognise around 50 grassland species from drone images to three-dimensional imaging technology that counts ears of wheat within seconds, showed what this approach means in practice. In the university's agricultural laboratory, the delegation examined in hands-on sessions GPS-supported systems that track the entire process from sowing to harvest by coordinates, NDVI analyses that can determine plant health from satellite data before signs of disease are visible to the eye, and chlorophyll meters that reveal a leaf's nitrogen requirement within minutes.

Aiming for near-zero waste on 61 plots

The most striking part of the observations came at Agro-Farm, a modern farming enterprise. The farm runs conventional fertilisation and software-supported precision fertilisation systems side by side, which allows the two approaches to be compared directly. The software processes real-time growth data and soil analyses for the crops on 61 pilot plots and mixes the nutrients in six separate tanks according to the crop's needs at that moment; the resulting tailored prescription is delivered directly to the plant roots through a fertigation system. The results are remarkable: localised applications deliver savings of 25–35 per cent in chemical fertiliser and pesticide use, while water stress analyses using thermal drone cameras and drip irrigation automation offer water savings of up to 40 per cent compared with conventional methods. Thermal imaging can detect water stress days before visible wilting begins in the plant, which means action can be taken before any yield loss occurs.

The way forward for small farms: cooperatives

The visit also offered important lessons from Greek agriculture, which has structural conditions similar to those in Türkiye. In Greece, where rugged terrain has resulted in small and fragmented holdings, the prevailing approach is to spread precision farming technologies through cooperatives and producer organisations rather than individual farms. Meanwhile, the modelling the country has carried out in line with the European Green Deal targets points to a balanced transformation: it is estimated that wider adoption of conservation farming practices such as smart fertilisation and cover crops could reduce greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture by 4–6 per cent.

Young people and civil society are part of the equation

At KEAN, the Athens-based civil society organisation visited on the final day of the programme, the delegation examined Erasmus+ and EU-supported projects on steering young people towards agriculture and integrating the circular economy into rural areas. Ranging from game-based environmental education tools to eco-entrepreneurship training, this work showed that the social dimension of technological transformation is at least as important as the technical infrastructure.

To be transferred to the pilot sites in Türkiye

The delegation's shared assessment is that the same culture was observed in all three strands of the visit (academia, production site and civil society): decisions are based not on intuition but on measurable data. In light of the observations made during the visit, the agenda for the coming period includes applying the satellite-linked crop monitoring systems examined in Athens on a limited scale at the project's pilot sites and sharing the technical documentation with the project partners. The project activities under way in Ankara, Adana, İzmir, Sakarya and Şanlıurfa will continue, strengthened by these experiences.