| Arable
Airbus Defence and
Space launches “One
Tasking”, a new Satellite
Tasking Service for the
agriculture industry
Airbus Defence and Space launched its latest
development in satellite imagery acquisition and
distribution, One Tasking.
epresenting a
major step
change, One
Tasking offers
customers
working in
agriculture the most intuitive and
cost-effective way to rapidly task
an Airbus Defence and Space
satellite – all from the comfort of
their own desk or when out in the
field.
The new One Tasking service
provides 24/7/365 access to
Airbus Defence and Space’s highresolution and wide-swath satellite
sensors. A team of dedicated inhouse experts ensures that any
requested area is captured on time
and in line with the customer’s
requirements.
R
“We wanted to create a product
which was unlike anything
already on the market and truly
focused on the agriculture
industry and its specific needs.
To achieve this we asked our
customers to challenge us”
30 years ago, Airbus Defence
and Space was the first to offer
bespoke satellite tasking services
– helping to support a variety of
unique agriculture-related
challenges ranging from
monitoring growth and optimising
water, fertiliser and pesticide
usage to forecasting crop yield
and assessing the impact of a
natural disaster. Today, with One
Tasking, Airbus Defence and
Space is resetting the bar once
again, with a capability to only
deliver the very best results. This
commitment to customer centric
flexibility goes far beyond the
current “best effort” approach,
where cloud cover and other
environmental factors can too
often reduce the extractable value
from the resulting imagery.
“We wanted to create a product
which was unlike anything already
www.farmingmonthly.co.uk
on the market and truly focused
on the agriculture industry and its
specific needs. To achieve this we
asked our customers to challenge
us. The result was a clear desire to
eliminate some of the risk and
simplify the longwinded orderingprocess clients associated with
tasking satellites,” said Be rnhard
Brenner, Head of Intelligence
Business Cluster at Airbus
Defence and Space. “With One
Tasking, those objectives have
been met and in many areas
exceeded, especially with our
commitment to only deliver the
very best results, which we believe
is a real game changer.”
A variety of tailored One Tasking
solutions are also available to
meet specific industry needs and
requirements:
• OneDay: Risk-free imagery
acquisition for a specific day.
Weather forecast will be sent 24
hours before the acquisition date,
enabling customers to confirm,
postpone or even cancel a tasking
request, at no cost.
• OneNow: Immediate and
useful imagery in an instant.
Satellites are tasked to deliver
valuable insights in the shortest
possible timeframe.
• OnePlan: Qualified coverage
within an agreed timeframe.
The qualified coverage is
agreed and delivered according to
customer selected timeframes and
dates to meet specific project
milestones.
• OneSeries: Repeated
coverage.
Imagery is acquired and
delivered on a regular basis to
monitor long-term changes or
highly dynamic situations.
OSR area down and
spring barley area up,
according to AHDB
planting survey
The 2016 AHDB Planting and Variety survey shows an
increase in the area for harvest of oats and spring barley
in Great Britain.
O
ilseed rape (OSR)
in England and
Scotland has seen
a 9% decline.
Winter barley and
wheat areas have
also declined.
The survey shows a 6%
increase in the area of spring
barley for harvest 2016 in Great
Britain. In terms of the total cereals
and oilseeds area, this increase is
more than offset by the sharp
decline in OSR area for a second
year running, plus slightly lower
winter barley and wheat areas. The
English OSR area has dropped by
8% to the lowest level since 2009,
the Scottish area is also sharply
lower, down 13%.
Isobel Robinson, AHDB Market
Analyst said: “Spring barley looks
to have benefitted from a common
trend across the country towards
spring cropping, likely influenced
by economic factors and efforts to
control black-grass and broader
agronomic issues. The prospect of
historically poor market returns at
planting was likely a key factor
behind the lower oilseed rape
area.”
Key findings of the survey are:
• GB wheat area down 2%, at
1.8Mha
• GB winter barley down 2%, at
426Kha
• GB spring barley area up 6%,
at 682Kha
• GB oat area up 4%, at 135Kha
• English and Scottish OSR
area down by 9%, at 591Kha
August 2016 | Farming Monthly | 13