WINETECH: Using Spatial Data Infrastructure to deal with climate change in Douro Valley
Adaptation to climate change is a major challenge facing the viticulture sector. Each wine growing region consists of unique contexts (terroirs) and knowledge.
Understanding the contextual factors and their interaction with the regional climate is essential to identify and prioritize adaptation initiatives at temporal and spatial scales.The quality and timeliness of the available information is an essential factor that determines the quality of the decisions taken and, consequently, the quality of the economic results.
The quality and timeliness of the available information is an essential factor that determines the quality of the decisions taken and, consequently, the quality of the economic results.
INESCTEC is a private non-profit research institution that hosts over 700 integrated researchers (about 350 PhDs). In partnership with a private company, GEODOURO, they developed an idea to a collaborative R&D project for a Spatial Data Infrastructure that could deal with climate change in Wine Industry at Douro Valley.
Our experience in designing consortium R&D projects suitable for receiving European funds through the national consortium R&D project program has been an important trigger to this idea. Thus, we developed a consortium R&D project, called INFRAVINI, and were able to achieve its funding. Two other partners strengthened the consortium: ADVID, the Association for the Development of Viticulture in the Douro Demarcated Region and UTAD, the University of Trás-os-Montes and Alto Douro, allowing to respond to industry demand for an efficient response to climate change.
This project will create a decision support platform (INFRAVINI) which will include climatic and agronomic indicators, allowing winegrowers to benefit from the cross-referencing and normalization of local sensory and forecast climate information collected in the “INFRAVINI Observatory”. This observatory will have as its main function to monitor both the impact of meteorological variability and the impact of climate change on certain spatially and temporally referenced territories. The development of the INFRAVINI solution contemplates the use and adaptation of a Spatial Data Infrastructure, allowing to gather thematic information from several sources, in an interoperable way, contributing to the creation of a standardized repository of geographic information.
The main objective of INFRAVINI is to make European wine-growing industries resilient to climate change, minimizing costs and risks by improving production management and monitorization (quality and quantity of the final product), while evaluating their replication to other agricultural sectors of high added value.
Client: Consortium Infravini with a Research Institute, a University, a Company and Wine Producers Association
Industry: Wine, Climate Change
