Paris (AFP)

While the French farmers are struggling, once again, with a terrible drought, the satellites come to their bedside: the Cnes and INRA signed on Monday a convention that strengthens their cooperation, especially to adapt agriculture to change climate.

"Jean-Yves Le Gall, President of Cnes and Philippe Mauguin, President and CEO of INRA, have signed a framework convention for cooperation on the definition and use of space systems in the fields of agriculture and the environment, "the two organizations announced in a joint statement.

"To know better, to better anticipate the effect of climatic disturbances, water stress on the vegetation in particular, on soils too, since we have very strong stakes, especially on carbon sequestration in agricultural and forest soils, for improve, accelerate our research, we need space technologies and we need aerial images, satellite images, "said Philippe Mauguin, in an interview with AFP.

Harvest forecasts, effects of climate change on agrosystems, precision agriculture, but also thematic related to the environment, Jean-Yves Le Gall has put the fields of common research in perspective: "Our researchers will work hand in hand with those of INRA to provide answers to all these questions, "he said.

"There is a long-standing cooperation between INRA and Cnes.The use of satellite images for the observation of the land, vegetation, agriculture, forests, has already developed since number of years, "said Mauguin.

"What we wanted, with Jean-Yves Le Gall, meeting last October, is to amplify and accelerate the cooperation between CNES and INRA, and for reasons that seem a little obvious today, with the increase in drought episodes, but that we had obviously anticipated, "he continued.

This framework agreement plans to intensify cooperation on all that is soil mapping, water management for agriculture, in order to "better anticipate the effect of water stress on the level of rivers, rivers further upstream, to be able to have an even more effective and more reasoned management of the water resource ", according to Mr. Mauguin.

- Tools for farmers -

It recalls that INRA will merge in early 2020 with Irstea (National Institute for Research in Science and Technology for the Environment and Agriculture), leading the way in research on the environment and water, to give birth to INRAE, "which will have an even stronger competence in the field of water".

The easier availability of spatial data, thanks in particular to algorithms that facilitate their exploitation, is one of the factors that favors this enhanced cooperation.

It will allow to "evaluate the quality of soils, the way in which the crops evolve, all that relates to the humidity of the grounds, the evolution of the vegetation and in fine, to facilitate the life of the farmers" and to allow them to "better guard against the consequences of climate change", according to the boss of CNES.

"These data, they are finally much easier to use, so people can use it without difficulty," said Le Gall, which refers to "tools for farmers."

INRA researchers will also take part in the design of space missions and the calibration of satellites, according to their president.

Among the many fields of use of satellites, the possibility of "appreciate the organic matter of soils", their clay character and therefore the "carbon storage potential in soils", according to Mr. Mauguin, thanks to ultra sensors -specific.

INRA researchers consider that the surface of the planet that will be affected by a strong water stress could reach 70% in 2050, against today less than 50%.

Surfaces affected by extreme drought could be multiplied by ten during this century.

"What has been and is still considered exceptional weather events, will become more and more recurrent events in Europe and in the world," added the boss of INRA.

This work primarily concerns French farmers, "but we are also working on a global scale," he concluded.

© 2019 AFP