The Challenge: Invasive Weeds & Volunteer Potatoes

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Sugar beet crops are especially affected by herbicide-resistant weeds, and even more by volunteer potatoes. These unwanted plants grow from leftover tubers and cause several problems: they host pests and diseases, reduce yield and quality, and disrupt crop rotation, not just for the current season but for future ones too.

Traditional solutions are often incomplete or too expensive. Manual weeding is hard work, while broadcast spraying uses more chemicals, puts stress on the crop, and speeds up herbicide resistance.

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The Solution: Targeted AI-Driven Precision

Ecorobotix’s ARA sprayer uses plant-by-plant AI technology to detect and spray individual weeds, including volunteer potatoes, with centimeter-level accuracy. Every plant is analyzed. Every action is optimized.

-Adapts to various emergence stages, even staggered ones

-Up to 95% less herbicide use

-Safeguards sugar beet yield and health

- Controls volunteer potatoes efficiently with reduced impact on the crop

The Challenge: Delicate Crops, Persistent Threats

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Crops do not compete well with weeds. But worse, volunteer potatoes, resprouting from missed tubers, pose a silent but costly threat.

These plants:

- Increase chemical use and compromise sustainable practices

- Slow down harvest operations and disrupt onion bulb development

- Host nematode pests, threatening future potato crops and breaking regenerative rotation cycles

- Persist through rotations and resist standard herbicides

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The Solution: Ultra-High Precision at Plant Level

Ecorobotix’s ARA combines high-resolution cameras and AI to individually detect and treat weeds and volunteer potatoes. This means:

Disease risk mitigation: Break pathogen hosts in rotation

Less chemical, more control: Up to 95% reduction in herbicide use

No crop damage: Phytotoxicity is minimized, ensuring no negative impact on crop development. With the ability to either plant later or harvest earlier than conventional practices, growers can optimize their operations without sacrificing yield.

Optimized harvest quality: Bigger bulbs, higher market value