The publication of the European Directive for a Sustainable Use of Pesticides four years ago has derived in a very active period concerning crop protection issues. Since new legislation has focussed the relevance on the use-phase of pesticides, a lot of efforts have been integrated in order to improve the efficiency and efficacy during the critical use-phase of pesticides. The use of new technologies allows improving consistently the whole crop protection process. Sensor technology for canopy characterization, electronic devices for drift estimation, new developed software determining the optimal volume rate or geo-referenced methodology for canopy map development have been the basis of the research activity of The Unit of Agricultural Machinery at Polytechnic University of Catalonia (Barcelona, Spain). Practical consequences of this research have been measured in pesticide savings, less risk of contamination, better distribution of active ingredient over the canopy and a better knowledge and awareness from the users. An overview of all these developments is presented in this paper, with special emphasis on the variable application rate technology and its fundamental relationship with the key discussion about the most accurate dose expression method, Dosavi�a software fordetermining the optimal volume rate and a new proposal for drift measurements using a Lidar sensor.

Advances technologies to improve spray application techniques in viticulture

248th National Meeting (2014)

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