Crop type: Table grapes

Location: Western Cape, South Africa

Reducing input costs and improving grape yields

with precise VRA

Kriegler Farms is located in De Doorns, South Africa and produces table grapes for premium local retailers and export markets. To optimise production, Managing Director André Du Toit replenishes the vines with the best possible products to ensure an optimal balance between vegetative and reproductive growth.

To do this, he uses an organic-based product as well as soil ameliorants to improve vineyard homogeneity and soil and root health.

The Challenge

With rising fertiliser and overall production costs combined with an ever-growing market demand, Kriegler Farms needed to ensure a high return on every investment on the farm. The top priority is for every input to result in maximum yield quality and quantity.

The Solution

Traditionally, fertiliser was applied throughout the vineyard at a flat rate, based on an average estimated vine performance. Using high resolution drone imagery and AI, we could calculate the actual vine health variability so that André and his team could refine the nutritional program and apply inputs only where needed at the rates suitable to those areas.

André partnered with Revive Soil Solutions to apply both his soil ameliorants and fertiliser using a variable rate spreader in conjunction with the our zonal health maps, applying higher doses in areas of low Health (measured by NDRE) than high Health zones, and skipping some applications overall.