This has been the 2nd Use Case Call

The deadline for applications was March 3rd 2025, 6 pm

We wish all applicants the best of luck and will be happy to annonunce the new FAIRagro Use Cases End of May!

Objectives of FAIRagro Use Cases

FAIRagro Use Cases are practical examples that describe and address specific challenges in RDM within agricultural sciences as well as develop and test potential solutions. They enable FAIRagro to collaboratively tackle the diversity and heterogeneity of agricultural data – ranging from drone imagery and gene sequences to farm surveys – as well as the broad range of relevant temporal and spatial scales, e.g. from the molecular and genetic level to entire landscapes.

A key objective is to avoid isolated, stand-alone solutions and instead develop adaptable, community-driven approaches that are relevant and beneficial for the entire agricultural research community and beyond. Through these Use Cases, FAIRagro ensures that its data infrastructures, tools, and services align with real-world research needs, enhancing daily scientific practices. Moreover, they contribute to more efficient and impactful (agricultural) research, foster cross-disciplinary collaboration, and extend beyond agroecosystem science to broader agricultural sciences and related fields as well as neighboring disciplines and domains.

Accepted Use Cases will become an integral part of the FAIRagro consortium. Use Cases are integrated into the consortium’s work plan, entailing collaborative efforts with the FAIRagro Task Areas (TA) (see Fig. 1) and are intended to accomplish specific Measures and Deliverables over a predetermined duration. An overview of the FAIRagro task areas and their measures can be found in this document for download (FAIRagro Use Case Onboarding). The Task Areas are also presented here on our website.

FAIRagro Use Cases – an interactive map

Our interactive Use Case (UC) and Use Case Pilot (PL) map provides an overview of the current FAIRagro Use Cases and Use Case Pilots. It shows which data resources they use, which semantic artifacts are relevant for their work and which workflows are being developed.

Use case map

Focus of the 2nd UC Call

With FAIRagro Use Cases, the following objectives are pursued:

Demonstrate FAIR practices: Use proof-of-concept to demonstrate that applying FAIR principles and practices will lead to more efficient and collaborative agricultural research, thereby fostering innovation and ultimately contributing solutions for related societal challenges.
Broaden the community: Engage new disciplines and/ or institutions and expand integration into agricultural science and beyond (including neighbouring and new disciplines and domains, e.g. animal-related sciences.

Foster cultural change: Establish FAIR data management as the normative standard in agricultural research and strengthen acceptance through proven best practices.

Develop and implement scalable solutions: Create practical approaches based on FAIRagro concepts, infrastructures, and services to address specific Research Data Management (RDM) challenges. These solutions must prioritize interoperability and scalability to ensure broad applicability across agricultural sciences and beyond.

Strengthen interdisciplinary and (inter-)national collaboration: Foster cross-consortium partnerships within NFDI and cooperation with relevant RDM as well as (agricultural) research initiatives, networks and projects.