Varda and TrueFootprint Partner to Support Smallholder Farmers with Field Data and EUDR Compliance

Varda, the agtech data service provider, has partnered with TrueFootprint, the value chain transformation platform that helps companies improve their sustainability and boost regenerative agriculture, to assist farmers with their digital transformation and mapping of farmland.

Varda, founded by Yara, the global leader in nitrogen fertilizer production, established its Global FieldID solution to provide a geospatial reference framework for the entire agricultural industry. The solution will integrate with TrueFootprint’s FieldApp platform to help farmers meet the requirements of the upcoming EU Deforestation Regulation (EUDR) which is set to be implemented at the end of this year. The collaboration will allow smallholder farmers to easily track, and evidence crop production, to ensure that forests are being respected.

Under EUDR, companies in the EU are prohibited from buying from producers who have engaged in, or may potentially engage in, deforestation. This means operators and traders are required to collect geographic coordinates of the land where their commodities are produced and ensure full product traceability down to the farm level, representing a significant challenge, especially for smallholder farmers.

TrueFootprint aims to make its collaborative FieldApp platform easily accessible for farmers who lack digital tools so they can get key insights into their farmland to identify, report and discuss solutions to agricultural problems.

“By integrating Varda’s Global FieldID into our FieldApp platform we can help its users save time and resources when mapping out their fields, facilitating collaborative data sharing with key stakeholders and providing evidence of EUDR compliance. Varda’s solution allows farmers to assign unique IDs to each land plot, mapping fields out digitally, similar to a ‘QR code for fields’, in a universal way that tackles data fragmentation,” explained Fredrik Galtung, CEO, TrueFootprint.

“The time has come for Global FieldID. It will help us onboard many more farmers faster and make it easier for food companies, traders and regulators to check that farmer cooperatives are compliant with deforestation regulations,” he added.

Davide Ceper, CEO at Varda, commented: “Large producers are well prepared and organized to supply the necessary information to validate their practices. However, smallholder farmers in some countries lack the technological ‘know how’ to do the same. This could lead to some farmers being forced out of business, which would further impact deforestation levels in these areas as they lack alternatives. This collaboration will provide farmers with essential digital tools to map out their farmland, identify issues and seamlessly share data to key stakeholders, ensuring that users comply with the upcoming regulations.”