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B. Vincent and P. Dardenne
14.1 Introduction
Different areas will be considered in this short section regarding applications of NIR
in agriculture: soil analysis, field analysis, forage and silage analysis, feed analysis, milk analysis, faeces and effluent analysis and orchard analysis. In order to
help the readers to assess the potential of NIR agriculture, some practical results in
terms of NIR equations are provided. The figures presented are those of the Belgian
REQUASUD network. This network has been in place in the Walloon Region of
Belgium (south part of the country) since 1989 and has the ambition of providing
classical analyses and NIR analyses of premium quality for the agri-food sector. The
network currently includes seven quality control laboratories performing routine
analyses for the public and private sectors (www.requasud.be). The Walloon Agriculture Research Centre (CRA-W) manages the NIR instrument network consisting
of 10 NIR spectrometers. A brochure in French explaining the organisation of the
NIR network, the current achievements and future developments can be downloaded from the following address: http://www.requasud.be/wp-content/uploads/
2017/07/brochure_requasud_spectrometrie_proche_infrarouge.pdf. In this chapter,
it has been decided to provide R
2 , SEC and RPD sec of the NIR equations in use in
the REQUASUD network. These figures could be considered to be a good estimation of the performance that could be achieved by NIR technology. It is important to
underline that the performance figures have been obtained with multi-annual spectral
databases covering a wide diversity in terms of origin and assembled in a NIR network
equipped with one single type of benchtop instrument (Foss XDS). Moreover, reference values have been provided by different laboratories having high quality standards. Indeed, REQUASUD frequently organises interlaboratory studies to assess the
quality of implementation of the Reference and NIR techniques. Frequent tailored
trainings are provided to members of the NIR network.
14.2 Applications in the Field and Crop Analysis
Applications of NIR to field and soil analysis are well illustrated in the literature.
These topics are also widely presented and discussed in NIR-focused conferences
(e.g. ICNIRS = www.icnirs.org; IDRC = www.idrc-chambersburg.org; HELIOSPIR
= www.heliospir.net). In the following section, the current status of application of the
NIR technique to soil and crop analysis is given. Some ongoing research with their
challenging objectives is briefly presented to give an idea of some of the forthcoming
developments in these fields.
B. Vincent and P. Dardenne
14.1 Introduction
Different areas will be considered in this short section regarding applications of NIR
in agriculture: soil analysis, field analysis, forage and silage analysis, feed analysis, milk analysis, faeces and effluent analysis and orchard analysis. In order to
help the readers to assess the potential of NIR agriculture, some practical results in
terms of NIR equations are provided. The figures presented are those of the Belgian
REQUASUD network. This network has been in place in the Walloon Region of
Belgium (south part of the country) since 1989 and has the ambition of providing
classical analyses and NIR analyses of premium quality for the agri-food sector. The
network currently includes seven quality control laboratories performing routine
analyses for the public and private sectors (www.requasud.be). The Walloon Agriculture Research Centre (CRA-W) manages the NIR instrument network consisting
of 10 NIR spectrometers. A brochure in French explaining the organisation of the
NIR network, the current achievements and future developments can be downloaded from the following address: http://www.requasud.be/wp-content/uploads/
2017/07/brochure_requasud_spectrometrie_proche_infrarouge.pdf. In this chapter,
it has been decided to provide R
2 , SEC and RPD sec of the NIR equations in use in
the REQUASUD network. These figures could be considered to be a good estimation of the performance that could be achieved by NIR technology. It is important to
underline that the performance figures have been obtained with multi-annual spectral
databases covering a wide diversity in terms of origin and assembled in a NIR network
equipped with one single type of benchtop instrument (Foss XDS). Moreover, reference values have been provided by different laboratories having high quality standards. Indeed, REQUASUD frequently organises interlaboratory studies to assess the
quality of implementation of the Reference and NIR techniques. Frequent tailored
trainings are provided to members of the NIR network.
14.2 Applications in the Field and Crop Analysis
Applications of NIR to field and soil analysis are well illustrated in the literature.
These topics are also widely presented and discussed in NIR-focused conferences
(e.g. ICNIRS = www.icnirs.org; IDRC = www.idrc-chambersburg.org; HELIOSPIR
= www.heliospir.net). In the following section, the current status of application of the
NIR technique to soil and crop analysis is given. Some ongoing research with their
challenging objectives is briefly presented to give an idea of some of the forthcoming
developments in these fields.