Chemical and fertilisers are widely used on horticultural crops. They ensure economic returns and help maintain the product consistency required for domestic consumption and export markets.

However, these chemicals and fertilisers are hazardous substances, and must be used and handled carefully according to the manufacturer’s guidelines to ensure workers’ safety and to protect consumers and the environment.

Keeping record of chemical application and storage is an essential process in order to comply with legislative and industry obligations relating to the use, handling, and storage of chemicals.

Maintaining extensive chemical and fertiliser records can be a laborious, complex and time-consuming process where record-keeping errors may occur, says Roei Yaakobi – CEO of agricultural technology firm Tie Up Farming.

“Tie Up Farming’s Spray Diary module provides growers with a digital spray and chemical management platform, presenting countless advantages over conventional record-keeping methods,” Mr Yaakobi said.

“With our Spray Diary, growers are meeting extensive record-keeping obligations at the click of a button. By the action of creating a ‘spray task’, growers are able to maintain the record of past and upcoming chemical application schedules. These spray tasks can then be sent to the operators in the field, and through their smartphone view all the required instructions to successfully complete the task.

“In addition to our Spray Diary, the Chemicals and Fertilisers module helps to keep a record and allows you to add specific chemicals and fertilisers to be available to use in the Spray Diary.

“When adding a chemical and fertilisers in the Chemical and Fertiliser module, all potentially auditable information about the chemicals can be added and edited, including the required Safety Data Sheet (SDS) and label,” Mr Yaakobi said.

Tie Up Farming further assists growers and agronomists with spray planning and tracking to decrease the risk of pest or disease resistance to a particular chemical.

“In tracking chemical usage history and application history, our Spray Diary can give critical information to the user in order to determine the cause of a particular usage level of a certain chemical,” Mr Yaakobi said. “This level of visibility and information further promotes farming best practice and high-quality assurance for produce.

“Additionally, cost effectiveness of inputs is a major challenge for horticultural growers. Tie Up Farming helps growers to keep track of chemical and fertiliser application costs, offering a remarkable decision-making tool to identify potential spray inefficiencies in order to reduce variable costs and increase profitability.

“Chemicals and fertilisers are a major part of the growing process. However, judicious input applications are one of the biggest drivers in maximising farm profit,” Mr Yaakobi said.

“Through Tie Up Farming, manage your chemical like never before. Focusing on visibility, ease of use, and great auditability capability, our Spray Diary and Chemical and Fertiliser modules will assist growers to improve their profitability, chemical use efficiency and comply with legislative and industry obligations.”