dr.ir. FK (Frits) van Evert

dr.ir. FK (Frits) van Evert

Senior researcher precision agriculture

Frits van Evert is a senior researcher in precision agriculture. He studied Agronomy at Wageningen University (MSc, 1988) and Soils at Washington State University in the US (PhD, 1992). Following his studies he worked in Niger and the USA before settling in Wageningen in 1998.

His main research interest is increasing crop yield, crop quality, and the profitability of farming while reducing the use of inputs and impact on the environment. Frits believes this can be achieved by supporting farmers with information that is based on crop and soil models combined with data from satellites, drones, and sensors on the ground. Additional research interests include agricultural robotics, semantic web techniques and data management, and measuring the sustainability of agricultural systems.

Frits coordinates ROBS4CROPS (H2020 project) and leads Digitale Twin Strokenteelt (national project). He also leads development of the N sidedress application for potatoes on Farmmaps. Further, he has participated cq. participates in national projects, including Digital Future Farm, HIP, NPEC and Towards Precision Agriculture 2.0, as well as in EU-funded projects, including ANTARES, AUDITOR, CATCH-C, DockWeeder, GALIRUMI, IOF2020, SEAMLESS, Smart-AKIS, and VALERIE. Projects starting in 2024 include "Digital Future Farm 2.0" and "System-based Precision Agriculture for Sustainable Crop Production (led by Aarhus University)".

Frits is a member of the AgroFoodRobotics group in Wageningen. He is an editor of Precision Agriculture. He is active in the Agronomy Society of America, where he has chaired the section on Climatology and Modeling and has been an editor of Agronomy Journal for eight years.