The Walloon Agricultural Research Centre (CRA-W) at Gembloux is a government-funded multidisciplinary research institution affiliated with the Agricultural Administration of Ministry of the Walloon Region. It employs some 450 persons including more than 120 scientists. The Centre's research activities cover most of the disciplines of agricultural sciences: soil chemistry and physics, plant and animal productions, plant breeding, biotechnology, quality of agricultural products, agricultural engineering, farming systems, applied statistics and plant protection.

The Biometry, Data Management and Agro-meteorology department which takes part to this project is mainly concerned with developing research and support activities in statistics and data processing as applied to agronomic research. It seeks to develop and promote the use of innovative data management methods and to create mathematical and statistical models representing agro-environmental systems with spatio-temporal components. Research activities in the unit have, in recent years, adopted a multidisciplinary approach to the projects. These activities all relate to science and technology knowledge advances in data processing with regard to sustainable agricultural development, the environment and food consumption. The Unit has a good expertise in Web-based mapping applications and GIS. Several research projects focus on developing computer applications for the interactive management of agro-environmental databases and the publication of available information through the Internet. The unit also participates in several European projects related to farm level traceability and Geo-Traceability (GeoTraceAgri, GTIS-CAP, PETER).

Key persons involved in the GEO FAIR TRADE project:

• Dr. Robert Oger is now in charge of the Biometry, Data Management and Agro-meteorology department of CRA-W. Apart from research activities in applied statistics, he contributed to the development and maintenance of a great number of databases in various domains related to crop productions and environmental data. He also participated in several research projects on the development of integrated systems to manage geographical and traceability data
• Dominique BUFFET is senior scientist and GIS and GIS Web application developer at the Biometry, Data management and Agro-meteorology Unit. He took part in various research projects related to GIS, database design and management. In relation to these projects, he participated in the development and the implementation of operational systems for monitoring agriculture, agri-environmental data and calculation of geographic traceability indicators using agro-meteorological model outputs, remote sensing data and land parcel information system of the CAP. He also developed an expertise in the implementation of Web-based GIS and worked on the particular domain of Interoperability.
• Quentin LEROY is scientist and has an expertise in food control and spatial data analysis. In the project, he is involved in the selection and validation of Geo-SDIs and in the implementation of the Geotraceability Integrated System.

Should you want to contact CIRAD in the GEO FAIR TRADE Project please contact:
- Dr. Robert Oger: oger@cra.wallonie.be