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Good practice Imported

SZIF's Satellite 'Checks by Monitoring' — Replacing On-Farm CAP Inspections Across Czechia

Czechia · Prague · See the Czechia profile · See the Prague profile

Evidence: Observational / pre–post Top 76% 33/100 · Ask Evidence Copilot about this practice

Czechia's farm-payments agency SZIF piloted Sentinel/Galileo satellite checks to replace on-site CAP inspections; a follow-on 2-year contract with Planet/Sinergise and Asseco extends AI-assisted daily satellite monitoring to about 25,000 Czech farms.

5,700
Monitoring tasks processed in pilot
~16,000
Geotagged photos collected
~70%
Inspector time savings vs manual documentation
~25,000
Farms covered under follow-on contract
SZIF's Satellite 'Checks by Monitoring' — Replacing On-Farm CAP Inspections Across Czechia

Details

Maturity
Scaling
Promoter
State Agricultural Intervention Fund (SZIF)
Period
2018-present
Keywords
agri-environmental payments, satellite monitoring, digital governance, CAP compliance

Context

Under the EU's Common Agricultural Policy, Paying Agencies such as Czechia's SZIF must verify that area-based and agri-environment-climate payment recipients meet land-use conditions; since 2018 the EU-wide 'checks by monitoring' approach lets agencies substitute Sentinel-1/2 satellite observation for a share of costly on-site farm visits.

Activities

SZIF ran a multi-phase 'Transformation' pilot combining Copernicus satellite data with Galileo-positioned geotagged farmer photos where satellite evidence was inconclusive, then contracted Sinergise Solutions (Planet) with AI analytics partner Asseco for a two-year near-daily satellite monitoring and crop-type/harvest-timing verification service across an estimated 25,000 Czech holdings.

Results

The pilot processed 5,700 monitoring tasks and collected roughly 16,000 geotagged photos, with SZIF reporting around 70% time savings for inspectors versus manual documentation; the contract's monetary value, total hectarage covered, and before/after data on avoided physical inspections are not publicly disclosed.

Implementation
Indicative cost
High (€500k–€5M)
Time to results
Medium (1–3 years)
Staffing & skills
SZIF inspectors, Sinergise Solutions (Planet) satellite analytics team, Asseco AI analytics partner

Conditions for success

  • EU-wide Sen4CAP/Copernicus toolkit and CAP legal basis for 'checks by monitoring' already in place since 2018
  • Galileo-positioned geotagged farmer photos used to resolve cases where satellite evidence alone is inconclusive

Commonly funded by

National / regional programmes

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Data sources

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