Using metadata formats and AGROVOC thesaurus for data description in the agrarian sector

Abstract

The paper deals with a general solution of semantic description related to various electronic data formats in the domains of agriculture, aquaculture, forestry, food industry, environment, horticulture and rural areas. The solution presented was developed on the basis of metadata formats analysis and then complemented with its own software superstructure. It is based on the VOA³R metadata application profile (AP) that was developed within the framework of the Virtual Open Access Agriculture and Aquaculture Repository project for the sake of describing research papers and scientific publications. However, thanks to its complexity and comprehensiveness, it is also suitable for different kinds of data and while combining it with the AGROVOC thesaurus, which is elaborated by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, it can become a robust and universal tool for data characteristics and semantic description. The potential of the proposed solution is illustrated by means of two examples. While the first example brings a metadata description of a photograph depicting anthocyanin pigmentation of barley straw caused by phosphorus deficiency, the second example is related to a research paper description. The developed system of metadata description is broadly applicable in agriculture such as in precision agriculture, in plant production or in ground cover monitoring and evaluation based on sensor or visual data.