This study evaluated the agronomic and economic prospects of Site-Specific Seeding (SSS) for consumption and seed potato production based on Management Zone (MZ) maps delineated with the fusion of multiple soil and crop attributes at four experimental sites in Belgium. Soil pH, organic carbon, P, K, Mg, Ca, Na, moisture content, cation exchange capacity, apparent electrical conductivity and crop normalized difference vegetation index were measured with an on-line visible and near-infrared reflectance spectroscopy sensor, electromagnetic induction sensor, and Sentinel-2 constellation, respectively. Spatial alignment of the different data layers generated a co-georeferenced data matrix for data fusion by k-means clustering. Per field MZ classes were ranked according to their fertility status and the prescription rule of sowing more seeds to the more fertile zones and vice versa was adopted and compared against a Uniform Rate Seeding (URS) treatment in a strip plot experiment. Cost–benefit analysis revealed that the SSS improved tuber yields, hence, increased gross margin (137.81 to 457.83 €/ha) of production compared to the URS, although SSS consumed relatively higher amount of seeds. The percentage of gross margin increase varied between 2.34 and 27.21%, with the highest profitability in fields with low productivity. Larger seed-to-seed spacing than the control increased the proportion of the most demanded and profitable tuber category, suggesting the seeding interval is a key determinant of tuber size distribution. It is suggested to adopt SSS for potato production using the proposed multi-sensor data-fusion approach to manage in-field soil and crop variabilities, and improve productivity and profitability.

本研究根据比利时四个试验地点融合多种土壤和作物属性的管理区 (MZ) 地图，评估了用于消费和种薯生产的定点播种 (SSS) 的农艺和经济前景。土壤pH值、有机碳、P、K、Mg、Ca、Na、水分含量、阳离子交换能力、表观电导率和作物归一化差异植被指数通过在线可见光和近红外反射光谱传感器、电磁感应测量传感器和 Sentinel-2 星座，分别。不同数据层的空间对齐生成了一个共同地理参考数据矩阵，用于通过 k 均值聚类进行数据融合。每块田的 MZ 类别根据其肥沃状况进行排序，并采用在更肥沃的区域播种更多种子的处方规则，反之亦然，并在带状小区试验中与均匀播种 (URS) 处理进行比较。成本效益分析显示，与 URS 相比，SSS 提高了块茎产量，因此提高了生产毛利率（137.81 至 457.83 欧元/公顷），尽管 SSS 消耗的种子量相对较高。毛利率增幅在2.34%至27.21%之间，在生产力较低的领域盈利能力最高。比对照更大的种子与种子间距增加了最需要和最有利可图的块茎类别的比例，这表明播种间隔是块茎大小分布的关键决定因素。