Spotlight on: Jack Verhoosel on Semantic Technologies in Agrifood
Semantic technologies and AI reasoning are increasingly shaping how data is shared, analysed, and applied across the agrifood sector. To learn more about their potential, we spoke with Jack Verhoosel, Senior Researcher in Knowledge Representation and Reasoning at Maastricht University, Department of Advanced Computing Sciences.
With extensive experience in semantic technology, data analytics, and AI, he reflects on his career path, European collaborations, and the future role of data-driven tools in addressing agricultural challenges.
Exploring Our Guest's Motivation and Background
What initially drew you towards working with semantic technology and data analytics in the agrifood and horticulture domains?
I’ve been active in the semantic technology area now for over a decade, and I started with the challenge to help the greenhouse sector improve its data-sharing activities. At that time, big data was the next big thing and how to exchange and analyse data in a semantically correct manner was still in its infancy.
So, I’ve helped the sector by setting up a data exchange infrastructure, the HortivationHub, that uses the Common Greenhouse Ontology to align data coming from different sources and feed it into decision support tools for growers in the greenhouse.
In your current role at Maastricht University, what does your workday typically involve, and which aspects of your research do you find most impactful?
At Maastricht University, I’m a Senior Researcher in data science and am busy with setting up new national as well as European projects in the application of AI techniques for agricultural challenges in general.
The most impactful activities include work on the effects of climate change on agriculture and food production across Europe and how to mitigate or adapt to these effects in the coming decades. By providing decision support tools to farmers and other stakeholders in the agrifood sector, I hope to help them deal with climate change and its effects on their businesses.
Connecting Ontologies, Big Data, and AI Reasoning
Your expertise spans ontologies, semantic web technologies, and big data analytics. How do you see these areas intersecting in your research projects?
Many sectors, including agriculture and horticulture, deal with an increasing amount and sources of data. This data is, in general, not aligned in terms of its semantics and meaning, which makes it difficult to combine them. So, semantic technology makes sure that we are not “comparing apples with oranges” and feeds the correct data into decision support tools.
Another aspect here is the use of reasoning technology that can improve decision-making by inferring new facts based on collected data. This technology can then also be fed with human expertise that is collected in the form of knowledge rules. All these aspects come together in the research projects that I’m involved in.
Insights from European Collaborations
You have been involved in building and leading consortium projects. How has your experience with European collaborative initiatives influenced the way you approach research and innovation?
One of the effects of dealing with European collaborations is that you get a lot of experience with various people from different organisations and different cultures. From a research and innovation perspective, my horizon of research challenges and potential solutions has broadened extensively. Especially, the different calls from the Horizon Europe programme give a nice overview of the main topics that Europe is interested in.
So, this is a two-way learning path that I also used to update and improve my own vision on AI technology to work on, including new hybrid AI mechanisms in which both data and human knowledge are combined.
Building Better Agrifood Data Spaces
STELAR aims to address common issues in agrifood data spaces, such as fragmented storage and poor searchability, by developing tools for improved data discovery and annotation. Based on your experience, what aspects of this approach do you consider particularly important or promising for supporting users in complex data environments?
The first thing that comes to mind here is the FAIR principle, in which findability, accessibility, interoperability and reusability aspects are all equally important to realise. One of the mechanisms to make this happen is the stimulation of digital product passports, also for agricultural and food products.
Using such a passport with its well-defined semantics as a mandatory set of datapoints that should be available for agricultural and food data sources, makes it possible to find, access and interoperate with them. One other aspect here is dealing with data ownership and access authorisation, as such mechanisms are needed to ensure that data is only available to those who are authorised to.
The Future of Semantic Technologies in Agrifood
Looking ahead, how do you envision the role of semantic technologies and AI reasoning evolving in the agrifood sector over the next decade?
In the next decade, important topics to cover in digitisation of AI technology for the agrifood sector include the adoption of digital technology by the agrifood sector to move to a more sustainable way of working. This includes environmental, economic but also social sustainability aspects.
As mentioned before, as the effects of climate change are now exponentially increasing on our continent, using AI technology to help with predicting potential food safety hazards and impacts on agricultural soil and crop becomes extremely important. That should enable adaptation of the agrifood sector to ensure food security for our increasing world population.
Conclusion
From supporting growers through semantic data exchange to leading European collaborations on climate and AI, Jack Verhoosel highlights the growing importance of semantic technologies in agrifood. His work demonstrates how digital tools can support sustainability, resilience, and food security in the face of complex global challenges.
Learn more about smart farming on the STELAR blog and connect with us on LinkedIn for more updates.
