Job offer

Organisation/Company Institut national d'enseignement supérieur pour l'agriculture, l'alimentation et l'environnement

Research Field
Mathematics » Statistics
Computer science » Database management

Researcher Profile
Recognised Researcher (R2)

Positions
Postdoc Positions

Country
France

Application Deadline
30 Jun 2025 - 23:59 (Europe/Paris)

Type of Contract
Temporary

Job Status
Full-time

Offer Starting Date
1 Oct 2025

Is the job funded through the EU Research Framework Programme?
Not funded by a EU programme

Is the Job related to staff position within a Research Infrastructure?
No

Offer Description

Context
The agricultural sector faces numerous challenges. Simultaneously, the development of digital technologies enables the generation of large volumes of spatialized data, which present a unique opportunity to better monitor crops and implement more efficient, sustainable, and technical agricultural practices. Farmers alone will not cope with the scale and complexity of these transformations. More than ever, they will need personalized support from agricultural technical advisors, whose tools and methods must evolve.

UMR ITAP, specifically the DéMo team (Decision and Modeling for Agriculture), and Fruition Sciences (a viticulture consulting company) are partnering within a LabCom (ANR funding). Their joint research aims at developing tools to deploy a 3.0 version of agricultural advisory services: data-augmented advisory. This involves integrating data acquired from the many and diverse sources of available spatial information, analyzing these shared datasets to improve and standardize global expertise, and integrating the operational characteristics of farms to produce locally relevant advice.

We are recruiting a post-doctoral researcher who will participate in the initial work launched by the LabCom starting October 1, 2025 for 18 months.

State of the art
Agricultural data, derived from the technical and economic traceability of farms, are necessarily less structured than data acquired in a controlled experimental context: they are uncertain, heterogeneous, asynchronous, incomplete, sparse, etc. Various studies have shown the potential of this data to generate new knowledge adapted to the local context. However, these studies also highlighted the challenges related to the valorization of this data, such as the detection of local or global outliers, spatial and temporal interpolation to address data incompleteness, and uncertainty management.

Scientific objectives
Data analysis approaches are constantly evolving in data science but are relatively underapplied to agricultural data. The first objective of the post-doctoral position is therefore to conduct a state-of-the-art review of different data analysis approaches in agriculture, highlighting their specificities in relation to the data. This review can be built from the example of the databases provided by the DéMo team and Fruition Sciences. The aim is to create a typology of the data to be cross-referenced: multivariate, spatialized, temporal, for what purpose (exploratory, estimation, etc.), and to compare the associated analysis or processing methods, or even to propose a new approach if no method is identified.

By leveraging this new framework, the second scientific objective of the post-doctoral position is to implement and evaluate the selected method(s) on example databases, starting with the Fruition Sciences database.

Operational objective
The objective of the post-doctoral position is to develop a method to standardize (merge) an agricultural database, similar to the Fruition Sciences database, to serve two applications: i) an expert and ad hoc data analysis using a data visualization application, and ii) the implementation of statistical models for the estimation of agronomic parameters.

During the last semester, the post-doctoral researcher will work in collaboration with a computer developer from Fruition Sciences to enable the implementation of the standardization method in the company's platform and, if time allows, the data visualization application.

Work environment and conditions
The post-doctoral researcher will benefit from co-supervision by researchers from UMR ITAP and researchers from UMR MISTEA, in close relationship with Fruition Sciences, which will provide its database and expertise. The post-doctoral researcher will be hosted at Fruition Sciences premises for part of the week and at the DéMo team premises for the other part of the week, both locations being in Montpellier, France.

Where to apply

E-mail bruno.tisseyre@institut-agro.fr

Requirements

Research Field
Mathematics » Statistics
Education Level: PhD or equivalent

Research Field
Computer science » Database management
Education Level: PhD or equivalent

Skills/Qualifications
We are looking for a Ph.D. in data science or statistics, motivated to contribute to applied research projects for the agriculture of tomorrow. Knowledge of mathematical concepts related to the management, analysis, and modeling of multivariate data is necessary. Knowledge of agronomy would be an asset. We are looking for a curious and rigorous collaborator who can manage the project autonomously, dynamically, and communicate effectively within the team. Fluency in English is required and fluency in French would be appreciated.

Languages
ENGLISH Level: Excellent

Additional Information

This position is for you if you want to work at the interface between a public research laboratory and an innovative private company. The teams know each other well, and the work atmosphere is good. Working with Fruition Sciences will allow you to join a Franco-American team and understand the realities of decision-making based on the analysis of complex data from concrete examples. Working with the DéMo team will allow you to benefit from a research environment that is both supportive and demanding, at the forefront of research in processing complex data in an applied context. We pay particular attention to ensuring that you can publish and participate in at least one conference during the post-doctoral period.

The post-doctoral researcher will benefit from an employment contract with l’Institut Agro and a gross monthly salary in line with the salary scale for contractual staff (between €2,800 and €3,300 gross depending on professional experience).

Work Location(s)

Number of offers available
1

Company/Institute
Institut Agro Montpellier - UMR ITAP - Technologies and Methods for the Agriculture of Tomorrow

Country
France

State/Province
Occitanie

City
Montpellier

Postal Code
34000

Street
2, place Pierre Viala