Research on control of multi-variable system with strong coupling has been a significant issue in industry. To accurately eliminate the coupling between system variables and improve the control effect, decoupling control techniques are investigated. In this paper, a decoupling control scheme based on fractional-order proportion integration differentiation neural network and sparrow search algorithm (SSA-FPIDNN) is proposed, where sparrow search algorithm is employed to derive the optimal initial weights, preventing the weights from falling into the local optimum, while the fractional-order algorithm is used to correct its connection weights to improve control accuracy. Compared with traditional PIDNN, the proposed SSA-FPIDNN has better decoupling control performance, and the tracking time can be reduced significantly. Numerical simulation and engineering examples verified its effectiveness.