Growers with little option to move to this technology or go out of business

As strawberry harvesting heats up in New Zealand, there is a very poignant video in the link below which is very timely. Californian growers are desperately short of water and labour. Protected cropping has help conserve water by using substrates and table systems. It has also made it easier to use harvesting ‘co-robots’ to pick the fruit. The picking accuracy is stated at a staggering 95%.

This is now the reality, and I do not think it will be too long before, (if they are not already) large NZ operations will look at this technology. Even if our labour market improves dealing with the uncertainty of seasonal workers, that strawberry growers rely on, is an ongoing occurrence.

This is the future of harvesting produce in large commercial operations.

Click on the link to see the video

https://www.cbsnews.com/video/strawberry-picking-robots-help-farmers-amid-drought/

Article  compiled by Stefan Vogrincic

All Article’s checked and edited by Marie Vogrincic

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