Robot strawberry pickers could end need for human workers...
A glimpse of
the fruit-ure: Experts take first steps to create ROBOT strawberry pickers who
could end the need for humans toiling in fields
·
Scientists
are developing a robot to replace human strawberry pickers at farms
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A fifth of
fruits aren't being picked due to a shortage of workers following Brexit
·
Demand for
strawberries has skyrocketed over the last 22 years with people in the UK
consuming 101,000 tonnes yearly, up from 67,000 in 1996
·
·
Experts are developing a robot to replace
human strawberry pickers as farms struggle to find workers due to Brexit.
Around 20 per cent of soft fruits are going to waste due
to a shortage of workers, University of Essex researchers say.
This will worsen when Britain leaves the EU, scientist
claim, which has led to farms looking for alternate solutions to harvest
crops.
Dr Vishuu Mohan a computer science and engineering
lecturer who is leading the project, said: 'The challenge is that no two
berries are the same - they come in different shapes, sizes, order of ripeness
and many are hidden in the foliage.
'Also the environment keeps changing constantly - sunny,
windy, rainy - in contrast to a typical industrial environment.
'Hence, dextrous manipulation in unstructured
environments is a big challenge for robotics today.'
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The demand for strawberries has skyrocketed
over the last 22 years with Britons consuming 101,000 tonnes yearly- up from
67,000 in 1996.
In 2015, the soft fruit industry employed 29,000 seasonal
workers.
But by 2020 the seasonal worker requirement for UK soft
fruit production will increase to 31,000, it is forecast.
A survey by the National Farmers Union shows that last
year there was a 12.5 per cent shortfall of seasonal workers required to work
on horticulture farms
Dr Mohan's team is looking at how robots can work in
natural, unstructured environments where they can pick, inspect and pack
fruits.
He hopes that the robots will be able to work alongside
humans in a farm environment and also help reduce production costs.
He added: 'Skilled humans find it effortless, but when we
try to build a system which does the same thing it is a complex, integration of
vision, touch, force and movement and on top of it the ability to learn and
adapt - which is the only way to deal with any changing, unstructured
environment.'
The university is also working alongside farmers and jam
makers Tiptree to complete a prototype of the robot.
Andrey Ivanov, manager of Wilkin and Sons farm in Essex,
said: 'It could take years, or it could be just six months.'
'Robots can help in many industries for repetitive work
on a production line, but with strawberries, they have to overcome changing
conditions throughout the day - and they have to first be able to find the
berry in the plant.
'Fruit picking may seem a simple task but picking the
fruit without touching the berry will be a challenge. We need to ensure that
the fruit we grow always arrives with the customer in perfect condition.'
A prototype of the robot is expected to be ready within a
few months and it is expected to be able to pick low hanging strawberries.
Researchers will then begin to work on bi-manual robotic
coordination which will recreate how humans pick with two hands and will have
active vision to help find berries hidden by foliage.
Later versions of the will learn to counteract changing
environmental conditions.
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