Advances in automated in-field grading of harvested crops

Publication date: 29/06/2019
Extent: 18 pages

Contributions by: Jose Blasco, María Gyomar González González, Patricia Chueca and Sergio Cubero, Instituto Valenciano de Investigaciones Agrarias (IVIA), Spain; and Nuria Aleixos, Universitat Politècnica de València, Spain

Chapter synopsis: Mechanical harvesting machines such as canopy and trunk shakers are widely used for yield collection from some crops; however, most fruits and vegetables produced for the fresh market have to be collected manually. This chapter reviews the current state of mechanized collection technology, such as the development of harvest-assist platforms, as well as the possibilities of these machines to incorporate artificial vision systems to perform an in-field pre-grading of the product. The main advantages of each system are discussed and the problems encountered in the field are described. A case study on the use of harvest-assist platforms in citrus orchards is presented describing prototypes that are capable of both inspecting collected fruits and separating them into categories using computer vision.

DOI: 10.19103/AS.2019.0056.16