Productising a robotic asparagus picker

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There are great challenges in finding enough staff to do agricultural jobs like fruit and vegetable picking, pruning and weeding. In many cases these are for perennial crops, where current automated machinery would damage plants. Asparagus is a typical example. It produces multiple spears from one root. Only those that are ripe can be picked, at ground level and with dexterity that avoids damaging the plant.Several companies have produced automatic and even autonomous asparagus harvesters. However, these rely on optical sensors and do not achieve the same yields as human pickers. We have used InnovateUK funding to develop a prototype harvester that uses an artificial vision system to detect all asparagus spears that are ready. It uses a robotic arm and knife to cut precisely at ground level. We have proven this in an operational environment, in trials with a commercial grower.In this project we will develop this further, incorporating an autonomous navigation system and self-charging capability, using a solar-powered charger. We will carry out two rounds of iterative development, using field trials with three growers in year one, followed by 40 in year two and a larger trial post-project. We will also identify what support is needed (parts, updates) to offer users a complete autonomous harvest service.The solution will be cost- effective at a target price of £50k and will be fully autonomous and able to work day and night. There will be a rental option for smaller growers (<25,000kg of output per annum), to facilitate maximum access to the technology with immediate labour cost savings for the growers. For larger growers, we are targeting a payback period of <4 years.