Aussie berry and table grape growers are primed to boost productivity through innovative labour-focused tech, including virtual reality training for pickers, motion-detecting wearables to evaluate performance and real-time quality-assessment cameras.

Delivered through Hort Innovation’s Frontiers investment program, the $9M program will revolutionise the industries through collaborations with cutting-edge augmented technology providers, Clarifruit and Think Digital.

Hort Innovation chief executive officer Brett Fifield said the program is a prime example of the grower-owned research and development corporation partnering with world-class partners to bring world-class innovation to Australian growers.

“Through this transformational program we are connecting local growers with the latest tech from here and across the world to enhance production and safeguard supply,” Mr Fifield said.

“The program is set to make a tangible difference to berry and table grape growers, with the aim to reduce farm waste through skilled fruit picking, automate quality control processes, improve training, deliver real-time data solutions for informed farming decisions, and ultimately, increase labour productivity.”

The program is focused on implementing two advanced types of technology within the berry and table grape industries: augmented, virtual and mixed reality innovations (such as augmented reality headsets, smart phone applications or specialised cameras) applied to mobile devices, and artificial intelligence (such as machine learning models for tasks like real-time image processing, pattern recognition, and data processing).

Clarifruit chief executive officer Elad Mardix said their goal is to standardise the way fruit quality is evaluated across the Fresh Produce supply chain to significantly reduce rejections and waste along the chain.

“Clarifruit is proud to bring the world’s first, AI-powered quality control software for the fresh produce industry to Australian berry and table grape growers,” Mr Mardix said.

“This investment will enable us to fully automate the quality control processes by leveraging AI and AR technologies, accelerating the development of real-time, automatic detection of all external fruit quality attributes with augmented reality for improved quality control.

Think Digital founder Tim Gentle said their aim is to provide growers and agronomists with a decision-making tool, and their core aim is to boost human performance and capabilities using technology.

"Think Digital are partnering with growers and agronomists to identify what data and information are essential for real-time decision-making, with the aim of developing an Augmented Reality data visualisation tool that can be used to expedite decision making, augment human behaviour and improve comprehension of complex data" Mr Gentle said.

Burlington Berries general manager Laurie Adams said this research will prep industry for the future.

“Through this program, our industry will get insight into how adopting new labour technology can increase our productivity, boost our team culture, reduce labour costs and bring wide ranging benefits to our businesses,” Mr Adams said.

“Implementing this technology could be a game changer for our industry, so we are looking forward to seeing what benefits it will bring.”