Australian agtech company, The Yield Technology Solutions allows farmers to predict their berry yield up to seven days in advance using their Sensing+ technology.
Earlier this year, The Yield Technology Solutions partnered with Australia's leading grower, packer and marketer of fresh fruit and vegetables, Costa Group.
Since their partnership, Costa has rolled out The Yield's Sensing+ solution across eight berry farms in New South Wales, Queensland and Tasmania with the company hopeful that they will gain a better understanding of specific growing conditions.
The Yield's Sensing+ technology combines sensors and analytics to provide information and predictions that is contained in an easy to use app.
The technology is expected to go a long way in helping farmers and commercial growers make important on farm decisions such as when to irrigate, feed, plant, protect and harvest.
Costa Group Chief Executive Harry Debney said he was hopeful that the technology would go a long way in improving the quantity and quality of their yields.
We're busy this month rolling out Sensing+ @ one of Costa Group's berry farms near Coffs Harbour. Costa Group users will be able to access microclimate data & weather predictions in our easy to use Sensing+ web & mobile apps. #manageyourmicroclimate #taketheguessworkoutofgrowing pic.twitter.com/HKSUeCi4CV
— The Yield Technology Solutions (@theyield) March 6, 2020
"Our berries are grown in tunnels and Sensing+ measures the growing conditions in our microclimates and uses AI to give us in-tunnel weather predictions," Mr Debney said.
"We are also rolling out the Sensing+ Yield Predictions module which predicts our berry yields using AI and data from both our harvest management systems and the microclimate weather.
"We have been impressed with the accuracy achieved to date compared with our current manual approach.
"Accurate yield prediction allows us to optimise our costs and achieve better prices when negotiating with our customers."
Founder and Managing Director of The Yield, Ros Harvey, said she was delighted to be working with the Costa Group on a commercial rollout of the product.
"Using Costa's extensive data sets, our platform enables us to quickly and efficiently combine data to create AI models for things like Yield Predictions that will drive significant commercial benefit for Costa Group," Ms Harvey said.
The Yield Prediction module was developed in collaboration with the Food Agility Cooperative Research Centre, Costa Group and the University of Technology Sydney (UTS) and was recently selected in the 2020 THRIVE TOP 50 scaling and visionary AgTech companies.
Having been shortlisted from 3000 global technology companies, Ros said that being she was delighted to have been included in the prestigious list of companies which featured several other Australian agtech start-ups.
"This is a great honour for us. It is recognition of our efforts in delivering a world-class solution in weather predictions and yield predictions for our customers," Ms Harvey said.
