Western Growers' Dennis Donohue is thinking about next-gen farmworkers
Let's learn from Dennis Donohue, director of Western Growers Center for Innovation and Technology, an agtech startup incubator, how agriculture has matured with its approach to technology.
In this "Tip of the Iceberg Podcast" episode, Donohue dives into water, economics, next-generation agriculture workers, robots and more. The episode is brought to you by ZAG Technical Services, part of our agtech series.
"So the reality is, you do need a workforce that can implement technology, and frankly, they're really critical, particularly in the apps world, in the data world," Donohue said in the podcast episode.
Food safety, labor and water: Those big issues were top priorities of produce growers in the western states of the U.S. when Dennis Donohue started tackling how technology and innovation could provide solutions for Western Growers.
Besides his extensive experience integrating agtech and innovations into the business structure at several produce companies and organizations, Donohue served as mayor of Salinas, Calif., from 2006 to 2012. He served on governing boards at the Grower Shipper Association of Central California, Salinas Chamber of Commerce and Steinbeck Innovation Foundation.
Now, agtech startups are maturing, he said. But how?
For one, robots.
"I think robots are not going away anytime soon," Donohue said. "I mean, one of the reasons we introduced the Western Growers Global Harvest Automation Initiative, and that speaks to why we're committed this category. If you look at the industry, there's been a lot of progress and automation, whether it's tractors or going on from a technology standpoint, sanding and weeding or harvest."
The initiative aims to accelerate ag automation by 50% in 10 years, and includes an annual series that will track, measure and report on industry progress in harvest automation across the fresh produce industry.
Among the findings of the 2022 report, which was prepared in collaboration with consultants at Roland Berger:
- Sixty-five percent of participating growers have invested in automation over the past three years.
- The average annual spend on automation was $350,000 to $400,000 per grower.
- Spending occurred in pre-harvest and harvest assist activities, including weeding, thinning, harvesting platforms and autonomous ground vehicles. It is anticipated that 30% to 60% of these activities will be automated by 2025.
- Harvest automation itself remains limited because of the technical difficulties in replicating the human hand to harvest delicate crops. It is anticipated that 20% of harvest activities will be automated by 2025.
Founded in 1926, Western Growers represents local and regional family farmers growing fresh produce in California, Arizona, Colorado and New Mexico.
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