Innovation Part 2

Innovation Part 2

Innovation Part 2. I'm Greg Martin with today's Fruit Grower Report.

Dr. Clark Seavert with Oregon State University recently spoke about the pear industry and some of the challenges it faces. He says that there are a lot of exciting new things on the horizon with great potential.

SEAVERT: So I sit and I think about how could we use those kinds of technologies in precision thinning if you have those kinds of situations or you need that in your different crops and pears maybe not so much so. But how is it going to impact larger fruit size? How is it going to increase fruit quality? Yield estimation? If they could estimate the crop size, how does that impact? Because that's what some folks are saying they can do.

He says it's important to scrutinize each of these technologies and their claims.

SEAVERT: Canopy management, fertility and water. How can I use this information to better apply these kinds of resources on my crop? It doesn't matter what industry I go into it's how much do those things cost? That's one of the first questions that probably 80% of the people will ask, how much does that cost to have a UAS come over and take pictures of my orchard...without really thinking about what that technology is going to do for you.

Seavert says it's important to ask yourself one very important question.

SEAVERT: What are the benefits? And then how do I measure those and how do I apply them into a model that I can kind of take a look at and in a cost benefit analysis does it make sense to do it? It's not all about yields but it is about size and it is about grade.

That's today's Fruit Grower Report. I'm Greg Martin on the Ag Information Network of the West.

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