Imagine a future where nurseries can effortlessly manage their plants with cutting-edge automation technologies, using potting or weed-spraying robots instead of having to dig each hole or spray each pot by hand. With the help of a $9.8 million grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture National Institute of Food and Agriculture, this vision is becoming a reality.
The University of Florida Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences (UF/IFAS) will use about $1 million of the grant to tackle the labor challenges faced by the nursery industry. The role of UF/IFAS in this grant includes evaluating herbicide, pesticide and fertilizer application equipment and testing people’s perceptions of and willingness to adopt new strategies related to automation.
“The big goal is to effect change,” said Chris Marble, associate professor at the UF/IFAS Mid-Florida Research and Education Center. “We want growers to adopt these different automation practices, but mostly, we want to give them information to even consider these changes in the first place,” he said. “We want them to take incremental steps, so they become more profitable and more sustainable, and it helps the industry as a whole.”
The primary goal of the five-year grant project, led by North Carolina State University, is to explore and implement various types of automation — from timed sprayers to robots — within the nursery industry.
The project will look at the return on investment of large-scale potting machines, automated sprayers and other innovative technologies. It will incorporate the expertise of economists, engineers and social scientists.
UF/IFAS, via Marble, will lead Extension efforts nationally, organizing field days across the country to demonstrate the benefits of automation.
Another initiative within the project will be led by UF/IFAS Professor Laura Warner of the agricultural education and communication department. She will investigate the perceptions and barriers to adopting automation technologies. “Is there concern that different types of automation might cost someone their job? That’s what we want to find out,” Marble said.
Incremental steps, from simple upgrades like switching from granular hand shakers to sprayers to large-scale implementations of potting machines, will be explored.
Source: UF/IFAS
Share this Post
Sponsored Content