System for the management, protection and enhancement of fruit supply chain
The main objective of FruitGuard is to innovate the company and the fruit supply chain through the use of the new technologies that allow to manage in detail the harvesting of the fruit by the farm and the traceability of the products inside of the supply chain starting from the production phase. The result of the project will then be a smart technological system whose use will allow to know in a capillary way the history of the product to protect and enhance the entire fruit supply chain.
FruitGuard will focus on the control and traceability of fruit products, from harvest to final sale. The development of wireless and low-cost technologies will enable the possibility to know the origin and the quality of the crop during the entire food chain. The farms' workers will be equipped with specific hardware that will enable them to link different information with the product: each box will hold harvest time, location, and who performed the harvesting. So, FruitGuard will develop specific technologies to increase goods traceability and information for the final customers.
Fruit harvesting does not take place in a single phase, but in several steps. In each one, only the product at the right point of ripeness should be collected and any overripe product discarded. If performed correctly, this procedure allows an important reduction in waste. Furthermore, goods that cannot be marketed as fresh will also decrease, increasing the crop's yield per hectare. However, the harvesting farms' staff is almost always seasonal and generally hired exclusively for the harvesting campaign, typically lasting a few weeks. The harvesters' training takes place for the most part in the processing phase and involves a level of "knowledge of the trade" rarely adequate. After being collected, the product is delivered to the warehouses that provide for cooling and all subsequent processing after an initial evaluation and possible sorting. Harvesting in the countryside that is not carried out correctly requires long sorting times in the warehouse, which leads to an increase in costs, a delay for the subsequent processing phases, and a lowering of the overall quality and risk of returns. Therefore, it is evident that poor management of the harvesting phase and the further processing steps within the farm produces waste of time and money, which consequently affects the quality and economic value of the final product.
