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<p><strong>The climate is changing, the amount of farmland is decreasing, and consumer preferences are shifting. All of this calls for innovation and greater efficiency in agriculture. The mushroom sector is leading the way in this area, as evidenced by Verbruggen Paddestoelen. Recently, in collaboration with the Arnhem-based engineering firm QING, they conducted an exploratory study into the potential of machine learning for sorting and packaging their products.</strong></p><p><img src="https://cms.aihub-oost.nl/uploads/Mh1_Eg_X3_WLAL_Hc8_C_Txa_Ab9_Q_Aivv_R_Sp_C_Iope_Xil_Lc6_aa36366564.jpeg" alt="Mh1EgX3WLALHc8CTxaAb9QAivvRSpCIopeXilLc6.jpeg" srcset="https://cms.aihub-oost.nl/uploads/thumbnail_Mh1_Eg_X3_WLAL_Hc8_C_Txa_Ab9_Q_Aivv_R_Sp_C_Iope_Xil_Lc6_aa36366564.jpeg 245w,https://cms.aihub-oost.nl/uploads/small_Mh1_Eg_X3_WLAL_Hc8_C_Txa_Ab9_Q_Aivv_R_Sp_C_Iope_Xil_Lc6_aa36366564.jpeg 500w," sizes="100vw" width="600" height="377"></p><p>Verbruggen Paddestoelen uses agricultural byproducts as raw materials and grows its crops in climate-controlled chambers. This so-called vertical farming makes efficient use of available space and provides greater control over growing conditions, resulting in reduced land and water requirements.</p><h2>Popular as a Meat Substitute</h2><p>The Erp-based company currently focuses on oyster mushrooms, which are becoming increasingly popular as a meat substitute thanks to their firm and meaty texture. Harvesting, packaging, and sorting oyster mushrooms still involve a great deal of manual labor, and finding suitable staff is becoming increasingly difficult.</p><p>To meet the growing demand, the company is exploring automation opportunities, starting with the sorting and packaging process. To this end, the oyster mushroom grower has entered into a partnership with QING, according to the high-tech engineering firm’s website. Together, they investigated whether it is possible to reliably analyze the oyster mushrooms using image processing.</p><h2>Automatic packing machine</h2><p>The results of this research provided both parties with important insights into the application of conventional image processing and deep learning to extract more value from oyster mushrooms. Specifically, this provided insight into, among other things, the size of the investment required for an automatic packaging machine. Verbruggen is still deciding how to roll out this innovation.</p><p>Want to learn more about AI applications in the agriculture and food industries? Please contact us via the contact form.</p>

Deep Learning Applied to Agriculture

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<p>The climate is changing, the amount of farmland is decreasing, and consumer preferences are shifting. All of this calls for innovation and greater efficiency in agriculture. The mushroom sector is leading the way in this area, as evidenced by Verbruggen Paddestoelen. Recently, they collaborated with the Arnhem-based engineering firm QING to conduct an exploratory study into the potential of machine learning for sorting and packaging their products.</p>