High technology - computer electronics (macro)_4279072

Fresh produce businesses are turning to cloud IT systems 

There’s a cloud hanging over the fresh produce business, but the outlook is far from grey. That’s because it’s an online, digital cloud holding an increasingly dense collection of data relating to production, distribution and demand. In theory, that data will soon trickle down to all parts of the supply chain and precipitate the greatest burst of productivity since the introduction of the shipping container just over 60 years ago. As information and communication technologies continue to develop, more and more fruit and vegetable companies could potentially harvest huge crops of information. The challenge, it appears, will be to dig out data that is useful and analyse it in such a way that significant improvement and innovation is possible.

The most obvious area in which this so-called ‘big data’ is already proving its worth is the food retail arena, where for some time the bigger operators have kept track of everything their customers do in order to provide them with better products at the right time. But whereas in the past their response to the data has been concentrated mainly around loyalty and discount schemes – offering incentives where demand has previously occurred – more and more retailers are using data to forecast demand itself and tweak their procurement accordingly.

Adam Yeoman is responsible for developing store-ordering systems at Tesco. “We developed a weather model to predict effects of weather on sales,” he explains in an interview with Tableau, a company that helps its customers visualise the data they generate. As a result, he says, the retailer can now predict with far more accuracy when an event it calls the ‘hot weekend’ will occur, boosting food sales as a result. “So we want to make sure we get all the barbecue foods and salad and rolls into the stores in time for that weekend,” Yeoman continues. “And we knew from previous hot weekends that there were some stores that we could improve on and provide better availability for customers. We put the data into Tableau, and just showing that on a map, you instantly see, ‘Oh, these are the stores in which we need to be doing a better job’.”

Sebastiaan Schreijen, a food analyst at Dutch financial group Rabobank, believes big data – by which he means the aggregation of information that explains consumer behaviour – is going to take the world of foodservice by storm in the near future. “The most successful bar and restaurant owners have a really good gut feeling for what their customers want, what the effect might be of certain weather conditions or events and how to work around those variables if necessary. Big data supports them by providing them with concrete information, based on which they can then make decisions on aspects such as menus, ingredients, prices and special offers.”

The feedback loop

Inevitably, greater accuracy in the market itself is throwing down an even greater challenge at the other end of the supply chain, particularly as growers and marketers are now under far greater pressure to ensure that the volumes they promise to deliver are indeed forthcoming. In turn, this is creating an opportunity for companies like Fresh4Cast, a UK-based data analytics start-up specialising in the fresh produce industry, to offer more detailed and accurate information. As its chief executive, Mihai Ciobanu, explains, the discrepancies that occur between what’s predicted and what is produced are a major problem for fruit and vegetable suppliers. Customers, especially those in the modern retail business, don’t appreciate suppliers saying they will have a certain volume and then falling short; but on the flip-side, deliberately over-producing in order to avoid such a shortfall is an extremely inefficient and costly way of working.

Fresh4Cast combines historical export data from several Latin American countries with a data mining and forecasting service, something which Ciobanu says can help growers quantify the impact of ambient factors on their yield. Greater demand for accurate yield forecasting has also prompted technologists to devise better ways of producing crops. At a high-security facility in Bleiswijk, near Rotterdam in the Netherlands, research group Delphy is taking production of crops including tomatoes and strawberries to a whole new level by recording and analysing the yields achieved using different combinations of coloured lighting. Lianne Schuddebeurs is part of a team overseeing one such trial that could provide growers with the means necessary to grow strawberries throughout the winter, based on creating optimum conditions for the plants. “LED lighting allows you to choose the colours and improve efficiency, which improves cultivation,” she comments.

For growers, one of the most crucial questions is: when does a plant need water? According to Timo Tarkianen of Dutch horticultural technology firm Priva, data can be used to answer that question if you factor in a whole array of variables, including transpiration rates, radiation levels, wind speed, humidity and evaporation. To that end, Priva has devised a system that harnesses all of the available numbers to deliver ideal irrigation levels throughout the day, thereby achieving better absorption of nutrients.

So-called smart farming is fast becoming a reality, according to Rabobank’s recently published report From Intuitive to Fact-Based Farming, which noted how data-intensive farming utilised new sensor technology to collect and process information that can then be used to optimise crop growth. “This allows farmers to tailor inputs and fine-tune application rates and cultivation activities down to the square metre,” comments analyst Harry Smit. “Over time, aggregation of data from many farmers will drive the development of even better agronomic decisions that can be customised and automated.” He predicts that rooting agriculture in data could easily add at least $10 billion per year to the value of field crop production worldwide, but accepts that this is easier said than done and will likely involve fundamental changes to current ways of working.

Joining up the dots

Rich Bown, a consultant at Innovia, says industries and markets could become far more collaborative as the interconnected nature of the world and its ability to share information – referred to as the ‘internet of things’ – becomes more and more evident and widespread. Demand for instant, universal communication between people and technology is apparently making it possible to create networks that can adapt themselves depending on the feedback they receive: for example, urban farming projects are able to collect waste water – excluding toilet waste – and use it to irrigate crops, at the same time delivering precise doses of fertiliser based on a direct measurement of how healthy the crop is.”

Danish shipping company Maersk Line also wants to use big data to modernise global logistics. Sheren Zarkani, the group’s head of reefer management, says transport documentation remains very much “in the stone age”, but there are signs this may be changing. Nearly six months ago, Maersk began the Herculean task of marking all of its 262,000 refrigerated containers with a chip. This will enable it to locate, and relocate, equipment faster than before. “We are currently working with the data to see how it can be used effectively,” Zarkani reveals.

Going forward, technical devices like readers, controllers and chips will continue to add real-time data collection as the information pool expands exponentially. “For many companies, however, it is still a challenge to get a sensible analysis out of the flood of data which these devices present,” says Gerry Daalhuisen, vice president product management at Kewill. “An efficient cloud-based system which can streamline and consolidate data is becoming essential to help organisations deal with the pressure – and make the most of the information they have.”

People say knowledge is power, but with the arrival of big data then it seems probable that, in future, the power will lie with those that can understand the knowledge they have, before acting decisively upon it.