In Japan, there is a high demand to automate agricultural work due to the decreasing birthrate and aging population. As one of the measures to address the problem, robots are drawing attention.
At the recent International Robot Exhibition, a forum titled “Future of Japanese Agriculture Cultivated by Robot Technologies” was organized. And agricultural robots were exhibited at the booths of businesses and universities.
Among others there was the tomato-harvesting robot. With a camera and range image sensor attached to each of the main body and the tips of the two robotic arms, the tomato-harvesting robot recognizes the bunches and fruits of tomatoes. When it detects a targeted fruit, two units of the “UR5” multi-joint robot, which was developed by Denmark-based Universal Robots A/S, function as arms and collect the fruit. At this point, the time it takes from searching to harvesting is 20 seconds.