Portal de Cartagena
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Researchers Design Group, automation and control of irrigation in greenhouses UPCT have developed a machine capable of reducing up to 90% the time required for thinning of peach trees.
This breakthrough technology also reduces the economic cost by two-thirds per tree.
The project has been developed jointly with researchers from the Universidad Politécnica de Valencia (UPV) and the Instituto Murciano Research and Agricultural Development and Food (IMIDA).
Thinning is a technique that involves removing part of the flowers or fruits freshly coagulated to allow the remaining fruits have a good commercial size, according to the investigator, Bernardo Martín Górriz, Department of Food Engineering and Agricultural Equipment.
The project aims to use mechanical equipment for clearing faster and with less need for labor, said the professor.
Górriz Martin clarified that the time required for traditional thinning a tree by hand between 20 and 30 minutes, "while when using mechanical equipment, followed by a review by hand or ignoring him, he does the same work between three and ten minutes per tree, "he adds.
The task of clearing accounts for 32% of the labor involved in growing, while picking up 45% and pruning the remaining 22%.
The teacher explains that for commercial peaches are a good enough size and gain weight need to remove between 50 and 60% of flowers of the tree.
The machinery developed in this research is able to reduce between 50 and 90% time of each tree thinning, depending on whether it applies only mechanical thinning and also a review by hand later.
The breakthrough developed is usable in both organic and conventional crops.
Cost savings
The machinery developed allows the clearing of three trees at the same time you can make one by hand.
Thus, "if a person charged six euros per hour to conduct the clearing work, they pay three euros per tree when this work is done by hand, while the use of mechanical equipment reduces the cost to one euro per tree," says the researcher.
Therefore, the cost of this work using the machinery developed is one euro, compared to three euros representing the job done using the traditional technique.
This research project, which began five years ago, is funded by the CARM.
Progress of this research were presented at the Technical Meeting on Fruit Attraction 2010, held in Madrid on 22.
Source: UPCT
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