INSTITUT FÜR AGRARTECHNIK BORNIM e.V.
Ein Institut der Wissenschaftsgemeinschaft Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz
INSTITUT FÜR AGRARTECHNIK BORNIM e.V.Ein Institut der Wissenschaftsgemeinschaft Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz
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Potsdam, September 10, 2001
Horticultural Science: 6th International Symposium on Fruit, Nut, and Vegetable Production Engineering
Some 150 scientists from 30 countries attended the International Symposium on Fruit, Nut and Vegetable Production Engineering from 11 to 14 September 2001. The series of symposiums that started in Israel in 1983 and was most recently held four years ago in Davis, California, is hosted in a different country every three to four years. In 2001 the symposium was organised by the Horticultural Engineering Department of the Institute of Agricultural Engineering, Bornim, and held in the Auditorium Maximum of the University of Potsdam at the Neues Palais. The latest research results in the fields of fruit, vegetable and nut production were presented in 132 papers.
As in the rest of the agricultural sector, this segment too has seen major structural changes during recent years which were also reflected in the contributions at the symposium. High fruit and vegetable quality, environmentally sound production and product safety are the demands currently made by consumers. However, the problem is how to tackle these demands with precisely measurable criteria, that are not yet available in standardised form.
Both cultivation engineering in the field and harvesting as well as the post-harvesting period were dealt with in different sections of the symposium. One group devoted itself to the theme of Humankind and Work. One of the processes presented consisted of machine control purely by language.
A workshop organised within the context of the symposium and entitled "Artificial Sensing Technology for Estimating Quality" (ASTEQ) looked at current developments in non-destructive sensors in the international research landscape. The action, supported by the European Commission, attracted a large number of visitors and established contacts between the work groups.
Another thematic area on which the symposium focused was the support of cultivation and harvesting work by Precision Farming. Potential approaches for transferring this technology for farm crops to permanent crops in market gardening were discussed.
The organisers would like to thank the sponsors from industry and the organisations ASAE (American Society Agricultural Engineers), EurAgEng (European Society of Agricultural Engineers), JSAM (Japanese Society for Agricultural Machinery), and AAAE (Asian Association for Agricultural Engineering) for their support. The next symposium in this series will be held in four years time at CEMAGREF in Montpellier.
For more information please contact:
Martin Geyer, Bernd Herold or Manuela Zude
Institute of Agricultural Engineering Bornim (ATB)
Horticultural Engineering, Max-Eyth-Allee 100
14469 Potsdam-Bornim
Email: mzude@atb-potsdam.de