The automated farm
In Salinas Valley, the future of farming is already here.
In the field, self-propelling harvesters lop off the heads of cabbages, then funnel the 8-pound goliaths to workers who trim and sort them. Inside a nearby Taylor Farms packing plant, a threearmed robot pivots and turns to maneuver bagged salads squarely into packing boxes.
Taylor Farms is a prime example of changes to come in the valley. When harvesting 1.5 million to 1.6 million pounds of iceberg lettuce a day, as the Salinas producer of bagged salads and fresh-cut vegetables does, automation starts to make sense.
Although one of the biggest players in Salinas Valley, which produces so many greens and other vegetables that it has been dubbed America’s Salad Bowl, Taylor Farms is not alone in its move toward automation. Two major factors have driven technology in the region. One is food safety, a major priority ever since the deadly 2006 e. coli outbreak that was traced back to locally grown spinach. Robotic arms are less likely to transmit pathogens than humans are, decreasing food safety risk. The bigger and more recent push for ag tech, however, has come from rising wages coupled with a labor shortage.
“It’s creating a sustainable solution for 10 years down the road,” says Chris Rotticci, the company’s director of automated harvest equipment. “People are not consuming less salad; they’re consuming more.”
Industry and labor insiders say automation and robotics will only increase in the next five to 10 years, with California’s minimum wage due to rise to $15 per hour by 2023, and the passage of AB1066, which calls for stricter overtime pay rules for agricultural workers. And while agricultural workers are in short supply now, the labor balance could always shift toward a surplus, in which case any jobs replaced by machines could be gone forever.
“In the end, I think technology is going to really change the shape of this valley,” says Cesar Lara, executive director of the Monterey Bay Central Labor Council.
Taylor Farms contracts with farmers who plant and grow their greens and vegetables. At harvest time, it brings crews into the fields and then delivers the produce to its 14 plants for trimming, washing and packaging. The company’s salads, Taylor Farms in Monterey County, one of North America’s largest producers of fresh-cut fruits and vegetables, uses automation to help harvest and ship its products. Above: Cleaned leafy greens fall into a hopper where they are weighed before falling into the packaging level. Right: A robot’s vacuum suctions lift salad cartons to place them into boxes for shipping.
vegetable snack trays, stir-fry kits and other products go to both retail stores and food-service companies. With a weekly output of 120 million servings per week, it’s one of North America’s largest producers of fresh-cut fruits and vegetables.
Last year, Taylor Farms became an investor in the company Soft Robotics, which designs grippers that can be used for handling bruisable produce, and has worked with UC Davis and others to develop its technology.
With produce coming in at a constant stream, its plant in Gonzales (Monterey County) stays in production six days a week, from 5:30 a.m. to 12:30 a.m., when a night crew hoses it down. But finding enough workers is difficult, says Jerrett Stoffel, vice president of operations at Taylor Farms, especially for less popular and physically deay