November 2022 - 13

Over 37,000 Wind Machines Sold Worldwide!
industry are clients, he said, and some
of the largest citrus, stonefruit, table
grape and mixed vegetable growers on
the West Coast use the service.
The core function of PickTrace,
the ability to track time, attendance
and productivity, enables growers to
use real-time data gathering via the
cloud to make decisions to optimize
efficiency during harvest, thinning or a
number of different field tasks.
While the ability to track labor
to that degree is an advantage
during normal harvests, Zemer said
PickTrace was instrumental in 2020,
as daily work rosters were wildly
changing with employees entering or
completing lockdown because of the
COVID-19 pandemic.
" It became much more important
to understand in real time the pace at
which the workforce that you do have
is moving, and how you allocate those
resources in a way that's going to put
the business in the best position to
maximize the amount of fruit you can
harvest, " Zemer said. " Instead of having
a crew running in a block that doesn't
have the urgency to be harvested now,
how do you pivot those people to a
block that actually does need to be
harvested now?
" Or do you have the people in the
block that are moving fast enough that
are going to get it off the trees in the
next two to three days? " he said " We
saw a lot of growers deeply analyze
the pace of their workforce, but also
the projected man hours needed
to complete a block and looking at
those projections and then allocating
resources appropriately to deliver to
meet those projections. "
Crew leaders are also finding their day
isn't prolonged in the field as they wrap
up paperwork and other administrative
tasks, or don't spend time on Sundays
consolidating time cards and sending
reports to accounting or human
resources, he said.
The system eliminates the need
for banks of filing cabinets to hold
paperwork , and improves the ability
to prove compliance during audits and
inspections, Zemer said, with all reports
and paperwork digitized and searchable.
" One of the recurring themes with
PickTrace is it is driving paperless
processes and removing paper from the
operation, " he said.
Ag-tech award recognition
PickTrace was named a recipient of
a 2022 AgTech Breakthrough Award,
in the Labor Management Solution
of the Year category. The awards
program recognizes the achievements
of ag-tech companies and solutions in
categories including farm management,
indoor farming, automation, robotics,
analytics and more.
" As growers experience a continued
rise in labor cost, the industry has
been challenged to understand how
they can effectively manage their rising
labor cost, remain compliant and drive
a profitable growing operation, " said
Bryan Vaughn, managing director
of AgTech Breakthrough, in a news
release. FGN
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Authorized Distributor of Orchard-Rite® Wind Machines
FGN | NOVEMBER 2022 | 13
http://www.orchard-rite.com http://www.fruit-treesales.com
November 2022

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of November 2022
