The World’s First Commercial Strawberry Harvesting Robot in Türkiye: A New Era in Agriculture
As the use of technology in the agricultural sector accelerates, robotic solutions are opening up a new chapter especially in labour-intensive and time-consuming harvesting processes. Today, many producers, particularly in greenhouses and orchards, struggle to find qualified harvest workers. In fact, even when companies plan their investments, they must first focus on regions with sufficient agricultural labour potential.
Rising labour costs, seasonal worker shortages and yield losses are putting the need for automation in agriculture on the agenda. This is exactly where smart robots developed for harvesting delicate fruits such as strawberries come into play.
Innovative Solution: Skilled Harvesting Robots
The autonomous strawberry harvesting robot developed by Dogtooth is designed to detect ripe strawberries in the greenhouse using AI-powered computer vision systems and gently pick them. This robotic system can harvest delicate fruit without causing damage by working around the clock.
The world’s first commercial strawberry picking robot is now in Türkiye and stands as a herald of a new era in agriculture. Developed by UK-based Dogtooth Technologies, this “skilled harvest robot” offers an innovative answer to the labour shortages faced in strawberry production. Equipped with two arms, the robot uses artificial intelligence and computer vision to detect ripe fruit with a sensitivity beyond the human eye and, thanks to its special mechanism, cuts strawberries from the stem without squeezing or bruising them.
Moreover, its integrated quality control system first inspects every harvested fruit with five cameras at 360°, then evaluates it against 16 different parameters and selects only those that meet the predefined standards. It also weighs each strawberry and places it directly into retail-ready punnets of different sizes (250–350–500 g) in the crate. In this way, unwanted or defective products are eliminated at the very start of the process and consistent product quality and standardisation are ensured.
Because it harvests without touching the soft red flesh of the strawberry, it minimises returns caused by bruising and eliminates the need for additional labour for weighing and sorting.
Efficiency and Performance: Up to 300 kg of Harvest Per Day
Advanced harvesting robots reduce dependence on human labour while delivering consistent and high performance to growers. Under appropriate conditions, Dogtooth’s fifth-generation robot can harvest approximately 300 kg of strawberries per day without compromising on quality.
Unlike humans, the robot can operate day and night without fatigue or breaks. This uninterrupted operation offers a major advantage for large-scale producers who face labour bottlenecks during peak harvest seasons.
Dogtooth notes that its new-generation robots can operate continuously across day and night shifts, enabling agricultural production to keep pace with rising demand. In periods of high seasonal temperatures, they can also harvest during the cooler night hours when greenhouses are at their most favourable, thereby increasing the volume of premium-quality produce.
Key Technical Features and Advantages
With its delicate picking capability and robust analytics platform, the Dogtooth strawberry harvesting robot clearly differentiates itself from conventional harvesting methods:
- High Harvest Capacity: Under nominal conditions, a single robot can harvest around 300 kg of strawberries per day. Compared with the quantity a skilled worker can harvest in a full day under varying standards, this represents a significant leap in productivity.
- Continuous and Flexible Operation: Subject to charging and maintenance planning, the robot offers 24/7 operating potential. With additional lighting it can harvest at night as well, extending the harvest window and ensuring fruit is picked at its freshest.
- AI-Enabled Precision Harvesting: Leveraging advanced sensors and AI-driven camera systems, the robot harvests only those ripe strawberries that meet your predefined standards. It can perform pinpoint harvesting to fulfil export-market demands for strawberries with 20% or 30% white (White Shoulder) colouring. This boosts customer satisfaction and prevents returns arising from harvesting errors.
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Damage-Free Premium Harvest: The robot’s soft-touch gripping and cutting mechanism harvests strawberries by cutting them from the stem without squeezing. Each fruit is instantly scanned by the integrated five-camera system against 16 parameters; bruised or defective fruits are separated, and only top-grade strawberries are placed into the crates. This significantly increases the share of supermarket-grade product.
- Beyond strawberry picking, the robot can also prune long shoots hanging from the gutter edges simply by changing the scissor attachments on the robot arms. This translates into savings on pruning labour costs.
- Compatibility with Standard Greenhouses: Dogtooth robots are designed to integrate with existing greenhouse infrastructure that uses heating rail systems. They can move smoothly in standard table-top systems, glass greenhouses or tunnel greenhouse rows. For ground-level operation, the robot requires a double-rail system with a minimum gap of 55 cm (it can run on existing heating pipes) and a gutter spacing of 110 cm. In addition, CE certification confirms that it can safely share the same working environment as people.
Agriculture Growing with Technology: Fertima
As one of the pioneers of digital transformation in agriculture, Fertima brings this innovative robotic technology to Türkiye in line with its vision of “agriculture growing with technology”. With an expert team boasting more than 15 years of experience, Fertima delivers solutions in agricultural automation and, through its collaboration with Dogtooth, aims to offer a breakthrough harvesting experience to producers in our country. This robotic system is a true game-changer especially for businesses engaged in greenhouse cultivation and large-scale fruit production. Producers who struggle to find labour or wish to boost efficiency can now strengthen their competitiveness with such smart automation solutions. In this way, land without agricultural labour potential can also be incorporated into the ecosystem through new greenhouses to be built in these regions.
Similar solutions in the sector include automatic tomato harvesting robots already deployed in European greenhouses. Dogtooth is working on a project that will allow truss tomatoes to be harvested without damaging the plant, using the same approach as with strawberry picking. Our strawberry harvesting robot is part of this global trend, taking efficiency, sustainability and smart production in agriculture one step further. By introducing this technology to the Turkish agricultural sector, we at Fertima aim to help our producers remain competitive in the era of digital agriculture.
In conclusion, skilled harvesting robots herald the beginning of a new age in agriculture. Starting with strawberry fields and expanding to other crops, these robotic solutions will increase productivity while reducing costs and post-harvest losses in agricultural production. By bringing advanced technologies to our farmers, we will jointly drive digital transformation in agriculture. If you would like to get to know this innovative robot and learn more, Fertima is always ready to engage with you. The agriculture of the future is meeting today’s technology – and we are proud to be at the forefront of this transformation.
Technical Specifications and Operational Structure: Robot Operating Conditions
For the Dogtooth strawberry harvesting robot to operate effectively, certain technical conditions must be met. This system is supported not only by high-end technology but also by smart planning:
- Each robot is equipped with two batteries and can operate continuously for 8 hours, harvesting on average 100 kg of strawberries. With three shifts per day, this capacity can reach up to 300 kg.
- Each robot comes with two additional spare batteries, which can be fully charged in just 5 hours. No separate charging station is required.
- Human labour is still needed for tasks such as battery replacement, monitoring and guiding the rail route, and changing the crates of harvested strawberries. The system is not designed to remove people entirely; rather, it aims to establish a structure that supports and complements human labour. Approximately 20% human contribution is still required.
- After each strawberry is picked, the robot transfers it to the integrated analysis chamber. Here, the fruit is scanned with five different cameras for a full 360-degree inspection and assessed against 16 parameters. Fruits that do not meet criteria such as the defined white-to-red colour ratio are directed straight to a separate waste bin, without coming into contact with healthy products.
- For the robot to operate, the greenhouse must have a double-rail infrastructure at least 55 cm wide (including existing heating pipes) and a gutter spacing of 110 cm. This allows seamless integration with the existing infrastructure.
- The robot technology is supported by AI-powered software that continuously updates itself. This enables the robot to deliver new functionalities over time and further enhance its productivity.