Abstract

Over the past three years, the AHDB -funded GROWBOT project has shown the significant potential of robotics as a route to addressing these challenges by reducing the dependency on human labour for horticultural businesses through robotic automation, specifically using the paradigm of programming by demonstration (PbD) of so-called collaborative robots. By developing automation systems which can be deployed directly by the grower, when and where it is required, this technology offers benefits to both workers and businesses. This talk will outline some of the efforts the Robot Learning Lab at King’s College London is making in making robotic systems suitable for use by non-expert users, such that ‘low hanging fruit’ – in automation terms – might be harvested.