The huge value of the global apple market – approximately US$79bn per year – can profitably sustain the many thousands of growers and packers able to stay competitive. And staying competitive is made much easier by adopting today’s state-of-the-art sorting and grading technologies, which solve the challenges faced today.
Solutions are available for businesses of almost every size, whether they pack 4,000 or 10,000 tonnes per year. These solutions enable packhouses to ensure product quality; to improve efficiency by ensuring the optimum market mix goes into each box; to improve sustainability by reducing food waste; and to improve traceability backwards and forwards along the supply chain. All of this empowers packhouses to enhance or protect their market position.
These solutions are offered by TOMRA Food, manufacturer of optical inspecting, sorting and grading machines for the food industry. TOMRA’s technologies allow packhouses to reduce the labor required for sorting whilst significantly improving the consistency, accuracy, and packout of the sorted product.
TOMRA’s innovative, industry-leading solutions for apple packhouse operations include the TOMRA 5S Advanced sorting and sizing platform, Spectrim sorter and grader, UltraView inspection module, and Inspectra² apple grading system.
The TOMRA 5S Advanced is the only platform designed for hygienic operation, with toolless cleaning and sanitization, and 100% stainless steel and food-safe polymer contact areas. Unrivaled efficiencies are made possible by the machine’s specialized software features and connectivity to the data platform TOMRA Insight.
TOMRA Insight can make sorting machines the digital heart of packhouse operations and enables better flow of information up and down the supply chain, and opens a pathway to traceability from bin to pack.
When using Spectrim, first the apples are sorted according to surface blemishes. Then they are graded on minor and major defects, including skin blemishes, insect damage, misshapen fruit, bruising, and abrasions.
The UltraView inspection module integrates with Spectrim to take its ‘seeing’ power to the next level. With a dedicated set of high-resolution multi-spectral (color and infrared) cameras and LED lights located ideally close to the fruit and parallel to its direction of travel, this is the world’s most powerful fresh produce grading platform.
Inspectra² is a non-invasive solution for internal defect grading. This platform’s near-infrared spectrometer can detect brix, core rot, internal browning, water core, firmness, hue, and bleeding. These detection capabilities keep bad apples out of a good box and reduce fruit giveaway.
