Automation and robotics in greenhouses

This chapter provides an overview of the state of the art of automation technology in protected cultivation and looks ahead to future directions for achieving further progress in this field. The chapter provides a generic description of the greenhouse crop production process and then uses it as a reference for reviewing the state of the art in automation and robotics. The chapter explains those tasks in protected cultivation that have already been automated and identifies those tasks that are predominantly still the domain of human labour. The chapter outlines the requirements for the technology capable of doing these tasks. The chapter describes the ongoing research in automation and robotics in protected cultivation and concludes with a description of the challenges facing high-tech systems in protected cultivation.