Fresh Focus Tropicals talks to Marco de Jong, CEO of Experience Fruit Quality, about the company’s bespoke ripening solutions.
Marco, can you tell us how the RipeWise project came about?
Marco de Jong: About two years ago, Adriaan van Beek of De Laat Koudetechniek approached us to work together to design solutions for the future of ripening, using De Laat’s advanced knowledge on ripening rooms and our data/AI skills and experience in the exotic fruit industry. We started exploring how we could collaborate – us providing our software capabilities and our in-house team of 20 people including data-scientists, mathematicians, developers and the like, and De Laat contributing its extensive experience in hardware and in building ripening rooms with new and innovative technologies.
What makes RipeWise so different from other ripening solutions and why do you believe it is a game-changer for the tropicals industry?
MDJ: Up to now, ripeners have had to carry out manual checks on fruit development and separate checks on ripening room conditions on a daily basis. We bring together these perspectives in our software platform, so that ripeners get a better feeling for fruit development in the context of ripening room conditions.
By combining this data, we can support our clients with predictive ripening, providing a solid basis for decision making. Upgrading the hardware in ripening rooms with optimal CO2 and O2 control enables precise steering of ripening cycles. Combining all of this in one solution enables perfectly controlled ripening that can be dynamically planned, monitored and adjusted by ripeners in one easy-to-use software platform: RipeWise. This solution will transform the tropicals industry, as the knowledge gained will increase product quality, planning and shelf-life, leading to satisfied consumers and growing demand. We can help to deliver consistency and a more homogeneous outcome, as well as more control in the decision-making process, which all adds up to greater efficiency from many angles.
What sort of data parameters can RipeWise capture? And what stages in the supply chain do you look at?
MDJ: We’re on a quest to understand fruit development in detail, together with our clients. To do this we capture and link all available data on harvest, cold chain, lab tests, transit, and storage timing and conditions.
Next to this we use cultivar, size, packaging, grower and other available meta data. During ripening we mix this with the planning and desired ripening target (such as ready-to-eat) and all the sensor data we get from within ripening rooms on temperature, CO2, ethylene, oxygen, humidity and airflow.
What do De Laat’s high-tech ripening cells add to the mix?
MDJ: Our goal is to deliver optimal control for the ripening team, whilst saving as much energy and resources as possible. De Laat’s high-tech ripening cells optimise temperature and airflow conditions using as little energy as possible. Its control system enables us to not only read sensor data in real time, but also feed back adjustments to ripening conditions based on our recipes, ripening planning and checks by ripeners.
So does that mean that other than delivering more consistent fruit quality, RipeWise is also more sustainable than other ripening solutions?
MDJ: Consistency of output is key, as it makes the ripening process more efficient. It means you have fewer pallet movements, there is no need to sort fruit after ripening, and less rework (pallets that have to go back into ripening). Furthermore, RipeWise allows the ripeners to spend less time on checks and more time on fine-tuning ripening for difficult batches or unforeseen planning events, such as a customer postponing their order.
What fruits is RipeWise configured to ripen currently?
MDJ: RipeWise is fully launched, and we’re starting our first customer trials this month. Currently our focus is on bananas and avocados, but we’re keen to use our vast knowledge to get to the same level of expertise in mangoes. We regard RipeWise as a high-tech toolbox for ripeners, so mango ripeners can already start to reap the benefits of the system with the current set-up.
More generally, how would you say our understanding of the avocado ripening process has evolved in recent years, and in what ways is this helping to shape the next generation of ripening solutions being developed?
MDJ: By testing avocados in a laboratory setting – and making sure we really test one condition at a time – we have learned a lot on how different factors play a role in ripening. This has enabled us to start creating what we believe are optimal ripening recipes to control ripening and increase consistency of outcomes.
What we have learnt from this phase has enabled us to start actively controlling the ripening, integrating all sensor input and previous learnings. This path is exactly what experienced ripeners can use going forward to keep learning and optimizing their ripening of avocados.
Interview by Maura Maxwell.
