The food industry was transforming and focused on automation.

To stay competitive, food processing industry players must apply automation solutions.

FREMONT, CA: Agribusiness is fighting rising labor costs, labor turnover, and increasing costs from food waste. The impacts of the COVID-19 crisis, comprising virus outbreaks in processing and packaging and the related shutdowns, have intensified these hurdles. Meanwhile, food prices have not risen to cope with higher costs, resulting in compressed margins. A transformation aimed at automation and AI is taking center stage. It is also more effective than implementing conventional lean methods that capture only incremental enhancements in process efficiency. With the considerate deployment of automation and AI, agriculture companies could see results within a short period.

The pandemic has sped up efforts to address hurdles to keep operations profitable and open for firms. Digital technologies, especially automation, offer practical solutions. The decrease in manual work optimizes processes, reduces waste, and improves safety. It also allows companies to deploy people to more value-adding tasks. The capital investment required for digital technologies is less than needed for a full-scale operations redesign. The time frame for accomplishing a return on investment is measured in months. Poor methods can lay the groundwork for implementing automation and AI by driving process effectiveness.

An implementation program starts with a powerful vision that navigates the growth of agribusiness solutions and a digital operating model. New capacity and talent are essential to help the effort. They are establishing an ambitious but achievable vision and combining it across functions. A successful concept can express several objectives, such as allowing a broad strategy, attaining a competitive advantage, enhancing customer service, rising speed and resilience, and mitigating costs.

The problems of automated food processing are significant, but so are the payoffs from getting it right. Firms must turn to automation to unlatch the next wave of required enhancements, having already applied conventional levers. Today’s unique hurdles demand nothing less than instant actions to explore the potential and implement solutions.