Technology Speeds the Pistachio Harvest

"From mid-August to mid-October every year, Paramount Farms of California's San Joaquin Valley processes roughly 11,000 loads of the year's pistachio harvest. For optimum quality, the nuts have to get from the tree to the huller as quickly as possible, without ever touching the ground. Since 2002, Paramount has been removing bottlenecks from the harvest process using a variety of computer technologies—RFID tags, bar code readers, Pocket PCs, networking, Web services, databases, and programmable logic controllers (PLCs)—tied together with software written using the Microsoft.NET Framework. Paramount has not only improved the speed of the harvest, it has also improved its accuracy at every step, reduced unnecessary data entry, and provided better visibility to management and growers alike."

Technology Speeds the Pistachio Harvest