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Mechanization Efforts in Fruit Tree Pruning and Thinning

Author

Listed:
  • Karkee, Manoj
  • Vougioukas, Stavros
  • Devadoss, Stephen
  • Bhusal, Santosh

Abstract

Farm labor shortages and increasing costs represent significant challenges to specialty crop production. Fruit production in particular involves numerous laborintensive tasks that must be carried out within a limited time. Fruit growers rely heavily on a diminishing workforce of migrant workers and a smaller number of temporary, H-2A guest workers (Devadoss and Luckstead, 2008; Devadoss and Luckstead, 2018; Devadoss and Luckstead, 2019). However, bureaucracy, unnecessary delays, and higher costs make it difficult for farmers to rely on the H-2A program (Luckstead and Devadoss, 2019; Devadoss, 2021). As a result, fruit growers are in dire need of labor-saving technologies to mechanize labor-intensive operations such as pruning, thinning, and harvesting.

Suggested Citation

  • Karkee, Manoj & Vougioukas, Stavros & Devadoss, Stephen & Bhusal, Santosh, 2025. "Mechanization Efforts in Fruit Tree Pruning and Thinning," Choices: The Magazine of Food, Farm, and Resource Issues, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 40(2), May.
    • Handle: RePEc:ags:aaeach:356843
    DOI: 10.22004/ag.econ.356843
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