Home Grown: Harvest automation is the newest farmer on the field

YUMA, Ariz. (KYMA, KECY) - In today's Home Grown, we look at a way that man and machine can co-exist side by side in the field.

There are millions of dollars invested in harvesting each year, but with a continuous labor shortage, it makes it difficult to get crops out of the dirt.

Thinning, weeding and spraying have already shifted to machine labor in our area.

Harvesting, on the other hand, is much more difficult because a robot would have to replicate a human being.

"You're looking at something. You're evaluating it. You're making a decision," said Dennis Donohue, executive director of the Western Growers Association. "You know, if you're looking at a strawberry, is it red, does it have white shoulder, is it no good."

Harvesting is a difficult process because a machine would have to have the same evaluation capabilities as a farmer.

Even though nothing can compare to the human eye, farmers feel switching to harvest automation is a necessary step in feeding America.