Yield Prediction for Tomato Greenhouse Using EFuNN

Abstract

In the area of greenhouse operation, yield prediction still relies heavily on human expertise. This paper proposes an automatic tomato yield predictor to assist the human operators in anticipating more effectively weekly fluctuations and avoid problems of both overdemand and overproduction if the yield cannot be predicted accurately. The parameters used by the predictor consist of environmental variables inside the greenhouse, namely, temperature, CO2, vapour pressure deficit (VPD), and radiation, as well as past yield. Greenhouse environment data and crop records from a large scale commercial operation, Wight Salads Group (WSG) in the Isle of Wight, United Kingdom, collected during the period 2004 to 2008, were used to model tomato yield using an Intelligent System called “Evolving Fuzzy Neural Network” (EFuNN). Our results show that the EFuNN model predicted weekly fluctuations of the yield with an average accuracy of 90%. The contribution suggests that the multiple EFUNNs can be mapped to respective task-oriented rule-sets giving rise to adaptive knowledge bases that could assist growers in the control of tomato supplies and more generally could inform the decision making concerning overall crop management practices.