55. Supporting growers to keep Europe’s wine flowing!
Duration 00:31:12
Spotify
Apple Podcasts
YouTube
Transcript
CORDIScovery podcast- Episode #55 - Supporting growers to keep Europe’s wine flowing!
This is an AI transcription.
00:00:18:01 - 00:00:45:09
Abigail Acton
Hello and welcome to this episode of CORDIScovery with me, Abigail Acton. People often forget just how significant the wine industry is in Europe. Across the EU, there are about 2.2 million winegrowing farms looking after a roughly 3.2 million hectares of vines. And every year, those vineyards turn out something like 150 million hectoliters of wine. That's around 20 billion bottles.
00:00:45:11 - 00:01:08:01
Abigail Acton
When the entire value chain is taken into consideration, from growing the grapes to selling the bottles, the wine sector brings in around 130 billion a year to the EU economy and supports close to 3 million jobs, mostly in rural areas. Wine exports alone are worth about 18 billion a year, making wine one of Europe's top agri-food exports.
00:01:08:03 - 00:01:32:08
Abigail Acton
But although the numbers are impressive, the industry is facing serious challenges. The last few harvests have been hit hard by droughts, heatwaves, heavy rain and disease. EU wine production in 2023 and 2024 was among the lowest of the century. And worldwide wine consumption has dropped to its lowest level since the mid-1990s. Growers are getting squeezed from both sides.
00:01:32:10 - 00:01:55:02
Abigail Acton
More unstable harvests and weaker demand. When a bottle is poured, it isn't just a drink on the table, it's part of a sector that keeps villages alive and brings billions into the economy. So what can we do to help the situation? Our three guests, all of whom have received support from the EU's Research and innovation funding programs, have some intriguing ideas.
00:01:55:04 - 00:02:11:19
Abigail Acton
Filipe Neves dos Santos develops autonomous robots and machinery which can operate safely on steep slopes for the agricultural and forestry sectors. He works at the Centre for Robotics in Industry and Intelligent Systems, INESC TEC, in Portugal. Hello, Filipe.
00:02:11:21 - 00:02:13:02
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Hello, Abigail.
00:02:13:04 - 00:02:28:12
Abigail Acton
Zoe Doulgeri is professor of Robotics and Control of Manufacturing Systems at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. Her current research interests include learning and control of unimanual and bimanual robotic object manipulation. Hello, Zoe.
00:02:28:14 - 00:02:29:15
Zoe Doulgeri
Hello everybody.
00:02:29:15 - 00:02:31:15
Zoe Doulgeri
Glad to be part of this podcast.
00:02:31:16 - 00:02:50:19
Abigail Acton
We're very happy to have you here. Gustavo Pérez González is a senior project manager and PhD in chemistry at the Autonomous University of Barcelona. He specialises in analytical chemistry specifically to develop secure, traceable and immutable solutions for wine authentication. Welcome, Gustavo.
00:02:50:21 - 00:02:51:17
Gustavo Pérez González
Hello.
00:02:51:19 - 00:03:11:16
Abigail Acton
Very nice to have you. Filipe I'm going to turn to you first. The SCORPION project wanted to help farmers reduce the amount of chemicals they use when spraying their crops, but at the same time maintaining the yield, efficiency and value. So, Filipe tell us a little bit about the problem your project wanted to help solve for example, in the context of wine producing.
00:03:11:18 - 00:03:40:14
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Well, Abigail, in the context of the wine production in Portugal, we have a specific reality that also exists in ten countries in Europe that is producing the wine in steep slope vineyards. These steep slop vineyards produce the amazing Port wine, as all of you know, and it's a premium quality wine. But there is a problem that is there is scarcity of human labor to work on this context.
00:03:40:16 - 00:04:05:13
Filipe Neves dos Santos
And we have a problem that you have mentioned before, that is the context of climate changes, where we need solutions to make these vineyards more sustainable. And what we have done here, we have solved the problem in two ways. One thing is to find machinery that could operate on these kind of steep slope vineyards. Okay. And the second situation was find solutions that can avoid the use of chemical products on its vineyards.
00:04:05:13 - 00:04:31:06
Filipe Neves dos Santos
And so here emerge the SCORPION project where we have developed a robot that could navigate in this kind of vineyards without falling through the vineyard and could navigate it without GNSS or GPS available. And we have also developed novel technology or implement tools to apply chemical products or UVB light treatments to these vineyards to make them sustainable.
00:04:31:08 - 00:04:38:18
Abigail Acton
Fantastic. That sounds very interesting, but some things I need to break down though with you a little bit. UVB treatments, what is this?
00:04:38:20 - 00:04:52:22
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Well, the UVB treatments. This is the kind of light spectrum that we have on the light, which we can apply to the vineyards, and the fungi are not good to angle with this kind of light.
00:04:53:03 - 00:05:07:20
Abigail Acton
Okay. So let me just break that down further. So basically there are some pests that will potentially cause damage to the vines in the form of fungi. And if you shine a certain type of light on the fungi, it causes them to retract or break down. Is that correct?
00:05:07:21 - 00:05:29:17
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Exactly. There are some fungi in vineyards that, during the day, put some kind of umbrella to protect against the sun. Right? But during the night, they close the umbrella to not use so much energy. And if you apply the UVB light treatment during this time, you can kill these fungi.
00:05:29:20 - 00:05:40:20
Abigail Acton
Very good. I mean, it sounds a little bit sneaky, but it also sounds very good. So you come along while they're sleeping and you zap them. Okay. And of course, that then saves the chemicals from, you know, instead of spraying.
00:05:41:01 - 00:05:55:09
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Yeah. You can avoid some kinds of fungicides that might be harmful for the environment. And in theory, this is a novel treatment that might have a positive impact in the sustainability of the system.
00:05:55:11 - 00:05:58:22
Abigail Acton
Fantastic. And I imagine maybe might be applicable to other crops.
00:05:58:24 - 00:06:17:01
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Yeah, this is applicable to other crops, indeed, the UVB treatments are being already applied in greenhouses for tomatoes production, and there are some benefits on using them. Of course, like other treatments, it should be used with some, limitations and regulations. Okay.
00:06:17:06 - 00:06:17:15
Abigail Acton
Yeah.
00:06:17:18 - 00:06:18:10
Abigail Acton
Some caution.
00:06:18:10 - 00:06:23:23
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Yeah, exactly. Because if we kill the good ones, we might kill also the bad ones. Well, in the positive way.
00:06:24:00 - 00:06:27:05
Abigail Acton
Yeah, the other way around. Yeah. You might, you might get more than you were thinking. Indeed.
00:06:27:05 - 00:06:27:21
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Yeah. Exactly.
00:06:27:23 - 00:06:35:10
Abigail Acton
Okay, now tell me a little bit more about the steep slope vineyards, because obviously that must be very challenging. And also the issue of labor.
00:06:35:16 - 00:06:58:16
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Yeah. So Portugal has different landscapes in the reality of our country, and in the north we have more mountains. Then, in these mountains we have found a way to use this landscape to produce wine. Okay. But this in the past, and like it was agriculture in the past, this was mostly done by human hands.
00:06:58:16 - 00:07:05:11
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Right? But now we are reaching to a phase where we don't have humans to operate in this reality.
00:07:05:15 - 00:07:17:02
Abigail Acton
So now tell me a little bit about because obviously our listeners have can't see you, but I can see you and I can see that you have an example of your wonderful machine. So describe it for our listeners. What have you actually come up with?
00:07:17:07 - 00:07:39:03
Filipe Neves dos Santos
In this context of small farmers and vineyards and steep slopes, we need something that is smaller and more efficient during the operation. So they are more expert in doing some operations. And so, what our robots look like? It's something like, four wheels robots, right? with an articulated joint that ensures every wheel is always in contact with the soil.
00:07:39:04 - 00:07:47:04
Abigail Acton
Okay. So the articulated joint can manipulate the robot to make sure that it's tilted favorably. Is that correct?
00:07:47:06 - 00:08:02:01
Filipe Neves dos Santos
It's most like this is, is more passive joint. So you don't activate on the joint, but ensures that the four wheels are always in contact with the soil. And this allows you to have a good traction system on this context.
00:08:02:01 - 00:08:03:01
Abigail Acton
And it's autonomous.
00:08:03:05 - 00:08:17:04
Filipe Neves dos Santos
It's fully autonomous. Yes. It has capacity to understand visually what is in front of him. If it detects a trunk, it will use this trunk to localize the robot. And this is one way to localize the robot without GNSS.
00:08:17:07 - 00:08:20:02
Abigail Acton
So it's like a little Mars rover, but for vineyards.
00:08:20:04 - 00:08:20:20
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Yeah.
00:08:20:22 - 00:08:22:14
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Yeah, exactly.
00:08:22:16 - 00:08:29:12
Abigail Acton
Yeah, fantastic. I think this is wonderful. Is this is a prototype? What sort of interest are you getting from actual wine producers?
00:08:29:14 - 00:08:50:05
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Yeah, the end users, like we tell in our context, is that they want this technology and what we have done was to close the innovation gap that we have identified in the European products innovation, that is, to take this to the market. So we have ten years of work that we aim to put in the market with the main companies that we have in Porto.
00:08:50:05 - 00:09:05:22
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Indeed, they are four competitors that produce machinery for agriculture, and we have joined them to start producing this technology and put in the market. So at this stage, we are moving these technologies to the market through these companies that are the guys that can put them in the markets.
00:09:06:03 - 00:09:10:05
Abigail Acton
Oh, that sounds like a very exciting time. You must be very proud of what you've managed to achieve.
00:09:10:05 - 00:09:15:19
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Yeah, I will be more proud when I see this in reality.
00:09:15:20 - 00:09:32:19
Abigail Acton
Yeah, that's still a quite a lot of work to go. Yeah. No it's wonderful. It's a great solution for people who otherwise might be really stuck not having the laborers that can go into these tricky environments and so on. So I think it's wonderful. This is a slightly disruptive technology. I mean it's obviously much needed and it's plugging a gap.
00:09:32:21 - 00:09:39:17
Abigail Acton
But do you think that there is any kind of negativity or reluctance when it comes to moving more to robotic tools in agriculture?
00:09:39:23 - 00:10:10:01
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Well, that is a, very common question that the people posed to me. That is, you are stealing the job of the people. That will be an issue. In reality, that is not true, because, you know, nowadays we have the situation of immigration, but most of these people they like to have also good jobs, not the exposure to 40 degrees temperature, to high labor context that is not easy to work on.
00:10:10:01 - 00:10:10:23
Abigail Acton
Exactly. Yeah.
00:10:11:00 - 00:10:41:03
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Yeah. So I would say that the problem is not there. And there is a reality that is if we want to have this machinery the most of these steep slope vineyards will not exist in the future. And instead of beautiful images that we might have on the river with the boats seeing the amazing vineyards, perhaps in the future, if we don't make them sustainable with the robotics and other solutions, perhaps they will not exist in the future.
00:10:41:03 - 00:10:53:07
Filipe Neves dos Santos
And so, we are not killing the jobs. We are bringing more quality for life, for the operators of this kind of vineyards. And we are making this more sustainable for the future.
00:10:53:09 - 00:11:15:11
Abigail Acton
Absolutely. No. Absolutely. Take your point completely. Thank you so much for that. Intellectually, very interesting. I'm going to turn to Zoe now. So your work also focused on automation, but at a later stage and involving advanced robotics. So the BACCHUS project tested a system in a vineyard environment that can monitor and harvest grapes of different varieties with very delicate precision.
00:11:15:11 - 00:11:22:18
Abigail Acton
Can you tell us, please, Zoe, what makes the development of robotic harvesters of this sort so challenging?
00:11:22:23 - 00:12:33:21
Zoe Doulgeri
Well, what we wanted to do is to develop a robotic harvester that is able to navigate safely in the vineyard road and identify the grapes of the appropriate level of maturity and cut them like a human does. So let us say that I stand in front of a vine, and I have selected the grapes that looks delicious to me and I want to cut it. So what I do to cut it is to reach and hold the grape with one hand, softly pull it towards me to extract its peduncle, possibly move my head around to have a clear view of it, because, the surrounding leaves and branches may occlude my vision. While with my other hand with which I hold the cutter, I reach and capture the peduncle in a coordinated synchronized manner. This is the way us, humans, act using both hands when handling sensitive objects, and we do so without thinking a lot about it. So that's what I wanted my robotic harvester to work like. And, harvesting this good quality grapes in a wine grape vineyard. And certainly this is a dexterous bimanual task that presents a lot of challenges for the robotic system.
00:12:33:23 - 00:12:47:20
Abigail Acton
Yes. I mean, absolutely. We you're right. We take it for granted. But when you break it down, it's a highly sophisticated series of movements. So, how on earth did you go about designing and creating such a complex arm?
00:12:47:22 - 00:13:21:08
Zoe Doulgeri
Well, it is true that robots have been used in agriculture task before the project started, but only few of these robots were used for crop harvesting. These were mainly single mobile robotic arms. And they have been used in collecting crops like apples, which would, for example, be detached by pulling the apple by using only one hand, or they were equipped with a specialised gripper that was able to simultaneously cut the peduncle and hold it by it.
00:13:21:08 - 00:13:24:23
Zoe Doulgeri
And these type of solutions were not appropriate for wine grapes harvesting.
00:13:24:23 - 00:13:30:12
Abigail Acton
Well, obviously the grapes are much more vulnerable. They're much more tender, aren't they? I mean, you can you can do things to an apple that you couldn't.
00:13:30:12 - 00:13:54:02
Zoe Doulgeri
Exactly. You will squeeze it and completely destroy the quality of it and the quality of the one that comes after that. So what we wanted in the BACCHUS was project was to fill this gap and expand the variety of crops that can be harvested autonomously by developing this mobile bimanual robot that could act like the humans act while harvesting wine grapes.
00:13:54:04 - 00:14:04:13
Zoe Doulgeri
So we certainly did not start from scratch. For the final system, we had to integrate an omnidirectional mobile platform on wheels with two robotic cells.
00:14:04:13 - 00:14:10:05
Abigail Acton
So omnidirectional. So basically you had a platform on wheels that could turn around completely.
00:14:10:07 - 00:14:17:21
Zoe Doulgeri
Yes. I mean, omnidirectional means that we can move sideways as well as forward and backwards. It's more than our cars, you know? So.
00:14:18:02 - 00:14:18:12
Abigail Acton
Right.
00:14:18:16 - 00:14:29:19
Zoe Doulgeri
We also have to use a gripper with two special 3D printed gripper fingers, which were adapted to the size of the grape variety we harvest.
00:14:29:24 - 00:14:36:08
Abigail Acton
Okay, hang on a second. Is the benefit of the 3D printing that you can then adjust it according to precisely what it is you're picking.
00:14:36:11 - 00:14:59:00
Zoe Doulgeri
Exactly. You can do so. So you are able to adapt to the size of the object you hold, particularly when this object is sensitive. So you can hold the grid with one hand, while on the other hand we have attached the cutter, a normal cutter like what the human uses and also a camera in order to identify the peduncle.
00:14:59:01 - 00:15:09:17
Zoe Doulgeri
And in that sense, we depart a little bit from the human solution because our eyes are not attached to the robotic head. But we attach our eyes on the handle with a cutter.
00:15:09:19 - 00:15:34:07
Abigail Acton
Well, that sounds like a good place to put it. And when we keep saying peduncle we mean the stem. Yeah. For us, normally it would be the stem. Okay. So super. And I understand also and I find this really, really amazing is not only have you come up with this fantastic way to automate intelligently and with great dexterity the harvesting process, but you have sensors on your robot that can detect the sugar level as well, I believe.
00:15:34:07 - 00:15:35:02
Zoe Doulgeri
Exactly.
00:15:35:04 - 00:15:37:18
Abigail Acton
Tell us a little about that, please. Zoe.
00:15:37:20 - 00:15:53:00
Zoe Doulgeri
Yes. Well, the decision on which grapes to harvest was based on the appropriate maturity level, the sugar content if it's a grape, which was made with the help of a hyperspectral camera and artificial intelligence algorithms, which could detect the sugar level.
00:15:53:02 - 00:15:55:01
Abigail Acton
Okay. So what is a hyperspectral camera?
00:15:55:02 - 00:16:19:23
Zoe Doulgeri
A hyperspectral camera is a camera that works on a band of the light spectrum that is not visible. And it can actually detect the chemical content of the object is looking at. So in this way, there's no more need to resort to human estimates of the maturity of the crop or to resort to the chemical lab analysis of the grape samples.
00:16:19:23 - 00:16:32:05
Abigail Acton
So instead of having to send it off for analysis. And that takes time. And I guess also maybe the time it takes is exactly the moment you should be harvesting, and you might miss the ideal window. This identifies in real time the sugar level.
00:16:32:05 - 00:16:32:18
Zoe Doulgeri
Exactly.
00:16:32:18 - 00:16:37:00
Abigail Acton
And you said you use AI to interpret the visual imageries that you're getting from the camera.
00:16:37:00 - 00:16:37:18
Abigail Acton
Is that correct?
00:16:37:18 - 00:17:05:06
Zoe Doulgeri
We interpret this after we train our algorithms, of course, so we can, in real time, detect the sugar level and decide whether this grape is mature enough in order to collect it. And in this way, we can perform selective harvesting. So immature grapes are left on the vine to be harvested at a later stage when reaching the appropriate sugar level, and in this way harvesting only the grapes that are at their optimal stage increases the quality of the produced wine.
00:17:05:08 - 00:17:10:09
Abigail Acton
I know, I could see that. Are you seeing much interest from industry? Are you trying prototypes out at all of this?
00:17:10:11 - 00:17:38:20
Zoe Doulgeri
Well, during the project we have invited a lot of wine grape growers from Italy and, our demonstration start site, which was a vineyard near Thessaloniki, which is actually a vineyard with wine producer of the north of Greece. And, here we have actually tested our prototypes and they were very interested in the product.
00:17:38:21 - 00:17:49:13
Zoe Doulgeri
And I believe, of course, they will be in the future in the field. And it is always a tool. It's a co-worker rather than a replacement of a human.
00:17:49:13 - 00:17:52:09
Abigail Acton
Right? Yeah, absolutely. Zoe, thank you so much.
00:17:52:15 - 00:17:53:13
Zoe Doulgeri
Thank you.
00:17:53:14 - 00:18:13:01
Abigail Acton
I'm going to turn to you now, Gustavo. It's a special occasion. So you decide to go a little crazy and buy a really good bottle of wine, but can you be sure it's the real thing? TRACEWINDU is hoping to make that purchase a little more reliable. Gustavo, we've followed the life of the wine from planting to harvesting.
00:18:13:04 - 00:18:23:15
Abigail Acton
But challenges facing wine producers don't end there. Counterfeit or forgery is something that we may think of when it comes to luxury labels, but can you tell us how it impacts the wine industry?
00:18:23:17 - 00:18:52:01
Gustavo Pérez González
Well, I would say that wine is one of those products that you trust in, let's say, the reputation of the producer. I mean, the jewel, unless you want to verify anything at the moment you're choosing the wine, or the supermarket, or the restaurant... But sometimes you want to understand. Okay.
00:18:52:01 - 00:19:13:03
Gustavo Pérez González
Can I verify which is the origin of the of the wine? But, nowadays, if you've seen yourself, you are buying a promise. You are buying the place, the practice, the reputation. Because all these producers are trying to sell you a story. But, I mean, what happens when there is an abuse of that?
00:19:13:03 - 00:19:31:13
Zoe Doulgeri
Because there's the mislabeling, there's the counterfeit. Then the damage, when this occurs, the damage affects everybody. It's not just the winery. It's all the small producers, all around in this denomination, that are affected because someone was trying to cut the corners.
00:19:31:15 - 00:19:42:19
Abigail Acton
Absolutely. I'm little curious how does the forgery or the counterfeiting, how does that actually take place? do people steal labels and just put it on sort of much cheaper wine?
00:19:43:00 - 00:20:08:11
Gustavo Pérez González
You could be really surprised about how is the sophistication there. I mean, the typical one is the relabeling. I mean, you have a cheap wine and you put it into a bottle that looks premium, and then you apply a forged label, a capsule that mimics the real thing. For me, the most curious one I was not really aware about is the bottle reuse.
00:20:08:13 - 00:20:36:07
Gustavo Pérez González
I mean, yeah in fact you have genuine bottles that are collected, they are refilled and they are resealed, because the glass and the shape look authentic. Sometimes it's... you could even have the situation of the complete counterfeiting of the product. I mean, it's the fake packaging from scratch, the fake label, the fake barcodes, and just sold through the channel.
00:20:36:07 - 00:20:39:01
Gustavo Pérez González
Yeah. And it seems that these are completely legitimate.
00:20:39:01 - 00:20:39:08
Abigail Acton
Right.
00:20:39:08 - 00:21:09:14
Gustavo Pérez González
So the counterfeit can enter the supply chain, so they go through the gray market traders, even online marketplace, there are the opportunist people doing the intermediation or even mixing it with the real stocks you put within the volume the fake ones. And you are not a specialist because you receive the bottle and for you, okay, that's premium, represents premium, I recall the bottle, the stamp, whatever, you taste, you are not a professional sommelier, you pay that, but you are not receiving what...
00:21:09:14 - 00:21:15:11
Abigail Acton
What you paid for. Yeah. So what the TRACEWINDU developed to make this counterfeiting more difficult?
00:21:15:12 - 00:21:19:01
Gustavo Pérez González
Well, I would say I'm trying to put it in in a normal words.
00:21:19:01 - 00:21:21:16
Abigail Acton
Because it is quite technical. So. Thank you. Yeah.
00:21:21:18 - 00:21:53:06
Gustavo Pérez González
For us, when we have to explain it to the target audiences... it's just... think about it as a passport system for a wine. I mean, you get the bottle, they get this smart passport, smart tag, let's say it in this way. It's a unique one. And you get it stuck to the bottle so you can see a QR code, and sometimes you have extra internal layers that you are unable to check, containing hidden information to verify all the transactions.
00:21:53:06 - 00:21:56:14
Abigail Acton
So what do you mean by hidden information and layers that you can't check? What do you mean?
00:21:56:18 - 00:22:17:00
Gustavo Pérez González
I mean, you can use invisible inks to hide information, you see? The people from post offices, printing currency... they have techniques that you are unable to check. So they are applying also this to the wine labels.
00:22:17:00 - 00:22:25:09
Abigail Acton
Oh, very interesting. So there's sort of hidden security measures, like, as you say, the sort of writing that you can't see, maybe some things that you have to scan with a certain type of scanner?
00:22:25:10 - 00:22:25:19
Gustavo Pérez González
Yeah.
00:22:25:19 - 00:22:26:14
Abigail Acton
Yeah.
00:22:26:16 - 00:22:34:10
Gustavo Pérez González
And even doing the scan, depending on the rights that you have been assigned as a user, you can have access to certain information or not.
00:22:34:12 - 00:22:34:22
Abigail Acton
Okay.
00:22:34:22 - 00:22:44:10
Gustavo Pérez González
So you have different ways. I mean, you could have a stockpile of different layers with different type of information because not everybody is interested in the same type of information.
00:22:44:12 - 00:23:11:07
Gustavo Pérez González
You have the layer of quality assurance. You have the layer of who is moving or who is traveling with the wine. I mean, there's a section just for the wine producers about gathering all the information for the production because they had to reply to the national authorities for the health issues. I mean, plenty of stakeholders there with different rights, different ways of putting information in the system and so on.
00:23:11:13 - 00:23:34:24
Abigail Acton
Oh that's great. So the label contains various layers of information depending on the target user. The target user can have access to that information depending on the rights that they are assigned by the system. Is that correct? Yes. I think. And basically or building up information, that is information with people concerned with logistics, people who are concerned with authenticity, people who... and is there something there also for just the purchaser?
00:23:34:24 - 00:23:39:01
Abigail Acton
Is there something that the buyer can find out about the wine that they're buying?
00:23:39:03 - 00:23:59:05
Gustavo Pérez González
Yeah. This is this typical... I mean, it depends on the experience, the curiosity. The buyer could have access. At the end, we return to the discussion about the promise you want to verify. And the system provides you with an information that is trusted, that comes from the producer in some way.
00:23:59:10 - 00:24:06:09
Gustavo Pérez González
So you have this chain of, let's say information, that verifies that is from that place.
00:24:06:15 - 00:24:15:08
Abigail Acton
So hang on a second. I'm a buyer. I go into a supermarket or I go into a wine shop. I take a bottle of wine off the shelf. I can see there's this QR code. What do I do?
00:24:15:14 - 00:25:00:07
Gustavo Pérez González
Yeah. Just scan it. I mean, you scan the QR code, and then it brings you to an interface where it provides all the information from the producer, the cépage, the typical information that it can provide you. But at the end you have some kind of verification that this belongs to that because we connected all the analysis that we performed there to verify that is coming from the specific terroir, the specific chateau that develop it. Because there is also hidden information that the producers make, the analysis of the wine. And then there is something like a fingerprint that is unique from this terroir and then is legitimate to that QR code. So we try to connect what is on the soil and the wine.
00:25:00:09 - 00:25:04:11
Abigail Acton
Okay. Fantastic. I'm seeing much more information. And then I just see on the label.
00:25:04:11 - 00:25:09:14
Gustavo Pérez González
Sure. I mean, you have the confidence. You're buying the confidence in some way.
00:25:09:20 - 00:25:28:13
Abigail Acton
So what happens? I just thought of something horrendous. Can you imagine, Gustavo, I go to an incredibly expensive restaurant. Maybe I'm trying to impress somebody, and I order an incredibly expensive bottle of wine, and it comes to the table. I say, can I scan this with my phone? Do I say that? Don't I feel a little strange saying, can I scan this?
00:25:28:19 - 00:25:34:22
Abigail Acton
Imagine I have the confidence. I think, okay, I will scan and I say, can I scan? And it's not the real thing.
00:25:34:24 - 00:26:00:08
Gustavo Pérez González
It's up to you. You decide. You want to go into troubles? We have been also experiencing during the project with sommeliers and people during the typical networking events and tasting some wines and so on, and they don't have any issue about explaining to the waiter: "you see, that's not what we are paying for.
00:26:00:08 - 00:26:24:03
Gustavo Pérez González
Or this is spoiled or whatever". So, then you are someone who doesn't have this tasting experience, you have the mobile and you can ensure: "you see, this is not what you were providing so I'm not going to pay for that". It's up to you, you have another, let's say, utility application that can help you in this type of situations.
00:26:24:05 - 00:26:26:14
Abigail Acton
Yes. I mean, it's up to you how you use the information.
00:26:26:16 - 00:26:26:22
Gustavo Pérez González
Yeah.
00:26:26:23 - 00:26:33:23
Abigail Acton
Super. So do you think we'll see such a label in the shops anytime soon? Does the industry seem keen to actually implement this interesting technology?
00:26:34:01 - 00:27:02:08
Gustavo Pérez González
Well, according to our feedback, this change with the wine makers that were inside of the project and also the pilots that we were the developing, I would say yes. I mean, we already had some pilots where they prepared the wines, they were analyzed, the passport was produced, the people were doing the tests at the supermarket, getting the scans and so on.
00:27:02:08 - 00:27:14:04
Gustavo Pérez González
So the pilot is already there and one of the partners of the project, they even have some type of internal deals with some of the partners that it seems that they are going to apply for mass production.
00:27:14:06 - 00:27:15:02
Abigail Acton
Okay. Cool.
00:27:15:02 - 00:27:21:16
Gustavo Pérez González
So I would say in the future... from our point of view, is not so far away from that.
00:27:21:16 - 00:27:22:01
Abigail Acton
Great.
00:27:22:02 - 00:27:32:14
Gustavo Pérez González
We need an early adopter, we need a winery that becomes a pathfinder. They test, they demonstrate, and then we will have the followers.
00:27:32:15 - 00:27:32:21
Abigail Acton
Yeah.
00:27:32:21 - 00:27:40:23
Gustavo Pérez González
So at the end, we were trying to explain to the winemakers that we were selling proofs, not promises.
00:27:41:00 - 00:28:09:10
Gustavo Pérez González
I mean, the scan is just to verify, to keep the confidence. So the consumers, at the end, they have a friendly experience and you can complement it with your vineyard story, with the tasting notes, with the food pairing and so on. You are doing your business as usual, but with this authenticity, with this confidence. And at the end, you have this trusted journey timeline. It's not just marketing, it's to provide what you promise.
00:28:09:10 - 00:28:16:13
Gustavo Pérez González
And they have the confidence of whatever you drink is what it was already on the on the bottle.
00:28:16:14 - 00:28:24:15
Abigail Acton
Right. What you paid for. Absolutely. Wonderful. Thank you so much. Does anyone have any questions for Gustavo? Yes. Sorry. What would you like to ask?
00:28:24:17 - 00:28:40:09
Zoe Doulgeri
I was wondering, how can one prevent to forge that type of label? They can have the QR code copied, let's say, and put it in another bottle and that is containing the wrong type of wine?
00:28:40:11 - 00:28:51:15
Gustavo Pérez González
Well, this is one of the critical questions that the wine makers were asking us during the project. I mean, is the QR code something that someone can copy easily?
00:28:51:17 - 00:29:22:16
Gustavo Pérez González
Well, let's say the QR code doesn't behave like a real order. I mean, you have a system that exports those duplicates, scans, impossible journeys or abnormal scanned bottles with tamper evidence. Or, let's say, that it's very hard to clone in a convincing way, when you are copying the QR code is copying the stamp, but that means you have to replicate the journey of the bottle.
00:29:22:17 - 00:29:56:17
Gustavo Pérez González
And what we are doing is that the QR code links to a unique digital identity, to a fingerprint, to the passport, not just a web page. So when the identity is scanned, the system checks whether the scan makes sense in the context. So if the same ID, the same fingerprint, the same passport suddenly appears in two countries or gets scanned of 200 times in short time before it ever reached the market, then you have a red flag, and those patterns are very hard to counterfeit to control this escape.
00:29:56:20 - 00:30:03:10
Gustavo Pérez González
So this is what we were explaining to the wine makers at the end. And it seems that they were convinced.
00:30:03:10 - 00:30:10:08
Abigail Acton
Well, it sounds very convincing to me as well. Thank you very much, Gustavo. Beautifully explained in a very important project. Excellent!
00:30:10:10 - 00:30:14:11
Gustavo Pérez González
Thanks to you for giving us the chance to explain our activities during the project.
00:30:14:15 - 00:30:26:13
Abigail Acton
You're very welcome. Well, thanks very much to the three of you for your time. I think that's going to be a really, really, interesting work that you're all doing. And, I hope your equipment is taken up by lots of producers.
00:30:26:18 - 00:30:27:18
Zoe Doulgeri
Thank you very much.
00:30:27:22 - 00:30:28:16
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Bye bye.
00:30:28:18 - 00:30:31:01
Gustavo Pérez González
Thanks for sharing your time with us. Good bye.
00:30:31:02 - 00:30:34:18
Abigail Acton
Lovely having you. Thank you.
00:30:34:20 - 00:31:00:00
Abigail Acton
If you've enjoyed this podcast, follow us on Spotify or Apple and check out the podcast homepage on the CORDIS website. Subscribe to make sure the hottest research and EU-funded science and innovation isn't passing you by. And if you're enjoying listening, why not spread the word? We've talked about maritime safety and pandemic preparedness, and we've also talked about the wonderful impact of your own gut microbiome.
00:31:00:02 - 00:31:11:24
Abigail Acton
So come and check out the research that's revealing what makes our world tick. We're always happy to hear from you. Drop us a line editorial@cordis.europa.eu. Until next time
This is an AI transcription.
00:00:18:01 - 00:00:45:09
Abigail Acton
Hello and welcome to this episode of CORDIScovery with me, Abigail Acton. People often forget just how significant the wine industry is in Europe. Across the EU, there are about 2.2 million winegrowing farms looking after a roughly 3.2 million hectares of vines. And every year, those vineyards turn out something like 150 million hectoliters of wine. That's around 20 billion bottles.
00:00:45:11 - 00:01:08:01
Abigail Acton
When the entire value chain is taken into consideration, from growing the grapes to selling the bottles, the wine sector brings in around 130 billion a year to the EU economy and supports close to 3 million jobs, mostly in rural areas. Wine exports alone are worth about 18 billion a year, making wine one of Europe's top agri-food exports.
00:01:08:03 - 00:01:32:08
Abigail Acton
But although the numbers are impressive, the industry is facing serious challenges. The last few harvests have been hit hard by droughts, heatwaves, heavy rain and disease. EU wine production in 2023 and 2024 was among the lowest of the century. And worldwide wine consumption has dropped to its lowest level since the mid-1990s. Growers are getting squeezed from both sides.
00:01:32:10 - 00:01:55:02
Abigail Acton
More unstable harvests and weaker demand. When a bottle is poured, it isn't just a drink on the table, it's part of a sector that keeps villages alive and brings billions into the economy. So what can we do to help the situation? Our three guests, all of whom have received support from the EU's Research and innovation funding programs, have some intriguing ideas.
00:01:55:04 - 00:02:11:19
Abigail Acton
Filipe Neves dos Santos develops autonomous robots and machinery which can operate safely on steep slopes for the agricultural and forestry sectors. He works at the Centre for Robotics in Industry and Intelligent Systems, INESC TEC, in Portugal. Hello, Filipe.
00:02:11:21 - 00:02:13:02
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Hello, Abigail.
00:02:13:04 - 00:02:28:12
Abigail Acton
Zoe Doulgeri is professor of Robotics and Control of Manufacturing Systems at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. Her current research interests include learning and control of unimanual and bimanual robotic object manipulation. Hello, Zoe.
00:02:28:14 - 00:02:29:15
Zoe Doulgeri
Hello everybody.
00:02:29:15 - 00:02:31:15
Zoe Doulgeri
Glad to be part of this podcast.
00:02:31:16 - 00:02:50:19
Abigail Acton
We're very happy to have you here. Gustavo Pérez González is a senior project manager and PhD in chemistry at the Autonomous University of Barcelona. He specialises in analytical chemistry specifically to develop secure, traceable and immutable solutions for wine authentication. Welcome, Gustavo.
00:02:50:21 - 00:02:51:17
Gustavo Pérez González
Hello.
00:02:51:19 - 00:03:11:16
Abigail Acton
Very nice to have you. Filipe I'm going to turn to you first. The SCORPION project wanted to help farmers reduce the amount of chemicals they use when spraying their crops, but at the same time maintaining the yield, efficiency and value. So, Filipe tell us a little bit about the problem your project wanted to help solve for example, in the context of wine producing.
00:03:11:18 - 00:03:40:14
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Well, Abigail, in the context of the wine production in Portugal, we have a specific reality that also exists in ten countries in Europe that is producing the wine in steep slope vineyards. These steep slop vineyards produce the amazing Port wine, as all of you know, and it's a premium quality wine. But there is a problem that is there is scarcity of human labor to work on this context.
00:03:40:16 - 00:04:05:13
Filipe Neves dos Santos
And we have a problem that you have mentioned before, that is the context of climate changes, where we need solutions to make these vineyards more sustainable. And what we have done here, we have solved the problem in two ways. One thing is to find machinery that could operate on these kind of steep slope vineyards. Okay. And the second situation was find solutions that can avoid the use of chemical products on its vineyards.
00:04:05:13 - 00:04:31:06
Filipe Neves dos Santos
And so here emerge the SCORPION project where we have developed a robot that could navigate in this kind of vineyards without falling through the vineyard and could navigate it without GNSS or GPS available. And we have also developed novel technology or implement tools to apply chemical products or UVB light treatments to these vineyards to make them sustainable.
00:04:31:08 - 00:04:38:18
Abigail Acton
Fantastic. That sounds very interesting, but some things I need to break down though with you a little bit. UVB treatments, what is this?
00:04:38:20 - 00:04:52:22
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Well, the UVB treatments. This is the kind of light spectrum that we have on the light, which we can apply to the vineyards, and the fungi are not good to angle with this kind of light.
00:04:53:03 - 00:05:07:20
Abigail Acton
Okay. So let me just break that down further. So basically there are some pests that will potentially cause damage to the vines in the form of fungi. And if you shine a certain type of light on the fungi, it causes them to retract or break down. Is that correct?
00:05:07:21 - 00:05:29:17
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Exactly. There are some fungi in vineyards that, during the day, put some kind of umbrella to protect against the sun. Right? But during the night, they close the umbrella to not use so much energy. And if you apply the UVB light treatment during this time, you can kill these fungi.
00:05:29:20 - 00:05:40:20
Abigail Acton
Very good. I mean, it sounds a little bit sneaky, but it also sounds very good. So you come along while they're sleeping and you zap them. Okay. And of course, that then saves the chemicals from, you know, instead of spraying.
00:05:41:01 - 00:05:55:09
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Yeah. You can avoid some kinds of fungicides that might be harmful for the environment. And in theory, this is a novel treatment that might have a positive impact in the sustainability of the system.
00:05:55:11 - 00:05:58:22
Abigail Acton
Fantastic. And I imagine maybe might be applicable to other crops.
00:05:58:24 - 00:06:17:01
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Yeah, this is applicable to other crops, indeed, the UVB treatments are being already applied in greenhouses for tomatoes production, and there are some benefits on using them. Of course, like other treatments, it should be used with some, limitations and regulations. Okay.
00:06:17:06 - 00:06:17:15
Abigail Acton
Yeah.
00:06:17:18 - 00:06:18:10
Abigail Acton
Some caution.
00:06:18:10 - 00:06:23:23
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Yeah, exactly. Because if we kill the good ones, we might kill also the bad ones. Well, in the positive way.
00:06:24:00 - 00:06:27:05
Abigail Acton
Yeah, the other way around. Yeah. You might, you might get more than you were thinking. Indeed.
00:06:27:05 - 00:06:27:21
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Yeah. Exactly.
00:06:27:23 - 00:06:35:10
Abigail Acton
Okay, now tell me a little bit more about the steep slope vineyards, because obviously that must be very challenging. And also the issue of labor.
00:06:35:16 - 00:06:58:16
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Yeah. So Portugal has different landscapes in the reality of our country, and in the north we have more mountains. Then, in these mountains we have found a way to use this landscape to produce wine. Okay. But this in the past, and like it was agriculture in the past, this was mostly done by human hands.
00:06:58:16 - 00:07:05:11
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Right? But now we are reaching to a phase where we don't have humans to operate in this reality.
00:07:05:15 - 00:07:17:02
Abigail Acton
So now tell me a little bit about because obviously our listeners have can't see you, but I can see you and I can see that you have an example of your wonderful machine. So describe it for our listeners. What have you actually come up with?
00:07:17:07 - 00:07:39:03
Filipe Neves dos Santos
In this context of small farmers and vineyards and steep slopes, we need something that is smaller and more efficient during the operation. So they are more expert in doing some operations. And so, what our robots look like? It's something like, four wheels robots, right? with an articulated joint that ensures every wheel is always in contact with the soil.
00:07:39:04 - 00:07:47:04
Abigail Acton
Okay. So the articulated joint can manipulate the robot to make sure that it's tilted favorably. Is that correct?
00:07:47:06 - 00:08:02:01
Filipe Neves dos Santos
It's most like this is, is more passive joint. So you don't activate on the joint, but ensures that the four wheels are always in contact with the soil. And this allows you to have a good traction system on this context.
00:08:02:01 - 00:08:03:01
Abigail Acton
And it's autonomous.
00:08:03:05 - 00:08:17:04
Filipe Neves dos Santos
It's fully autonomous. Yes. It has capacity to understand visually what is in front of him. If it detects a trunk, it will use this trunk to localize the robot. And this is one way to localize the robot without GNSS.
00:08:17:07 - 00:08:20:02
Abigail Acton
So it's like a little Mars rover, but for vineyards.
00:08:20:04 - 00:08:20:20
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Yeah.
00:08:20:22 - 00:08:22:14
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Yeah, exactly.
00:08:22:16 - 00:08:29:12
Abigail Acton
Yeah, fantastic. I think this is wonderful. Is this is a prototype? What sort of interest are you getting from actual wine producers?
00:08:29:14 - 00:08:50:05
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Yeah, the end users, like we tell in our context, is that they want this technology and what we have done was to close the innovation gap that we have identified in the European products innovation, that is, to take this to the market. So we have ten years of work that we aim to put in the market with the main companies that we have in Porto.
00:08:50:05 - 00:09:05:22
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Indeed, they are four competitors that produce machinery for agriculture, and we have joined them to start producing this technology and put in the market. So at this stage, we are moving these technologies to the market through these companies that are the guys that can put them in the markets.
00:09:06:03 - 00:09:10:05
Abigail Acton
Oh, that sounds like a very exciting time. You must be very proud of what you've managed to achieve.
00:09:10:05 - 00:09:15:19
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Yeah, I will be more proud when I see this in reality.
00:09:15:20 - 00:09:32:19
Abigail Acton
Yeah, that's still a quite a lot of work to go. Yeah. No it's wonderful. It's a great solution for people who otherwise might be really stuck not having the laborers that can go into these tricky environments and so on. So I think it's wonderful. This is a slightly disruptive technology. I mean it's obviously much needed and it's plugging a gap.
00:09:32:21 - 00:09:39:17
Abigail Acton
But do you think that there is any kind of negativity or reluctance when it comes to moving more to robotic tools in agriculture?
00:09:39:23 - 00:10:10:01
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Well, that is a, very common question that the people posed to me. That is, you are stealing the job of the people. That will be an issue. In reality, that is not true, because, you know, nowadays we have the situation of immigration, but most of these people they like to have also good jobs, not the exposure to 40 degrees temperature, to high labor context that is not easy to work on.
00:10:10:01 - 00:10:10:23
Abigail Acton
Exactly. Yeah.
00:10:11:00 - 00:10:41:03
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Yeah. So I would say that the problem is not there. And there is a reality that is if we want to have this machinery the most of these steep slope vineyards will not exist in the future. And instead of beautiful images that we might have on the river with the boats seeing the amazing vineyards, perhaps in the future, if we don't make them sustainable with the robotics and other solutions, perhaps they will not exist in the future.
00:10:41:03 - 00:10:53:07
Filipe Neves dos Santos
And so, we are not killing the jobs. We are bringing more quality for life, for the operators of this kind of vineyards. And we are making this more sustainable for the future.
00:10:53:09 - 00:11:15:11
Abigail Acton
Absolutely. No. Absolutely. Take your point completely. Thank you so much for that. Intellectually, very interesting. I'm going to turn to Zoe now. So your work also focused on automation, but at a later stage and involving advanced robotics. So the BACCHUS project tested a system in a vineyard environment that can monitor and harvest grapes of different varieties with very delicate precision.
00:11:15:11 - 00:11:22:18
Abigail Acton
Can you tell us, please, Zoe, what makes the development of robotic harvesters of this sort so challenging?
00:11:22:23 - 00:12:33:21
Zoe Doulgeri
Well, what we wanted to do is to develop a robotic harvester that is able to navigate safely in the vineyard road and identify the grapes of the appropriate level of maturity and cut them like a human does. So let us say that I stand in front of a vine, and I have selected the grapes that looks delicious to me and I want to cut it. So what I do to cut it is to reach and hold the grape with one hand, softly pull it towards me to extract its peduncle, possibly move my head around to have a clear view of it, because, the surrounding leaves and branches may occlude my vision. While with my other hand with which I hold the cutter, I reach and capture the peduncle in a coordinated synchronized manner. This is the way us, humans, act using both hands when handling sensitive objects, and we do so without thinking a lot about it. So that's what I wanted my robotic harvester to work like. And, harvesting this good quality grapes in a wine grape vineyard. And certainly this is a dexterous bimanual task that presents a lot of challenges for the robotic system.
00:12:33:23 - 00:12:47:20
Abigail Acton
Yes. I mean, absolutely. We you're right. We take it for granted. But when you break it down, it's a highly sophisticated series of movements. So, how on earth did you go about designing and creating such a complex arm?
00:12:47:22 - 00:13:21:08
Zoe Doulgeri
Well, it is true that robots have been used in agriculture task before the project started, but only few of these robots were used for crop harvesting. These were mainly single mobile robotic arms. And they have been used in collecting crops like apples, which would, for example, be detached by pulling the apple by using only one hand, or they were equipped with a specialised gripper that was able to simultaneously cut the peduncle and hold it by it.
00:13:21:08 - 00:13:24:23
Zoe Doulgeri
And these type of solutions were not appropriate for wine grapes harvesting.
00:13:24:23 - 00:13:30:12
Abigail Acton
Well, obviously the grapes are much more vulnerable. They're much more tender, aren't they? I mean, you can you can do things to an apple that you couldn't.
00:13:30:12 - 00:13:54:02
Zoe Doulgeri
Exactly. You will squeeze it and completely destroy the quality of it and the quality of the one that comes after that. So what we wanted in the BACCHUS was project was to fill this gap and expand the variety of crops that can be harvested autonomously by developing this mobile bimanual robot that could act like the humans act while harvesting wine grapes.
00:13:54:04 - 00:14:04:13
Zoe Doulgeri
So we certainly did not start from scratch. For the final system, we had to integrate an omnidirectional mobile platform on wheels with two robotic cells.
00:14:04:13 - 00:14:10:05
Abigail Acton
So omnidirectional. So basically you had a platform on wheels that could turn around completely.
00:14:10:07 - 00:14:17:21
Zoe Doulgeri
Yes. I mean, omnidirectional means that we can move sideways as well as forward and backwards. It's more than our cars, you know? So.
00:14:18:02 - 00:14:18:12
Abigail Acton
Right.
00:14:18:16 - 00:14:29:19
Zoe Doulgeri
We also have to use a gripper with two special 3D printed gripper fingers, which were adapted to the size of the grape variety we harvest.
00:14:29:24 - 00:14:36:08
Abigail Acton
Okay, hang on a second. Is the benefit of the 3D printing that you can then adjust it according to precisely what it is you're picking.
00:14:36:11 - 00:14:59:00
Zoe Doulgeri
Exactly. You can do so. So you are able to adapt to the size of the object you hold, particularly when this object is sensitive. So you can hold the grid with one hand, while on the other hand we have attached the cutter, a normal cutter like what the human uses and also a camera in order to identify the peduncle.
00:14:59:01 - 00:15:09:17
Zoe Doulgeri
And in that sense, we depart a little bit from the human solution because our eyes are not attached to the robotic head. But we attach our eyes on the handle with a cutter.
00:15:09:19 - 00:15:34:07
Abigail Acton
Well, that sounds like a good place to put it. And when we keep saying peduncle we mean the stem. Yeah. For us, normally it would be the stem. Okay. So super. And I understand also and I find this really, really amazing is not only have you come up with this fantastic way to automate intelligently and with great dexterity the harvesting process, but you have sensors on your robot that can detect the sugar level as well, I believe.
00:15:34:07 - 00:15:35:02
Zoe Doulgeri
Exactly.
00:15:35:04 - 00:15:37:18
Abigail Acton
Tell us a little about that, please. Zoe.
00:15:37:20 - 00:15:53:00
Zoe Doulgeri
Yes. Well, the decision on which grapes to harvest was based on the appropriate maturity level, the sugar content if it's a grape, which was made with the help of a hyperspectral camera and artificial intelligence algorithms, which could detect the sugar level.
00:15:53:02 - 00:15:55:01
Abigail Acton
Okay. So what is a hyperspectral camera?
00:15:55:02 - 00:16:19:23
Zoe Doulgeri
A hyperspectral camera is a camera that works on a band of the light spectrum that is not visible. And it can actually detect the chemical content of the object is looking at. So in this way, there's no more need to resort to human estimates of the maturity of the crop or to resort to the chemical lab analysis of the grape samples.
00:16:19:23 - 00:16:32:05
Abigail Acton
So instead of having to send it off for analysis. And that takes time. And I guess also maybe the time it takes is exactly the moment you should be harvesting, and you might miss the ideal window. This identifies in real time the sugar level.
00:16:32:05 - 00:16:32:18
Zoe Doulgeri
Exactly.
00:16:32:18 - 00:16:37:00
Abigail Acton
And you said you use AI to interpret the visual imageries that you're getting from the camera.
00:16:37:00 - 00:16:37:18
Abigail Acton
Is that correct?
00:16:37:18 - 00:17:05:06
Zoe Doulgeri
We interpret this after we train our algorithms, of course, so we can, in real time, detect the sugar level and decide whether this grape is mature enough in order to collect it. And in this way, we can perform selective harvesting. So immature grapes are left on the vine to be harvested at a later stage when reaching the appropriate sugar level, and in this way harvesting only the grapes that are at their optimal stage increases the quality of the produced wine.
00:17:05:08 - 00:17:10:09
Abigail Acton
I know, I could see that. Are you seeing much interest from industry? Are you trying prototypes out at all of this?
00:17:10:11 - 00:17:38:20
Zoe Doulgeri
Well, during the project we have invited a lot of wine grape growers from Italy and, our demonstration start site, which was a vineyard near Thessaloniki, which is actually a vineyard with wine producer of the north of Greece. And, here we have actually tested our prototypes and they were very interested in the product.
00:17:38:21 - 00:17:49:13
Zoe Doulgeri
And I believe, of course, they will be in the future in the field. And it is always a tool. It's a co-worker rather than a replacement of a human.
00:17:49:13 - 00:17:52:09
Abigail Acton
Right? Yeah, absolutely. Zoe, thank you so much.
00:17:52:15 - 00:17:53:13
Zoe Doulgeri
Thank you.
00:17:53:14 - 00:18:13:01
Abigail Acton
I'm going to turn to you now, Gustavo. It's a special occasion. So you decide to go a little crazy and buy a really good bottle of wine, but can you be sure it's the real thing? TRACEWINDU is hoping to make that purchase a little more reliable. Gustavo, we've followed the life of the wine from planting to harvesting.
00:18:13:04 - 00:18:23:15
Abigail Acton
But challenges facing wine producers don't end there. Counterfeit or forgery is something that we may think of when it comes to luxury labels, but can you tell us how it impacts the wine industry?
00:18:23:17 - 00:18:52:01
Gustavo Pérez González
Well, I would say that wine is one of those products that you trust in, let's say, the reputation of the producer. I mean, the jewel, unless you want to verify anything at the moment you're choosing the wine, or the supermarket, or the restaurant... But sometimes you want to understand. Okay.
00:18:52:01 - 00:19:13:03
Gustavo Pérez González
Can I verify which is the origin of the of the wine? But, nowadays, if you've seen yourself, you are buying a promise. You are buying the place, the practice, the reputation. Because all these producers are trying to sell you a story. But, I mean, what happens when there is an abuse of that?
00:19:13:03 - 00:19:31:13
Zoe Doulgeri
Because there's the mislabeling, there's the counterfeit. Then the damage, when this occurs, the damage affects everybody. It's not just the winery. It's all the small producers, all around in this denomination, that are affected because someone was trying to cut the corners.
00:19:31:15 - 00:19:42:19
Abigail Acton
Absolutely. I'm little curious how does the forgery or the counterfeiting, how does that actually take place? do people steal labels and just put it on sort of much cheaper wine?
00:19:43:00 - 00:20:08:11
Gustavo Pérez González
You could be really surprised about how is the sophistication there. I mean, the typical one is the relabeling. I mean, you have a cheap wine and you put it into a bottle that looks premium, and then you apply a forged label, a capsule that mimics the real thing. For me, the most curious one I was not really aware about is the bottle reuse.
00:20:08:13 - 00:20:36:07
Gustavo Pérez González
I mean, yeah in fact you have genuine bottles that are collected, they are refilled and they are resealed, because the glass and the shape look authentic. Sometimes it's... you could even have the situation of the complete counterfeiting of the product. I mean, it's the fake packaging from scratch, the fake label, the fake barcodes, and just sold through the channel.
00:20:36:07 - 00:20:39:01
Gustavo Pérez González
Yeah. And it seems that these are completely legitimate.
00:20:39:01 - 00:20:39:08
Abigail Acton
Right.
00:20:39:08 - 00:21:09:14
Gustavo Pérez González
So the counterfeit can enter the supply chain, so they go through the gray market traders, even online marketplace, there are the opportunist people doing the intermediation or even mixing it with the real stocks you put within the volume the fake ones. And you are not a specialist because you receive the bottle and for you, okay, that's premium, represents premium, I recall the bottle, the stamp, whatever, you taste, you are not a professional sommelier, you pay that, but you are not receiving what...
00:21:09:14 - 00:21:15:11
Abigail Acton
What you paid for. Yeah. So what the TRACEWINDU developed to make this counterfeiting more difficult?
00:21:15:12 - 00:21:19:01
Gustavo Pérez González
Well, I would say I'm trying to put it in in a normal words.
00:21:19:01 - 00:21:21:16
Abigail Acton
Because it is quite technical. So. Thank you. Yeah.
00:21:21:18 - 00:21:53:06
Gustavo Pérez González
For us, when we have to explain it to the target audiences... it's just... think about it as a passport system for a wine. I mean, you get the bottle, they get this smart passport, smart tag, let's say it in this way. It's a unique one. And you get it stuck to the bottle so you can see a QR code, and sometimes you have extra internal layers that you are unable to check, containing hidden information to verify all the transactions.
00:21:53:06 - 00:21:56:14
Abigail Acton
So what do you mean by hidden information and layers that you can't check? What do you mean?
00:21:56:18 - 00:22:17:00
Gustavo Pérez González
I mean, you can use invisible inks to hide information, you see? The people from post offices, printing currency... they have techniques that you are unable to check. So they are applying also this to the wine labels.
00:22:17:00 - 00:22:25:09
Abigail Acton
Oh, very interesting. So there's sort of hidden security measures, like, as you say, the sort of writing that you can't see, maybe some things that you have to scan with a certain type of scanner?
00:22:25:10 - 00:22:25:19
Gustavo Pérez González
Yeah.
00:22:25:19 - 00:22:26:14
Abigail Acton
Yeah.
00:22:26:16 - 00:22:34:10
Gustavo Pérez González
And even doing the scan, depending on the rights that you have been assigned as a user, you can have access to certain information or not.
00:22:34:12 - 00:22:34:22
Abigail Acton
Okay.
00:22:34:22 - 00:22:44:10
Gustavo Pérez González
So you have different ways. I mean, you could have a stockpile of different layers with different type of information because not everybody is interested in the same type of information.
00:22:44:12 - 00:23:11:07
Gustavo Pérez González
You have the layer of quality assurance. You have the layer of who is moving or who is traveling with the wine. I mean, there's a section just for the wine producers about gathering all the information for the production because they had to reply to the national authorities for the health issues. I mean, plenty of stakeholders there with different rights, different ways of putting information in the system and so on.
00:23:11:13 - 00:23:34:24
Abigail Acton
Oh that's great. So the label contains various layers of information depending on the target user. The target user can have access to that information depending on the rights that they are assigned by the system. Is that correct? Yes. I think. And basically or building up information, that is information with people concerned with logistics, people who are concerned with authenticity, people who... and is there something there also for just the purchaser?
00:23:34:24 - 00:23:39:01
Abigail Acton
Is there something that the buyer can find out about the wine that they're buying?
00:23:39:03 - 00:23:59:05
Gustavo Pérez González
Yeah. This is this typical... I mean, it depends on the experience, the curiosity. The buyer could have access. At the end, we return to the discussion about the promise you want to verify. And the system provides you with an information that is trusted, that comes from the producer in some way.
00:23:59:10 - 00:24:06:09
Gustavo Pérez González
So you have this chain of, let's say information, that verifies that is from that place.
00:24:06:15 - 00:24:15:08
Abigail Acton
So hang on a second. I'm a buyer. I go into a supermarket or I go into a wine shop. I take a bottle of wine off the shelf. I can see there's this QR code. What do I do?
00:24:15:14 - 00:25:00:07
Gustavo Pérez González
Yeah. Just scan it. I mean, you scan the QR code, and then it brings you to an interface where it provides all the information from the producer, the cépage, the typical information that it can provide you. But at the end you have some kind of verification that this belongs to that because we connected all the analysis that we performed there to verify that is coming from the specific terroir, the specific chateau that develop it. Because there is also hidden information that the producers make, the analysis of the wine. And then there is something like a fingerprint that is unique from this terroir and then is legitimate to that QR code. So we try to connect what is on the soil and the wine.
00:25:00:09 - 00:25:04:11
Abigail Acton
Okay. Fantastic. I'm seeing much more information. And then I just see on the label.
00:25:04:11 - 00:25:09:14
Gustavo Pérez González
Sure. I mean, you have the confidence. You're buying the confidence in some way.
00:25:09:20 - 00:25:28:13
Abigail Acton
So what happens? I just thought of something horrendous. Can you imagine, Gustavo, I go to an incredibly expensive restaurant. Maybe I'm trying to impress somebody, and I order an incredibly expensive bottle of wine, and it comes to the table. I say, can I scan this with my phone? Do I say that? Don't I feel a little strange saying, can I scan this?
00:25:28:19 - 00:25:34:22
Abigail Acton
Imagine I have the confidence. I think, okay, I will scan and I say, can I scan? And it's not the real thing.
00:25:34:24 - 00:26:00:08
Gustavo Pérez González
It's up to you. You decide. You want to go into troubles? We have been also experiencing during the project with sommeliers and people during the typical networking events and tasting some wines and so on, and they don't have any issue about explaining to the waiter: "you see, that's not what we are paying for.
00:26:00:08 - 00:26:24:03
Gustavo Pérez González
Or this is spoiled or whatever". So, then you are someone who doesn't have this tasting experience, you have the mobile and you can ensure: "you see, this is not what you were providing so I'm not going to pay for that". It's up to you, you have another, let's say, utility application that can help you in this type of situations.
00:26:24:05 - 00:26:26:14
Abigail Acton
Yes. I mean, it's up to you how you use the information.
00:26:26:16 - 00:26:26:22
Gustavo Pérez González
Yeah.
00:26:26:23 - 00:26:33:23
Abigail Acton
Super. So do you think we'll see such a label in the shops anytime soon? Does the industry seem keen to actually implement this interesting technology?
00:26:34:01 - 00:27:02:08
Gustavo Pérez González
Well, according to our feedback, this change with the wine makers that were inside of the project and also the pilots that we were the developing, I would say yes. I mean, we already had some pilots where they prepared the wines, they were analyzed, the passport was produced, the people were doing the tests at the supermarket, getting the scans and so on.
00:27:02:08 - 00:27:14:04
Gustavo Pérez González
So the pilot is already there and one of the partners of the project, they even have some type of internal deals with some of the partners that it seems that they are going to apply for mass production.
00:27:14:06 - 00:27:15:02
Abigail Acton
Okay. Cool.
00:27:15:02 - 00:27:21:16
Gustavo Pérez González
So I would say in the future... from our point of view, is not so far away from that.
00:27:21:16 - 00:27:22:01
Abigail Acton
Great.
00:27:22:02 - 00:27:32:14
Gustavo Pérez González
We need an early adopter, we need a winery that becomes a pathfinder. They test, they demonstrate, and then we will have the followers.
00:27:32:15 - 00:27:32:21
Abigail Acton
Yeah.
00:27:32:21 - 00:27:40:23
Gustavo Pérez González
So at the end, we were trying to explain to the winemakers that we were selling proofs, not promises.
00:27:41:00 - 00:28:09:10
Gustavo Pérez González
I mean, the scan is just to verify, to keep the confidence. So the consumers, at the end, they have a friendly experience and you can complement it with your vineyard story, with the tasting notes, with the food pairing and so on. You are doing your business as usual, but with this authenticity, with this confidence. And at the end, you have this trusted journey timeline. It's not just marketing, it's to provide what you promise.
00:28:09:10 - 00:28:16:13
Gustavo Pérez González
And they have the confidence of whatever you drink is what it was already on the on the bottle.
00:28:16:14 - 00:28:24:15
Abigail Acton
Right. What you paid for. Absolutely. Wonderful. Thank you so much. Does anyone have any questions for Gustavo? Yes. Sorry. What would you like to ask?
00:28:24:17 - 00:28:40:09
Zoe Doulgeri
I was wondering, how can one prevent to forge that type of label? They can have the QR code copied, let's say, and put it in another bottle and that is containing the wrong type of wine?
00:28:40:11 - 00:28:51:15
Gustavo Pérez González
Well, this is one of the critical questions that the wine makers were asking us during the project. I mean, is the QR code something that someone can copy easily?
00:28:51:17 - 00:29:22:16
Gustavo Pérez González
Well, let's say the QR code doesn't behave like a real order. I mean, you have a system that exports those duplicates, scans, impossible journeys or abnormal scanned bottles with tamper evidence. Or, let's say, that it's very hard to clone in a convincing way, when you are copying the QR code is copying the stamp, but that means you have to replicate the journey of the bottle.
00:29:22:17 - 00:29:56:17
Gustavo Pérez González
And what we are doing is that the QR code links to a unique digital identity, to a fingerprint, to the passport, not just a web page. So when the identity is scanned, the system checks whether the scan makes sense in the context. So if the same ID, the same fingerprint, the same passport suddenly appears in two countries or gets scanned of 200 times in short time before it ever reached the market, then you have a red flag, and those patterns are very hard to counterfeit to control this escape.
00:29:56:20 - 00:30:03:10
Gustavo Pérez González
So this is what we were explaining to the wine makers at the end. And it seems that they were convinced.
00:30:03:10 - 00:30:10:08
Abigail Acton
Well, it sounds very convincing to me as well. Thank you very much, Gustavo. Beautifully explained in a very important project. Excellent!
00:30:10:10 - 00:30:14:11
Gustavo Pérez González
Thanks to you for giving us the chance to explain our activities during the project.
00:30:14:15 - 00:30:26:13
Abigail Acton
You're very welcome. Well, thanks very much to the three of you for your time. I think that's going to be a really, really, interesting work that you're all doing. And, I hope your equipment is taken up by lots of producers.
00:30:26:18 - 00:30:27:18
Zoe Doulgeri
Thank you very much.
00:30:27:22 - 00:30:28:16
Filipe Neves dos Santos
Bye bye.
00:30:28:18 - 00:30:31:01
Gustavo Pérez González
Thanks for sharing your time with us. Good bye.
00:30:31:02 - 00:30:34:18
Abigail Acton
Lovely having you. Thank you.
00:30:34:20 - 00:31:00:00
Abigail Acton
If you've enjoyed this podcast, follow us on Spotify or Apple and check out the podcast homepage on the CORDIS website. Subscribe to make sure the hottest research and EU-funded science and innovation isn't passing you by. And if you're enjoying listening, why not spread the word? We've talked about maritime safety and pandemic preparedness, and we've also talked about the wonderful impact of your own gut microbiome.
00:31:00:02 - 00:31:11:24
Abigail Acton
So come and check out the research that's revealing what makes our world tick. We're always happy to hear from you. Drop us a line editorial@cordis.europa.eu. Until next time
Robots and QR passports for the wine sector – tackling labour shortages and fraud 21st century-style!
People often forget just how significant the wine industry is in Europe. Across the EU there are about 2.2 million wine growing farms looking after roughly 3.2 million hectares of vines, and every year those vineyards turn out something like 150 million hectolitres of wine, that’s around 20 billion bottles a year. When the entire value chain is taken into consideration, from growing the grapes to selling the bottles, the wine sector brings in around EUR 130 billion a year to the EU economy and supports close to 3 million jobs, mostly in rural areas. Wine exports alone are worth about EUR 18 billion a year, making wine one of Europe’s top agri food exports. But although the numbers are impressive, the industry is facing serious challenges. The last few harvests have been hit hard by droughts, heatwaves, heavy rain and disease. EU wine production in 2023 and 2024 was among the lowest of this century and, worldwide, wine consumption has dropped to its lowest level since the mid 1990s. Growers are getting squeezed from both sides: more unstable harvests and weaker demand. So, what can we do to help the situation? Our three guests, all of whom have received support from the EU’s research and innovation funding programme, have some intriguing ideas. Filipe Neves dos Santos(opens in new window) works at the Centre for Robotics in Industry and Intelligent Systems(opens in new window), INESC TEC, in Portugal. He develops autonomous robots and machinery, which can operate safely on steep slopes, for the agricultural and forestry sectors, developed under the SCORPION project. Zoe Doulgeri(opens in new window) is professor of Robotics and Control of Manufacturing Systems at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. Her current research interests include learning and control of unimanual and bimanual robotic object manipulation(opens in new window), which she explored in the BACCHUS project. Gustavo Pérez González(opens in new window) is a senior project manager at the Autonomous University of Barcelona(opens in new window). He specialises in analytical chemistry, specifically to develop secure, traceable and immutable solutions for wine authentication, something the TRACEWINDU project developed.
Happy to hear from you!
If you have any feedback, we’re always happy to hear from you! Send us any comments, questions or suggestions to: editorial@cordis.europa.eu.
Keywords
Countries
Greece, Spain, Portugal