DESIGNING A DIGITAL HORTICULTURAL TOOLBOX
We seek to understand and identify solutions to the challenges faced by Midwestern fruit and vegetable growers as they cultivate their crops. This includes learning how farmers use information from various sources (weather, soil, markets, etc.) to make pivotal decisions, identifying the most critical challenges that occur during horticultural production, and determining how tools can be built to reduce these challenges. The Designing a Digital Horticultural Toolbox (DDHT) project looks to inform the design of more digital technologies for practitioners of annual fruit and vegetable production. We’re looking for farmers engaged in fruit and vegetable production who are interested in sharing their insight on crop production challenges and potential digitally-enabled solutions.
Who:
Owners and operators of Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio, and Wisconsin farms producing cucumber, melon, pepper or tomato. The combined total of annual revenue contributed by horticultural crops must be at least 20% of total revenue and farming operations must be considered either small or medium in scale.
What:
Participate in a 2-hour in-person interview about information challenges faced by growers and their use of information at critical decision points and a set of two workshops (3 and 1.5 hours long) where we will get your input and feedback on digital tool designs.
When:
Interviews will be held between January and April 2023, the first workshop will be held between April and August 2023, and the second workshop will be held between November 2023 and January 2024.
Where:
The interview will be conducted in person (if possible) at your farming operation. The design workshops will be conducted in person at a nearby Purdue Agricultural Center or other suitable location.
Thank You:
As a thank you to participants we will be compensating you at a rate of $25 per hour, rounded up to the nearest hour. This will result in compensation of $175 for participation in all study activities.
For more information on this project see our webpage.
Sign up here.
Questions:
Ankita Raturi (ankita@purdue.edu)
Steven Doyle (doyle11 O@purdue.edu)
Purdue University IRB Protocol: # IRB-2022-841