Vodafone Business partnered with Hugh Lowe Farms to use cutting edge IoT technology to ensure the delivery of perfect strawberries to The Championships.
Hugh Lowe Farms has supplied all the strawberries to Wimbledon for nearly 30 years. Each year, more than 30 tonnes of strawberries are consumed by tennis fans at the event, meaning Hugh Lowe Farms’ operations must be as efficient as possible to meet the demand.
With the help of Vodafone IoT technology and the cloud-based platform MyFarmWeb, Hugh Lowe Farms sustainably grew and delivered 1.5 million fine strawberries to tennis fans at the 2022 event.
It’s vital that the strawberries arrive at The All England Lawn Tennis Club in the best possible condition, so Vodafone also provided Hugh Lowe Farms with a new tracker which enables the farm to track the journey of the strawberries. The technology located each load going to Wimbledon and gave detailed feedback on temperature, collisions, and vibrations in the packaging.
The deployment of Vodafone Business IoT technology and the MyFarmWeb platform help Hugh Lowe Farms have a dramatic impact on operational efficiencies, as well as offering greater insight to reduce carbon emissions. The MyFarmWeb platform collects farm data from IoT sensors to support better informed decision making for improved soil and crop health, effective water use, and precision fertilizer and pesticide application. This helps improve farm productivity and optimises farming practices, to help reduce greenhouse gases.
“Technology has the power to change society for the better and we can see it in action at Hugh Lowe Farms. Not only does our IoT technology help the team make their operations more efficient and produce the best strawberries, it also helps them be as environmentally friendly as possible by reducing excess water usage and minimising greenhouse gas emissions.”
Nick Gliddon - Business Director, Vodafone UK
Strawberries are very susceptible to disease and this technology means the farm can make informed decisions on how to apply controls to protect them. This allows for better and more sustainable growing conditions, as well as ensuring Hugh Lowe Farm has a good return on yield and quality of crop.
Vodafone estimates that the introduction of IoT technology could help agriculture industries save 2.4-4.8 million tonnes of CO2e annually and new technologies such as 5G and IoT could help the UK reduce its carbon emissions 4% a year, particularly in the transport, manufacturing, and agriculture sectors.
Vodafone recently announced it’ll work with business customers around the world to deploy IoT technology to save more than 350 million tonnes of CO2e by 2030.
“We are excited to be working with Vodafone and their support is helping us optimise the growing conditions of our strawberries. It is a great privilege to be the sole provider of strawberries to Wimbledon, and that’s a role we’ve had for nearly 30 years. Now we’re using Vodafone’s cutting-edge technology to be able to deliver the best ever quality strawberries, all produced in a more sustainable way, for fans to enjoy.”
Marion Regan - Hugh Lowe Farms
