DEEP LEARNING FOR AUTOMATIC CLASSIFICATION OF AVOCADO FRUIT MATURITY

Abstract

Avocado (Persea Americana), a fleshy fruit with a single seed, has increased in popularity globally, especially in tropical and Mediterranean climates, thanks to its commercial and nutritional value. Rich in bioactive compounds, avocados contribute to the prevention and treatment of various diseases, including cardiovascular problems and cancer. Avocado production in Indonesia, for example, is showing a significant increase, reflecting the growing demand. Avocado ripeness affects shelf life and quality, making the determination of ripeness level a critical aspect of postharvest management. Skin color and pulp firmness change during storage, affecting quality and nutritional value. Proper classification of ripeness is important to reduce post-harvest losses, improve quality and optimize export costs. Recent research shows the use of technologies such as machine learning and YOLO (You Only Look Once) version 9 in real-time detection of avocado ripeness, offering innovative solutions to reduce post-harvest losses and improve distribution efficiency. This approach not only benefits farmers and consumers but also ensures consumer satisfaction and reduces economic losses. This study highlights the importance of real-time detection in monitoring avocado ripeness, where the training process was conducted for 89,280 iterations resulting in a new model for avocado ripeness detection. The final model has a mean Average Precision (mAP) validation value of 84.3%, mAP 84.3% signifies the optimal level of accuracy in object recognition in avocado fruit maturity images using the YOLO model that has undergone an intensive training process.