Preserving Expertise, Optimising Processes
Empowering Sri Lankan Tea Production with AI
Preserving Expertise, Optimising Processes
Empowering Sri Lankan Tea Production with AI
Challenge
Sri Lanka has a thriving tea industry, with more than 300,000 workers employed in the industry. Tea tasting, a crucial aspect of the trade, relies heavily on the expertise of highly skilled tea tasters who have honed their skills over decades. However, as these experts age or retire, or if they’re simply overloaded (especially during harvest season), their unique tasting abilities, defining a company’s brand identity, could be at risk – potentially impacting the industry’s ability to maintain quality standards.
Solution: ProfilePrint's AI Apprentices
Working closely with our client’s master tea tasters, we built AI models that capture their distinctive tasting styles. This approach goes beyond simple imitation; it leverages the power of AI to learn and act as an AI Apprentice to mimic the decision-making process.
Despite a limited sample set (18 for STD 3 and 28 for STD 6), the models achieved an impressive accuracy of 100% for STD 3 and 87% for STD 6.
The models also accurately predicted the suitability of blind samples for both SKUs. Notably, the samples included diverse forms – whole leaves and tea fannings – highlighting the technology’s ability to adapt to variations within the tea itself.
Results
This collaboration between human expertise and AI technology unlocks several advantages:
Digitalising and preserving expertise: By capturing the expertise of tea masters, ProfilePrint safeguards and transfers valuable knowledge and ensure consistency even as personnel changes
Reduced manual tea tasting and increased sample throughput: ProfilePrint’s AI model efficiently screened samples according to our client’s existing standards and quality requirements, significantly reducing the workload for master tea tasters. Our client can now dedicate their time and expertise to the most promising samples identified by the AI model. By automating the initial assessment, our client was able to evaluate a much larger volume of samples in a shorter timeframe
- Supporting training for tasters: AI models can serve as valuable training tools for new tea tasters, accelerating their learning curve and maintaining quality standards
ProfilePrint offers a powerful tool for Sri Lanka’s tea industry. It is not designed to replace tea masters, but to empower them. By leveraging AI, ProfilePrint captures and amplifies their expertise, and ensures the continuity of their capabilities while optimising processes, safeguarding the future of Sri Lanka’s tea expertise.