Business Challenge

• Meat and Livestock Australia (MLA) is a service provider to the red meat industry, and they provide research to protect and promote the industry in Australia and international markets

• To detect levels of harmful parasites in livestock, farmers collect samples, and distribute them for manual testing, a lengthy and inefficient process

• MLA sought to streamline this laborious process through the development of a predictive smartphone app

Results

• The technology developed enables farmers to identify and treat parasites in the field, saving time and increasing productivity

• The app uses Machine Learning to detect the number and type of parasites from a photograph of the animals faeces, rather than a collection sample

• Research has uncovered future avenues to explore, and technology can be developed further, with the ability to deploy via smartphones, dedicated appliances, laptops or the Cloud

Solution & Approach

• Due to the lack of existing data, tools, and research publicly available in this area, an R&D project was conducted

• A 3-stage plan was developed to leverage the power of Artificial Intelligence to tackle detection challenges through computer vision and Machine Learning

• The plan encompassed the creation of parasite images, study of machine learning algorithms, training of neural networks and deployment of the technology