{"id":643803,"date":"2026-05-03T08:04:33","date_gmt":"2026-05-03T06:04:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/?p=643803"},"modified":"2026-05-03T09:32:03","modified_gmt":"2026-05-03T07:32:03","slug":"south-african-town-where-appletiser-was-born-is-using-drones-and-ai-to-supercharge-farms","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/technology\/643803-south-african-town-where-appletiser-was-born-is-using-drones-and-ai-to-supercharge-farms.html","title":{"rendered":"South African town where Appletiser was born is using drones and AI to supercharge farms"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The Western Cape town of Grabouw is a major playing field for innovative agricultural technologies, including drone-based spectral imaging and artificial intelligence-driven irrigation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

About 65km east of Cape Town, Grabouw is the commercial hub of the Elgin Valley, the largest single source of exported fruits in Southern Africa. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The area in which the town is located was originally inhabited by the Khoi pastoralists and San hunter-gatherers. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the years after Dutch settlement, the region became a stopping point for wagons travelling eastwards out of Cape Town along what would become the N2 highway. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Grabouw itself was established on the farm Grietjiesgat, which was bought by Cape Town painter Wilhelm Langschmidt in 1856. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Langschmidt’s wife operated a small trading store on the farm, which was the beginning of its conversion into a village. He renamed the settlement Grabow, the town of his birth in Germany.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The region first began seeing deciduous fruit farming in the early 1900s, starting with farm workers of suffragist farmer Antonie Viljoen cultivating apple trees in their own plots.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Other major early contributors to its agricultural expansion were the Italian-South African Molteno family and Franco-Italian immigrant Edmond Joseph Lombardi, who settled in the Elgin Valley in the 1930s. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lombardi created the Appletiser soft drink, a blend of Apple juice and carbonated water, on his farm, Applethwaite. He introduced the product to the market in 1966. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since the early 2000s, the region has seen an increase in viticulture farming and has become more tourism-oriented.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to official census data, its population more than doubled from 21,595 in 2001 to 44,593 by 2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While the latest census data is widely considered unreliable, estimates suggest Grabouw’s population exceeded 160,000 in 2026.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Grabouw’s farming community has embraced technology to optimise their operations and product yields, stimulating substantial agricultural and viticultural growth. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Among the companies that have contributed technology used in the region is Aerobotics, founded in 2014 by Benji Meltzer and James Paterson.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

AI-enhanced farming<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
Aerobotics app and drone above an orange orchard<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The company initially made a name for itself with its AI-based analysis of multispectral imaging and thermal sensors data captured by drones.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Aerobotics’ Drone Scan technology can assess the health of individual trees and detect a wide range of potential problems at an early stage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To conduct the analysis, the drone positions itself about a metre above a tree and takes a high-resolution image to capture specific leaf details. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The system saves farmers and agricultural businesses valuable time and effort spent analysing crop health manually.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Over the years, Aerobotics has expanded its product offering with various features on a mobile app:<\/p>\n\n\n\n