Using robotics to surmount labour challenges in commercial horticultureFrom mobile platforms to deliver automated crop-tending services to banana de-handing robots, QUT's Dr Chris Lehnert is helping cut labour costs to Australia’s indoor cropping sector.
Future Food Systems – Collaborating to foster agrifood clusters across Australia Collaborative Future Food Systems projects and initiatives are providing powerful tools to help establish and promote successful, sustainable regional agrifood clusters in areas of comparative advantage across Australia.
Melville Park farm: a value-adding storyDavid Doepel and wife Barbara Connell are co-custodians of historic Melville Park Farm, where they’re collaborating with researchers and local businesses to add value to primary produce.
Scoping the Sunshine Coast agrifood ecosystemSunshine Coast cluster FAN is teaming with experts at QUT to ascertain what local agribusinesses need and how they can team up to reduce costs.
Future foods facility to fast-track new product development in WAMurdoch University is the first Western Australian university to partner with the state government in a new commercial food factory that will help food and beverage businesses develop value-added food products for local consumption and global export. The Sustainable Innovative Food Technologies (SIFT) Centre – the result of a WA Government partnership with Future Food…
FFS PhD student finds cost-effective hands-free way to estimate plant height in protected cropping facilitiesNamal Jayasuriya’s research at Western Sydney University using machine vision to estimate crop-height, a proxy for vegetative growth, has been published in Computers and Electronics in Agriculture.
For Food’s Sake Summit tours: SIFT opening and Melville Park farmGuests who joined our recent day tours of the new SIFT facility at FIPWA and Melville Park farm glimpsed the collaborative future of food innovation and value-adding in WA
Empowering smarter food consumption with sensorsBy creating colour-changing sensors that detect spoilage in real time, nanotech experts at UNSW hope to change the way we consume everyday food products, reducing food waste.
Robots to make banana processing more a-peelingHort Innovation, QUT, ARM Hub and Australian Hydraulics Services are collaborating with Future Food Systems in a $2M project to automate the labour-intensive job of de-handing bananas.
Crack research team to extend Australian Tree Crop Map in $1.7m collaborationUniversity of New England mapping experts are again teaming with Hort Innovation in a significant collaboration to extend the national tree-crop map.
Coffs Harbour’s collaborative spirit shines at the launch of CALLIn the picturesque coastal city of Coffs Harbour, the collaborative spirit was in full swing as the Coffs Agrifood Living Lab (CALL) launched at Yarrila Place on October 25
LLEAF takes its sunlight-shifting, growth-enhancing films globalSydney-based SME LLEAF has secured a global distributor for its innovative light-spectra-shifting agricultural film, shown to boost crop yields by up to 20%.
What do Australian consumers want when buying fruit & veg?NSW DPI is collaborating with QUT and farmers state-wide in research that aims to establish what drives consumers' fresh-produce purchases – knowledge growers can use to craft personalised marketing messages.
Produce prescriptions: Delivering free fruit & veg to cut T2D costs Could a six-month dose of free fresh produce lead to improved health in food-insecure Australians with type-2 diabetes? The George Institute and UNSW are working with Harris Farm Markets to find out.
FFS team flies west for pre-Summit planning & FIPWA workshopIn August, FFS team members flew west for a series of stakeholder meetings, visits to Mt Lindesay and Melville Park farms and delivery of an FFS-FIPWA workshop.
Claudia Vacca, PhD student: Boosting resilience in Broccolini™Western Sydney University PhD student Claudia Vacca has spent their career studying plant pathogens, from trees to potatoes, developing new ways for early detection and intervention.
Planet-friendly F&B packaging projects unwrappedIndustry partner FP Paradigm is teaming with UNSW scientists in a series of projects that aim to develop food and beverage packaging that is smarter, safer and more sustainable.
‘Living Lab’ to drive value-adding innovation in Coffs Harbour’s agrifood sectorA new Future Food Systems project will establish Australia’s first food-focused ‘Living Lab’ to foster creative collaboration among stakeholders in Coffs’ agrifood ecosystem, including co-designing the concept for a dedicated food innovation and logistics precinct for the region.
PhD progress report: Gehan Abdelghany, ‘Commercialising native rice’ projectDarwin-based FFS PhD scholar Gehan Abdelghany's research is contributing valuable agronomic information to the FFS-backed ‘Commercialising native rice’ project.
First national map of Australia’s protected cropping structures launchedLaunched in mid-July, Australia’s first national map of PC systems enables accurate yield forecasting and speedy, targeted response to natural disasters and biosecurity threats.
