Background
Hort Innovation is the grower-owned, not-for-profit research and development corporation for Australia's horticulture industry.
Our role is to advance Australia’s $16 billion horticulture industry by investing in research and development, marketing and trade to build a prosperous and sustainable future for growers.
We partner with Australian and international co-investors including government, leading science, technology, and consumer strategy experts to anticipate future challenges and opportunities. Our role is to capture value from the investments we make to benefit all levy payers.
Challenge
We invite innovators, problem solvers, and innovative organizations to join us in addressing the pressing challenge of advancing Australian horticulture resilience against extreme weather events.
Challenge Context:
In the face of increasingly unpredictable and severe weather patterns, Australian growers are encountering significant challenges in safeguarding their crops. This challenge seeks innovative solutions that can enhance resilience within the horticulture sector, enabling growers to mitigate the adverse impacts of extreme weather events such as droughts, floods, heatwaves, and storms. Participants are encouraged to develop technologies, strategies, and practices that empower growers to adapt to changing climatic conditions, optimize resource management, and maintain productivity and sustainability in their operations.
Some of the challenges and impacts caused by climate change in horticulture includes:
- Production on farm is affected in multiple ways including lower crop yields, stress, higher operational costs, and the potential complete loss of production.
- Transport of food is disrupted by more frequent extreme events, such as floods or bushfires.
- Storage is becoming more vulnerable to pests and diseases in warmer weather. Costs of refrigeration are increasing, and refrigeration is less effective in heatwave conditions.
The primary goals of this challenge include:
- Encourage innovators, problem solvers, and organizations to develop novel solutions and technologies that address the challenges caused by extreme weather events in the Australian horticulture sector.
- Promote the development of strategies, practices, and technologies that enhance the resilience of Australian horticulture against extreme weather events.
- Ensure that proposed solutions enable growers to maintain productivity and profitability in their operations despite the increasing frequency and severity of extreme weather events, thereby safeguarding food security and economic sustainability.
Key Success Criteria:
- Improved Crop Resilience: Development and adoption of strategies, technologies, and practices that enhance the resilience of horticultural crops to withstand extreme weather conditions, leading to minimal yield losses and crop damage.
- Effective Risk Assessment and Management: The ability to accurately assess and mitigate risks associated with extreme weather events.
- Adaptability and Scalability: Successful initiatives should be adaptable to different climates and scalable to cater to various scales of horticultural operations, ensuring broad applicability across diverse agricultural settings.
- Cost-Efficiency: The solutions should demonstrate cost-effectiveness, providing growers with economically viable options to implement resilient practices without imposing prohibitive financial burdens.
What we aren’t interested in:
- Traditional weather forecast solutions.
What's in it for you?
This is a global challenge, and Hort Innovation is willing to collaborate with innovative companies, researchers, universities, and technical solution providers. A successful collaboration could mean funding for the solution through the Hort-Frontier co-investment mechanism. It is important to mention that although the implemented solution must be available in Australia, the implementation can be carried out anywhere in the world.