Thanks to everyone who made LandWISE 21 such a successful Conference!
We were a touch nervous after Covid-cancelling last year, but so heartened when our sponsors jumped on-board, and delgetaes began registering earlier than usual. Perhaps there was a vacuum . . .
The speakers’ presentations are summarised in a series of blog posts, many with a short sound clip. The time put in to create the presentations is clearly huge, it is a very large gift each one makes. Thanks each and every one of you!
Dr Jamie Blennerhassett is opening LandWISE 2021 asking the questions, “What are the future challenges to the primary industry and where might they come from?”
Jamie looked at the opportunity to get ahead of those challenges so that we not only survive as an industry but thrive.
Future environmental trends, regulations, technology threats and opportunities
Anyone with a passing interest in the news will see daily items covering the impending catastrophe of climate change and the ongoing decline of our freshwater resources. Alongside these stories, you will also likely see reporting on regulatory reform introduced to deal with these challenges as well as the resultant dissatisfaction from farmers at the scale and pace of those regulatory changes.
Should any of this have been a surprise? In short the answer is no. We have been aware of declining water quality and a changing climate from human caused greenhouse gas emissions for well over 20 years, as firstly scientists, then environmentalists and lastly the wider public sounded alarm bells and raised concerns around human caused impacts on the environment. The resulting outcome in the shape of regulatory change was inevitable as the voice of the people took effect.
So as we sit here now and reflect on the fact that the regulatory response was entirely predictable by following the science and the subsequent consumer/community desires, what are the next issues that will drive regulatory change and how do we get out in front of the change?
Topics such as indigenous biodiversity and water use efficiency are obvious places to start as they gain increasing attention from scientists and environmentalists alike. While many consumer trends come and go, particularly around things like fashion and diets, trends linked to the environment and sustainability have been consistent and growing for well over 20 years and usually follow the science.
By looking to the science, we likely allow ourselves an early insight into the next consumer trends and a chance to get ahead of the curve in the premium end of the market by setting up our farming systems to solve for these problems. Not only will this allow us to win in the market place, it will likely have us well placed for the next wave of regulatory change that will invariably follow shortly behind those consumer demands as they then turn into the voice of the people at the ballot box.
Listen to a Summary SoundClip here:
Jamie is the Innovation Leader at Ballance AgriNutrients. He has 20 years’ experience in the fertiliser industry across a range of leadership roles from science and new product development to sales management.
Jamie has a PhD in soil science from Massey University and has a passion for finding an optimum balance between the need for efficient food production and protecting our natural environment.
Jay Clarke, Director of Woodhaven Gardens joined us at LandWISE 21 to discuss changes that have been made on their vegetable growing farm.
Woodhaven grows a diverse range of 23 vegetable crops in Horowhenua. Operating on more than 1000ha their annual production comprises 10% of the national fresh leafy greens supply for New Zealand.
Woodhaven Gardens has been working hard to meet and exceed environmental targets in their region. They have sought help from the experts, collaborated within their community, and thoroughly reviewed their processes on-farm to achieve improved environmental outcomes. Some examples include considerable reductions in fertiliser use, reduced soil and nutrient losses, contribution of land and resources for trials, and community engagement supporting other vegetable growers with environmental management.
Jay urges growers to avoid “ticking the compliance boxes”. AS well as providing 220-250 full-time jobs, Woodhaven Gardens consults with their community, iwi and regulators to understand their needs and wants. By meeting these community aspirations, Jay believes Woodhaven Gardens will stay ahead of regulation.
Listen to a Summary SoundClip here:
Woodhaven Gardens was named the Regional Supreme Winner at the Horizons Ballance Farm Environment Awards in April 2020. This award recognised their significant efforts to improve their efficiency on-farm and the environmental outcomes of their land management practices. Judges commented that “new technology is being integrated to lower nutrient output” and that “the Clarke’s are making changes to their business to improve water quality”.
David Manktelow founded Applied Research and Technologies, providing contract and independent research work in horticultural plant protection, pathology and spray application technology.
A life-long innovator, he constantly seeks technologies that do tasks better. Whether simple strips of water sensitive paper or a fast laser scanner, he finds ways to help growers constantly improve practices.
At LandWISE 2021, David described the Green Atlas system of automatic counting and mapping of flowers and fruit in orchards. Together with Fruition Horticulture’s Jack Hughes, David has trialled the Green Atlas system in Hawke’s Bay and displayed the equipment at the field event.
Green Atlas Cartographer is a combination of hardware and software that allows flower and fruit counts to be quickly and accurately mapped over entire orchards. An unprecedented level of detail allows crop management to be tailored to every tree.
Matty Blomfieldgrew up in a small town in New Zealand. He took a chance and moved to Japan at 17, and later New York to broaden his view of the world. When he asked growers and packhouses what their biggest problem was they answered, “How do I know what fruit I have to store/pack/sell?”
Committed to reducing the amount of fruit wasted globally, by giving growers the platform to capture data, analyse their orchard in ways they’ve never done before, and improve the consistency of high quality, safe fruit, Matty co-founded Hectre to provide an orchard management software tool. Their super quick and simple fruit sizing app, Spectre, is an example of the innovation they’re bringing to the fruit industry.
Spectre uses computer vision AI technology to detect fruit size and colour, all from the simple click of an iPad or iPhone. Sample sizes captured by Spectre are 100 times those obtained in traditional sizing practices and accuracy levels are extremely high at 95%+. Results are served up within seconds making Spectre the simplest, fastest and most accurate, portable computer vision fruit sizing tool available on the market.
Genevieve is a kiwifruit grower and founder of PicMi, a digital platform connecting horticultural work with workers.
With a foundation in spatial design, she joined PWC as an Experience Designer, scoping and shaping work, and creating a platform and accelerator for new ways of working. Supporting clients with their strategic initiatives, she specialised in group facilitation, design thinking and provide neutral, safe discussions around the strategic or tactical needs of the business.
Her mission to create straight-through seasonal hiring was born from Genevieve’s first-hand experience of the frustrations of hiring for her family’s kiwifruit orchard in the Tasman. She stepped in to help when her father had a serious tractor accident, and came face-to-face with the pain and time pressures of trying to find seasonal staff.
At LandWISE 21, Genevieve will outline the problems she encountered, and her path to finding a solution and creating a business to make the process of engaging with growers and workers easy, and meeting the many aspects of compliance.
Matt Flowerday has been involved in farming and horticulture his whole life.
Matt started using GPS to map farms and orchards in 1998. In 2001 he set up GPS-it to carryout GPS mapping, with a focus on kiwifruit.
From beginnings in a small office on a kiwifruit orchard, with just one staff member and a GPS unit, the business has evolved significantly. GPS-it is now an established aerial farm mapping and software development company, providing high-quality customised geospatial solutions to our clients, using ESRI technology.
At the LandWISE 21 Conference, Matt will show how Landkind, an interactive platform that lets orchards and packhouses unlock the value of their maps, improves productivity and profitability by allowing users to create, manage, and interact with orchard data effortlessly.
Dan Bloomer is an aging part-time PhD student at Massey University. Passionate about farming and technology, he’s been an irrigation consultant, kiwifruit orchardist, lecturer, and land management advisor. He is currently Principal of Page Bloomer Associates, member of the AgritechNZ Executive Council, and importantly, Manager of LandWISE Inc.
At LandWISE 21, Dan will describe some alternative non-herbicide weed management technologies, and give consideration to the amount of energy they may require.
The amount of energy required typically ranges from 2 to 2,000 Litres of diesel per hectare. With a desire for sustainable practices and low energy consumption in food production, Dan’s current focus is using very targeted, high voltage but low energy techiques to effect control of arable weeds, including braodleaves and ryegrass in cereal crops.
Dan’s weeding research is part of an MBIE AgResearch project “Managing Herbicide Resistant Weeds”, with Dan’s role being assessing non-chemical techologies including hot water/hot foam, compressed-air abrasion and electric weeding.
Hamish Penny started the electric weeding company Weda Tech in 2019. He has a passion for solving problems with technology.
Hamish was introduced to agritech in his final year engineering project which focused building an electric weeding device.
Since then, Hamish has completed a Master’s in Engineering and worked on several projects including Weda Tech, which aims to commercialise the unique equipment he has developed to provide weed control options for farmers.
Electric weeding is the destruction of weeds with high-voltage electricity. Differentiating it from other non-chemical weed control techniques, electricity allows a systemic kill of a whole plant, low energy usage, minimal soil disturbance, operation in wet soil conditions, and can control weeds in close proximity to crops – even when touching.
Weda Tech was founded to harness the inherent benefits of electrical weed control and use a precision approach to develop novel equipment that can control the widest variety of weeds in the widest range of environmental conditions. The focus has been to build highly flexible pulse generation equipment and powerful measurement techniques to allow understanding of the way weeds respond to specific treatments.
There are some obvious synergies between electric weeding and image-based weed recognition and robotics, that could be combined to maximise the capabilities of electrical weed management.
There are a few start-up companies around the world developing and commercialising electric weeding equipment, including Rootwave (who have recently been collaborating with the Small Robot Company), Crop.Zone and others. Weda Tech is focused on thinking about the problem differently and through an understanding of the optimal dosage for a specific weed in specific conditions, is creating solutions that solve the most significant problems faced by farmers.
A strip weeding device is currently under development, with a 10-20cm wide electrode that could control a strip next to a crop or, be combined in parallel to control any width of paddock.
The current research device will also be developed into a site-specific weeder that can control low weed densities, with a robotic or human arm guiding to the target weed.
Nick Fitzpatrick has spent the last 20 years in Primary Industries, primarily Fresh Fruit and Vegetable sector including 15 years with T&G Global’s International division, including establishing their Latin America business with offices in Peru and Chile, and in Asian market expansion.
More recently Nick worked for California based Science and Innovation start up company – Apeel Sciences, introducing plant based science and technology solutions to post harvest operators globally.
Now consulting to the Agriculture industry, including Callaghan Innovation, Nick is passionate about helping companies to embrace Innovation and Sustainability across their business.
With this background and his current role as Project Lead – Agritech Commercialisation at Callaghan Innovation working within the Agritech ITP, Nick was well placed to inform LandWISE 21 delegates about New Zealand’s place in a big world increasingly focused on agritech development.
Nick introduced the NZ Agritech Industry Transformation Plan and its aims:
using comparative advantage to grow Agritech as a high value export sector
Lifting primary sector productivity & sustainability, and enabling companies to move from volume to value
Contributing to global environmental and sustainability
challenges, and helping feed the world & reduce emissions
Callaghan Innovatoin is developing and early adopter network. THe aims are
Ensuring companies are solving the right problems
Increased collaboration between Industry, Agritech companies and government + Research partners
Better understanding of the ‘size of the prize’, both in NZ and Offshore.
Better prepared Agritech companies when showcasing/trialing products or going to market.
Nick explained the size of LATAM opportunities while contrasting the nature of agriculture and horticulture in Chile and Peru. Chile has good infrastructure, an educated population, and a qualified
technical workforce in the Fruit industry. Their key products are Cherries, Grapes, Pipfruit, Berries, Citrus and Avocados.
Peru is emerging as regional superpower. It has a different agriculture structure to Chile which has thousands of small farms and hundreads of packers and exprters. Peru has a number of very large farms. The key products are Berries, Grapes, Avocados, Citrus, Mangos, and Vegetables.
In summary:
Chile and Peru in particular are ripe for introduction of new, cost efficient, technology as the fruit sector transforms from being heavily dependant on human labour to embracing automation and
innovation. Chileans and Peruvians are eager to engage and open to new tech in Agriculture.
Jay Clarke, Director of 
David Manktelow
Genevieve is a kiwifruit grower and founder of 
Dan Bloomer is an aging part-time PhD student at 
Hamish Penny started the electric weeding company Weda Tech in 2019. He has a passion for solving problems with technology.
Nick Fitzpatrick has spent the last 20 years in Primary Industries, primarily Fresh Fruit and Vegetable sector including 15 years with T&G Global’s International division, including establishing their Latin America business with offices in Peru and Chile, and in Asian market expansion.