John McPhee
Tasmanian Institute of Agriculture, Burnie

A project involving an industry representative group, the private sector, Tasmanian Institute of Agriculture and collaborating growers aims to facilitate uptake of PA technologies, with a focus on the vegetable industry.  Through the use of six commercial farm case study sites spread across a range of soil types and cropping enterprises, the project aims to:

• raise awareness and increase knowledge of PA to aid adoption
• identify and raise awareness of on-farm variability of soils and crops
• provide advice regarding variable crop management and application of inputs
• share experiences and develop networks

Project activities in the first year have focused on:

• accumulating pre-existing data layers (primarily EM38 and elevation derived layers) and mapping case study sites for soil pH
• collecting NDVI imagery for use as a scouting tool to aid crop management
• sample harvests to determine the variability of crop yield and quality in a range of crops
• planning and holding a PA Expo, allowing service providers and technology dealers to promote their products to the agricultural community

A major limitation at this stage is the relative lack of access to yield monitoring equipment for most vegetable harvesters.

In the first season of field work, harvest samples have been collected from accurately surveyed points in crops at densities ranging from 1 – 5 per ha.  Data from these harvest samples show that the variation in crop yields ranged from 2.2 fold in the best case (poppies) to nine fold in the worst case (processing potatoes).  Data will be analysed to determine correlations between crop yield and quality and underlying characteristics derived from map layers (e.g. EM38).

All sample points are located with RTK accuracy to allow inter-season sampling from the same locations (either manually or with yield monitors as they become more available) to determine if yield responses are consistent between seasons and crops.