In June this year, I was chosen for one of two teams attending the 2024 International Food and Agribusiness Management Association (IFAMA) Case Study Competition and Conference in Almeria, Spain. The theme of the conference was Food Security Through Innovation & Sustainability. We were then invited to attend a weeklong food and agri-innovation tour to Bologna, Cologne and then through the Netherlands.

I am lucky to have been in a team with four clever individuals from across the New Zealand Agri-Food sector. Our team included Dan from Silver Fern Farms in Dunedin, Fatima from ANZ in Auckland, Braydon from Perrin Ag in Rotorua, and Katie from Auckland University. We brought a diverse range of skills to our case study analysis, as well as a diverse range of opinions and perspectives on agriculture.

We were incredibly excited to learn that we won first place in our division, with the other New Zealand team coming in second place. Not bad for a little country at the bottom of the world!

While travelling together after the conference we were able to explore food provenance and food culture in Bologna, agricultural research and development in Cologne, and agricultural and horticultural innovation in the Netherlands. We will all be spending the next few months digesting what we have seen, discussed and learnt, and how our experience links to food production back here in New Zealand.

Many thanks to LandWISE (Dan & Phillipa) for allowing me the time away to learn, grow and explore the agri-food sector at a global level.

Applications are open!

Applications are open for the 2024 STAMP intake so if you have talented young people in your business (under 27 at the time of application), encourage them to apply! Click here for more information. Applications close 31st Aug 2024.

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Almería – a sea of greenhouses

At the bottom of Spain on the edge of the Mediterranean Sea, you’ll find Almería. Almería is a city and municipality of Andalusia, and is located in the desert, receiving only 200 mm of rain per year. Despite this, the region is a hub of horticultural production, with 32,200 ha of greenhouses spread across the landscape (3.7% of the total area of the province), as well as around 30,000 of open-air production.

There are 12,500 farms with undercover production which generate more than 110,000 jobs. There are many small growers who are represented by grower co-operatives. In fact, there are enough co-operatives that secondary co-operatives exists which are ‘co-operatives of co-operatives’, for example Unica, which represents 15 co-operatives. The industry prides itself on being leaders in tech transfer to growers of all sizes, and strives for shared wealth creation, and keeping small farmers in business.

The annual turnover in the region is €4.4 billion, plus an additional €1.5 billion from the auxiliary industries including nurseries, R&D centers and suppliers (approx. €6 billion total per year). Given the region’s warm location, growers can achieve year-round production. The main crops grown are eggplants, zucchini, cucumber, tomato, pepper, melon, watermelon and lettuce. In total, 3.7 million tons of fruit and vegetables are produced each year. The first greenhouse was built in 1963 and since then has taken the province from one of the poorest in Andalusia to one of the wealthiest, now ranking above average in Spain.

In 2007 a program was started to implement biological controls in horticultural crops to produce residue free crops. In 2023, Almería had the largest area in the world using biological controls in vegetables, totaling 26,800ha.

Challenges

There are significant challenges to producing food in such an intensive way, and there has been much criticism of the region’s intensive production methods and the impact on the environment.

Water is unsurprisingly a key issue in a desert. Historically water has been extracted from groundwater, depleting underground aquifers. In recent years, desalination plants have been built to provide fresh water through reverse osmosis for both human consumption and irrigation, although water is still having to be extracted from the ground to meet demand.

Plastic use is also a challenge, with the plastic on the greenhouses being replaced by growers every 3 years, however the industry reports that 100% of the plastic is recycled.

The source of the region’s labour supply has faced criticism in recent years, in relation to the exploitation of migrant workers working in the greenhouses.

Netherlands- home of the modern glasshouse

As part of our trip, we travelled through The Netherlands, where we had the opportunity to visit Van der Harg in Bemmel. They grow and pack capsicums/bell pepper in their 8.6 ha of glasshouses. They are also experimenting with growing eggplants. The design of the Dutch glasshouse originated in Den Hague, and there are 10,000 ha of glasshouses in The Netherlands today, which largely grow bell pepper, eggplant, tomato and cucumbers.

The seedlings are grown at an independent nursery and planted into the glasshouse in November. The first fruit is harvested in February. Production lasts until October when the plants are pulled out and the greenhouse is prepared for the next crop. Interestingly, the crop is grown with few to no sprays, however the crop cannot be classified as organic as it is not grown directly in the soil. The plants are grown in ‘cultivation gutters’, where there are understory plantings which are used for pest control, and climate control.

The glasshouse is located in an Agropark, NextGarden, which allows participating growers to reduce their costs by ‘industrial symbiosis’; sharing resources and infrastructure. This includes collective power generation and a biodigester. By-products of the biodigester are captured (heat and CO2) and used by the glasshouses. There is also collective water harvesting systems that delivers clean rainwater for irrigation and processing.

Challenges

There are of course challenges to this system. The process of harvesting is labour intensive, with the labour supply coming from largely from countries like Romania. A robotic harvester has been developed, however must harvest ’27 hours a day’ to be the same cost as a human. Once they reach 24 hours, the human element of production will largely be gone.

Additionally, the strings used for training the capsicum plants are plastic. To maintain production levels they are not able to use biodegradable strings as they are not transparent enough and block too much light. The plastic string is used for just one season and is the major waste product of the system.

This system is energy intensive, particularly in heating over the winter months. However, Van der Harg are working with NextGarden Agropark to reduce or capture emissions, to power the glasshouse in a sustainable way.

Same challenges, different growing system

Regardless of growing system or location, the same conversations are happening globally, in relation to the challenges growers face. Water, energy, ethical labour supply, agrichemical use, and plastics are issues facing farmers and growers regardless of system or size.

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Alex wins in Spain

LandWISE is delighted to have supported our Project Manager Alex Dickson to be part of the 2024 IFAMA case study competition held in Almeria, Spain in June.

We were even more delighted by an immediate result, as Alex posted in LinkedIn:

“I’m thrilled to share that we have taken out first place at the IFAMA 2024 Student Case Study competition in the Early Career Professional category. I’m so proud of my unbelievably talented teammates Katie Henderson, Fatima Imran, Dan Ryan and Braydon Schroder. It came down to the final two, made up of both NZ teams. It’s brilliant that NZ took home both first and second place in Spain this year!

The case study explored the global seed industry, from the perspective of the International Seed Federation (ISF) and asked us to consider how to improve collaboration and communication between stakeholders throughout the value chain, in the face of changing European policy.

It has been a roller coaster of emotions; we are all so grateful for this amazing opportunity. Thank you to FoodHQ, Massey University, AGMARDT (The Agricultural and Marketing Research and Development Trust) for supporting us to get here!“

Their group developed a proposal for a food alliance which was powered by data and a governance model to help the seed industry collaborate and deal with regulatory pressures, such as the EU green deal.

Alex travelled as one of the members of the Strategic Thinking for Agrifood Management Programme (STAMP), and initiative of FOODHQ at Massey University supported by AGMARDT. The STAMP programme focuses on accelerating emerging leaders’ strategic thinking, broadening sector awareness and helping build local and global personal and professional networks.

After spending time in Spain, the group has been travelling, including visits to a number of food producers in other EU countries, and

As Dr Victoria Hatton, CEO of Food HQ noted, “The value of this experience can’t be underestimated. The exposure the cohort have been given to a real world challenge is fantastic. I am so proud of this amazing group of young leaders.”

We share that opinion and are justly proud of Alex’s and colleagues’ achievement.

IFAMA is an international management organization that brings together current and future business, academic, and government leaders along with other industry stakeholders—to improve the strategic focus, transparency, sustainability, and responsiveness of the global food and agribusiness system.

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This is a summary of Dan’s work published under the AgResearch led “Herbicide Resistance Management” project, of which LandWISE was a small co-funder. The full paper was published open access in the Sustainability journal, and is freely available to everybody here>

Abstract:

Seeking low environmental impact alternatives to chemical herbicides that can be integrated into a regenerative agriculture system, we developed and tested flat-plate electrode weeding equipment for applying ultra-low-energy electric shocks to seedlings in the field.

Better than 90% control was achieved for all species, with energy to treat 5 weeds m⁻² equivalent to 15 kJ ha⁻¹ for twincress (Lepidium didymum) and redroot (Amaranthus. powellii), and 363 kJ ha⁻¹ (leaf contact only) and 555kJ ha⁻¹ (plants pressed to soil) for in-ground Italian ryegrass (Lolium multiflorum), all well below our 1 MJ ha⁻¹ target and a fraction of the energy required by any other weeding system.

We compared applications to the leaves only or to leaves pressed against the soil surface, to seedlings growing outside in the ground and to plants growing in bags filled with the same soil. No previous studies have made such direct comparisons. Our research indicated that greenhouse and in-field results are comparable, other factors remaining constant. The in-ground, outdoor treatments were as effective and efficient as our previously published in-bag, greenhouse trials. The flat-plate system that we tested supports sustainable farming by providing ultra-low-energy weed control suitable for manual, robotic, or conventional deployment without recourse to tillage or chemical herbicides.

Download the full paper here>

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Many thanks to everybody involved in our 2024 Annual Conference! All up we had 99 registrants who heard from 23 amazing presenters and saw 9 different practical demonstrations. Our special thanks to everyone who contributed by sharing their knowledge and experiences, and to delegates for their active interaction. Thanks to Pure Catering and our hosts at the Havelock North Function Centre and at the Centre for Land and Water which hosts our MicroFarm and the demonstrations.

Many thanks also to our conference sponsors and supporters. These organisations support us through the year as well as for the conference and we are very grateful. They are the most loyal of partners we could hope for.

Ka mau te wehi!

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LandWISE 2024 – Rebuilding Our Soils

Havelock North – 15-16 May 2024

We are looking forward to our annual conference this week.
We will report on our current work with industry, researchers and growers
seeking out and trialing best ways to rebuild soil.
Our invited speakers will present alternative practices and novel ideas,
some perhaps fringe, but all looking to be mainstream, on a range of topics.

The key topics in 2024 are:

Carbon Positive – Regenerative Cropping
Alternative Pest Management
A year on – Cyclone impacts
Data capture to understanding
New Zealand Agritech
Novel Technologies

We welcome presenters old and new and are most excited by
the breadth and depth of knowledge they offer on many topics.
We also have a great range of practical demonstrations lined up for
viewing at the MicroFarm.

The draft programme is available now, and registrations are open.

Draft Programme

Our Presenters

Registration

We are delighted that Apatu Group is continuing their sponsorship
to allow secondary students free conference attendance, and that
for 2024 they have been joined by Vegetables NZ and Onions NZ
so an even larger cohort can attend.

We view this as a vital element, as such students are indeed the future of our industry,
and feedback from previous years has been very positive.

Discount for our Financial Members = pay for one day, get the other free. See you there!

Thanks to BASF Crop Protection and Hawke’s Bay Regional Council for continuing their Platinum Sponsorships. Both are long-term, loyal supporters and we are most grateful. Our other loyal supporters are also back with us, so please take time to look and give them your support in return.

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In the summer of 2023-2024, the LandWISE MicroFarm grew process tomatoes for Heinz-Wattie’s using three alternative management systems: conventional, regenerative, and a hybrid taking from each. One of the principles for a regenerative system is to build natural resilience rather than rely only on a chemical-based crop protection regime. Nothing new, of course, we’ve had IPM programmes for decades.

How can we apply these concepts in an intensive process vegetable crop production system? What are the elements we need to consider, and how do we bring them together? There are tried and proven approaches, there are ongoing developments, and there are new ways that are being explored. Come to the LandWISE Conference “Rebuilding Our Soils” and hear what experts have to say!

Bruce Mackay, Heinz Wattie’s agricultural manager, has been an agronomist for a long time and has seen and tried different growing philosophies in a commercial context. As a key partner in Carbon Positive, Wattie’s has been deeply involved since Day Zero, and doubly so through the 2023-24 cropping season as we’ve worked to integrate regenerative agriculture principles into an intensive crop programme. Why is Kraft-Heinz interested at a global level? Why is Heinz-Wattie’s investing in local research?

Tika Schellevis started working on assessment of regen ag practices in Canada as part of her master’s degree in climate studies at Wageningen University. Over the last two years, Tika has been part of McCain Foods’ Regen Ag journey. Since October 2023, Tika has been working with the McCain Foods agronomy team in Timaru. Tike will outline how the Environmental Impact Quotient, EIQ, can help understand the relative impacts of different agrichemical options, and help select an optimal programme.

Jessica Vereijssen will discuss integrated pest management, using our crops as examples, but presenting transferable principles. She leads the Insect Dynamics, Ecology, and Sustainability team at Plant & Food Research in Lincoln. Jessica specialises in Integrated Pest Management and sustainable management programmes, considering the biology, behaviour, and ecology of pests. Her current research delves into (invasive) insect vectors such as psyllids and aphids, as well as the potential transmission of plant pathogenic organisms, leveraging her dual background in entomology and plant pathology. 

Chris Thompson will describe the use of predatory insects. He is a seasoned professional in the biotechnology industry, and Managing Director of Bioforce, where he leads the development of sustainable agricultural products and environmentally friendly solutions for various industries. When we received a “bag of bugs” to help control Tomato Potato Psyllid, he’s who we rang with twenty questions. Where do we put them? What agrichemicals might be OK? Which ones should we avoid at all costs? etc.

Since we began the Carbon positive project, we’ve been introduced to a huge range of products described variously as crop elicitors, bioactives, biostimulants, natural protectors and more. Tony Reglinski is a Senior Research Scientist at Plant and Food Research where he investigates the use of plant defence inducers to enhance natural resistance against pathogen attack. His research has covered a broad range of crops including, cereal, radiata pine, wine grapes and kiwifruit. His aim is to is to improve our understanding of the benefits and potential limitations of inducers in order to facilitate their practical implementation as crop protectants.

Come along and hear these experts as they lay out options to increase our resilience and reduce reliance on single approaches to crop protection. The principles and concepts apply broadly, so there wil be gold nuggets regardless of your crop interests!

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Sustainable production through technology has been one of the key themes through the history of LandWISE Inc. We started with minimum tillage and strip tillage equipment, then rapidly adopted RTK GPS and autosteer, which we saw unlocked many opportunities for financial and environmental gains. We’ve looked a precision viticulture, canopy monitoring, crop mapping, soil sensing and more. We investigated agricultural robotics and options for management software. So much stuff to keep up with!

The 2024 LandWISE Conference has three components dedicated to agritech: an innovation panel discussing the experience of taking an idea to commercial reality, a group presenting technologies that automate data collection and help make sense of it all to support management decision making, and a practical in-paddock session where equipment will be demonstrated.

In the session, “Commercialising New Technology”, Andrew Cameron will chair a discussion between Tim Neale from Data Farming, Matt Flowerday from Landkind, Clare Bradley from Agrisea NZ, Hamish Penny from Croptide, and Richard Beaumont from AGOVOR. Different people, different technologies, different growth paths and different insights.

“Data Capture and Understanding” builds on the agritech theme, presenting technologies to capture data remotely and turn it into information to assist management. Tim Neale’s DataFarming platform presents satellite data and interpretations, Matt Flowerday capture aerial imagery and has a platform to plan farm management spatially, Hamish Penny and Croptide have a “smartwatch” for plants, collecting internal water status information and sending it straight to your phone, and Lia Willis helps clients pull different layers of data together.

The Horizons Regional Council Practical Session at the MicroFarm will display technologies and give opportunity to discuss details with the people with answers. Look for drones and robots from Airborne Solutions, AGOVOR and Robomate, cover crops and roller crimpers, pest predators with Bioforce and new irrigation technology from WaterForce!

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Canopy Development Week 2 – 13

Pest Management

In mid-January we started to see holes appearing in tomatoes, caused by corn ear worm/tomato fruit worm. The first insecticide application we used (Benevia) is registered for chewing insects, so caterpillars were targeted early in the season. However, subsequent insecticides have predominantly targeted sucking insects (psyllid/thrips/aphids/whitefly). We applied Uphold (spinetoram) across all treatments to control fruit worm. The crop was inspected five days after application, and found no active caterpillars. Additionally, we still haven’t seen any psyllid on the sticky traps in the field, which is positive!

Nutrient Management

We have been regularly monitoring soil nitrate levels using the Nitrate Quick Test method. Nitrate levels have been declining since side dressing, which indicates that plant demand is exceeding supply of nitrogen. Fruit set has been good and we want to ensure there is enough energy in the canopy to increase fruit size (and yield).

Additionally, we have been doing monthly leaf tests to look at nutrient levels in the tomato leaves. There have been signs of leaf rolling, and purpling along the leaf margins in all treatments in January. This was more distinct in the Regen treatment. This is an indication of low phosphorus or potassium causing plant stress.

Leaf tests showed lower than optimum Nitrogen percentages in the leaf for this stage in the season, as well as low P and K percentages (graph below showing N%). The Operations Advisory Group decided to apply a late application of fertiliser across all treatments. The Regenerative treatment has appeared stressed compared to the other treatments in recent weeks. There has been concern as to whether the canopy is big enough to size the fruit already set. The OAG used the information available to make a justified ‘grower decision’ to address the apparent nutrient deficiencies.

Nitrogen concentrations in the leaf were lower in the Regen treatment than the other two treatments, so we decided to apply a higher rate of N, to support the plants to harvest. The OAG decided to apply YaraRega 9-0-27.5. The Conventional and Hybrid treatment had 9kg N and 27.5kg K applied (100kg/ha). The Regen treatment had 18kg N and 55kg K applied (200kg/ha). This is somewhat counter intuitive for the Regen treatment, however all of the treatments have now received the same amount of N, around 90kgN/ha. Even with this application the Regen plots have had much less potassium applied compared to the other two treatments.

Drone Application

Fertiliser applied late in the season is normally done using a tractor mounted spreader. However, because our plots are 12m wide, we are unable to get the desired spread width this way. We worked with Airborne Solutions to apply the fertiliser with their drone, to be more targeted with our application, plus avoids damaging the plants by driving over with a ground spreader. The spread of the product was uniform and spread to the 12m width of our plots. The drone carries 40kg of product so was a quick job to get done on our 1.5ha.

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I have grown up in Hawke’s Bay. I have always been interested in the environment and the processes taken place around me. This is why I am currently studying a Bachelor of Environmental Science at Massey University. The main topics I have enjoyed learning about are soils and water quality. From working at LandWISE, I hope to get a better idea of what job I would like after I graduate.

Olivia has been running a soil aggregate slaking trial, drying peds, and capturing images over time to determine the degree of collapse in water. This is a relatively new test but the first we know of that can be done with minimal equipment using a standard methodology. A phone app “Slaker” does the image analysis and calculates the spread of peds. We’ll do a post on the results of this preliminary study once the number crunching is done.

Olivia is also becoming experienced in soil sampling, sample preparation and quick nitrate testing among other things! More to follow as the season unfolds.

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