Grower-owned Horticulture Innovation Australia (Hort Innovation) has announced four expert advisory panels to help direct A$40m into cross industry research and development projects in Australia’s horticulture industry.
The four key areas for flagged for new investments will be health, nutrition and food safety; green cities; leadership and development; and Asian markets.
A range of specialists sit on each panel, including growers, government exporters and professionals who will serve in an advisory role to Hort Innovation, helping to direct investments on both short and long-term projects of up to 15 years.
“Now, more than ever, consumers are making smarter food choices leading to the need for industry to develop new products, technologies and processes – hence the health, nutrition and food safety panel,” John Lloyd, CEO of Hort Innovation said in a company statement.
“The green cities panel exists because it’s vital that we invest in strategic longer term research, which drives a measurable increase in urban green space to improve the health and wellbeing of Australians.
“The Asian markets panel will help us build a globally competitive, unified, agile and profitable Australian horticulture industry through advice on investments in high value and high growth Asian markets,” Lloyd continued.
“And the leadership and development panel will help facilitate a globally competitive, resilient and profitable industry though investment in programs which develop people at all stages of their career.”
The first role of the panels, which could be expanded in the future, will be to assess co-investment opportunities submitted to Hort Innovation in January.
