Grower-owned body Horticulture Innovation Australia (Hort Innovation) has announced it’s secured a A$1.65m grant to bolster its fight against fruit fly.
The grant will go towards a five-year trade programme that Hort Innovation said would erase trade partners’ concern about Mediterranean Fruit Fly (Medfly) in Australia.
The grant was awarded through the Australian government’s Rural Research and Development for Profit programme, and will add to the A$3.4m in funding for the project from Hort Innovation, Murdoch University and research partners.
“This hard-fought Rural Research and Development for Profit programme grant is a win for the $9bn Australian horticulture industry as it will help open up access to trade partner countries that have stringent Medfly requirements,” Hort Innovation CEO John Lloyd said.
A laboratory at Murdoch University in Western Australia will be used to develop post harvest technologies to treat produce prior to export and identify treatments that could become standard protocols for fruit and vegetable exports in Australia. Researchers will also look to develop small-scale, mobile and cost-effective technology for growers to use in packing sheds.
The laboratory will pick up on the treatments that had been conducted at a dedicated facility in Western Australia that was closed in 2015.
