FMA approved for government grant

Fresh Markets Australia (FMA) has been approved for a federal government grant for its FreshData project.

The project aims to investigate, develop, implement and pilot the adoption of a ready verifiable market price reporting scheme.

“It will technologically enable the data lifecycle of market sales price data ranges and produce provenance, sourced from wholesalers in central markets,” according to a release from FMA.

Australian minister for agriculture, David Littleproud, said a grant of A$653,950 would be provided to FMA under the federal government’s A$5.94m programme to improve market transparency across perishable goods supply chains.

FMA general manager, Gail Woods, said the project would bring enormous benefit to those who trade in central markets across Australia, and the wider fresh produce industry.

“FreshData will be accessible online and be underpinned by best practice data governance,” Woods explained. “It will provide market sales price data insights to the supply chain to assist in gauging whether prices received are competitive and to deliver price signals to interpret if there is an under or over supply of produce.”