New funding shows big support for primary industries

Plant & Food Research has been awarded more than $30 million in funding for four projects as part of the Ministry of Business, Innovation & Employment’s Endeavour Fund.

The fund invests in research excellence that has the potential to positively transform New Zealand’s economic performance, sustainability, environmental integrity and society.

The largest allocation of Plant & Food Research’s funding has gone to a five-year project aimed at developing new sensing tools for accurately predicting fruit maturity and storage performance. This will assist with optimising fruit quality at export market destinations, providing a competitive advantage to New Zealand through higher returns and preserving the country’s reputation as a reliable supplier of fresh fruit.

Another funded project involves the development of gene editing and innovative genomic tools to reduce breeding cycles, allowing for faster conventional breeding and the rapid production of superior crops with beneficial traits.

A breeding project aimed at developing native finfish diversity will improve traits such as disease resistance and environmental robustness to improve long-term growth prospects for the aquaculture industry. Funding has also been provided to a research project which aims at developing electrospun nanofibres which are less prone to fouling through commercial processes.

Plant & Food Research scientists will also play a lead role in the Endeavour Fund research projects of other organisations in areas such as soil health, nitrogen loss reduction and grape yield analysis.