Latest news with #PlantAndFoodResearch
RNZ News
02-07-2025
- Business
- RNZ News
Climate change resilient apple proving popular
A new type of climate change resilient apple is proving popular overseas, with exports tipped to nearly double this year. The 'Sassy' apple, bred by Plant and Food Research and grown by Taylor Corp in Hawke's Bay, can tolerate warmer climates while still developing good red colouring even during hotter summers. Hawke's Bay Tairawhiti reporter Alexa Cook reports. Tags: To embed this content on your own webpage, cut and paste the following: See terms of use.
RNZ News
01-07-2025
- Business
- RNZ News
Canterbury's Lincoln to be new Bioeconomy Science Institute HQ, Scion to leave Christchurch
Plant and Food Research chief executive Mark Piper now holds the role at the helm of the new Bioeconomy Science Institute. Photo: SUPPLIED/PLANT & FOOD RESEARCH The board behind the new Bioeconomy Science Institute - which merges public research organisations has picked its new headquarters. AgResearch's Tuhiraki building at the Lincoln University Campus in Canterbury will become head office to the new institute, the board has decided. It comes as the science sector overhaul , considered one of the most significant reforms to the sector in decades, came into effect officially on Tuesday. The Bioeconomy Science Institute merges AgResearch, Manaaki Whenua Landcare Research, Scion and Plant and Food Research. The institute's new chief executive Mark Piper said it shared the board of directors' decision with staff after several weeks of deliberation, on Tuesday. He said the decision was more of a legal formality, as it had many sites and facilities scattered across New Zealand, and all were important. "We will have a head office because we need to have one, but we will have distributed leadership," Piper said. "And so, when we looked through it, Lincoln is our largest site in the Bioeconomy Science Institute. It's co-located with an excellent university, and our biggest collection of scientists. So it makes a lot of sense that would be our representative head office." Further assessment of bringing together sites and facilities like laboratories of the former Crown Research Institutes was expected. Piper said 70 percent of the Institute's 2300 people were scientists, and 560 people were already at Lincoln. He said Scion would be leaving its Christchurch office, for Lincoln. "Within walking distance, AgResearch, Manaaki Whenua and Plant and Food all have facilities [there] today, and Scion is just down the road in Christchurch, and moving into Tuhiraki building down in Lincoln in the near term. "All four of the institutes that have come together today in the bioeconomy, we have some representation down there." Piper, the outgoing Plant and Food cihef executive, said Auckland or Wellington may host high profile visitors, while forestry work would likely remain in its Bay of Plenty hub. Speaking to the Economic Development, Science and Innovation select committee on Monday, before the announcement, outgoing AgResearch chief executive Sue Bidrose said there had been a lot of discussion about the new head office location. "Lincoln is our largest campus with the beautiful new Tukaki building on site there, which is a location co-located with Lincoln University," Bidrose said, during the review briefing on its 2023/24 annual review. "The work being done to suggest that that head office or a proportion of the agency should be in the South Island was certainly heard by the people who were involved in making that decision, so it certainly got a good hearing." "These changes are about sharpening our focus and lifting performance," Minister Shane Reti says. Photo: RNZ / Mark Papalii But Bidrose said the organisation's previous work to understand the location choices for research found that "scientists aren't widgets" and any attempts to move the workforce had to be carefully considered. "They're people and they have children in the local schools and they have partners who work in the local businesses as well, and so on and so forth." Manaaki Whenua Landcare Research outgoing chief executive, James Stevenson-Wallace also told the select committee, Lincoln was its innovation hub. "For Landcare, our strategic base is and always will be in Lincoln, so there's a critical mass. There are particular anchor scientists who are highly competitive," Wallace said. "And likewise, there's very clear rationale for what we have anchored and Auckland, particularly around our biological collections, and there in Palmerston North where we have distinct capabilities around our geospatial." With 600 projects still currently running, Stevenson-Wallace said the key was about having researchers and scientists in the right places, and it would bring its many specialist facilities to the new entity. "There is no active downsizing of our offices. That hasn't been a campaign," he said. "The highly specialised nature of those labs drives the workforce that's actually attached to it. So there's an infrastructure and human capability component." Barry Harris, former chairman of NIWA (now Earth Sciences New Zealand) with extensive governance experience chaired the new Bioeconomy Science Institute board, alongside directors Kim Wallace and Andrew Morrison of AgResearch, Candace Kinser of Plant and Food, and Gray Baldwin of Manaaki Whenua Landcare Research. Science, Innovation and Technology Minister Dr Shane Reti said on Tuesday, the new organisations were designed to unlock innovation, drive economic growth, and improve the lives of hardworking New Zealanders. "These changes are about sharpening our focus and lifting performance," Minister Reti said. "By bringing together complementary research skills and infrastructure, we're enabling greater collaboration, better alignment with Government priorities, and stronger commercial outcomes. "These new organisations will be set up to deliver real-world value, creating jobs, boosting exports, and helping New Zealand compete globally." Tuhiraki was built on independently-owned land on the campus and was opened in September 2023.
RNZ News
23-06-2025
- Science
- RNZ News
Could spiders help manage pests on New Zealand's farms?
A female nursery web spider guards her nurseryweb. Photo: Claire Concannon, Unravelling new information about spiders could be the key to unlocking productivity in the horticulture sector, according to scientists. An article published in the New Zealand Journal of Ecology found there had been no research on the role spiders play in managing pests on horticultural farms here in Aotearoa. Lead author and PhD candidate Nicola Sullivan, from Plant and Food Research, said spiders could help increase fruit production through predating pest insects, but more information was needed to attract spiders to these environments. "Spiders are the most diverse and most abundant generalist predators in horticultural systems that have been seen overseas." She said they could play a "beneficial role" within horticulture, though she acknowledged it might be more difficult to rear them and introduce them to systems. Part of this was that most of the New Zealand research to date has focused on spider numbers in specific farm ecosystems. "We can look at ways that we can enhance and encourage them into those systems," Sullivan said. "So if we can understand what it is that the spiders like about a habitat, do they like the complex branch structure as they've found overseas, do they like native plantings... we can create those conditions within the productive system to encourage those spiders in and perform that ecosystem service of consuming pest insects." It's been estimated that spiders consume up to 800 million tons of (mostly) bugs globally per year and overseas studies had shown the positive impacts of this on horticultural farms. "I think it's an approach we should be looking at in Aotearoa New Zealand." Sullivan said more funding was needed to study how spiders can be used for more eco-friendly pest control practices in the horticultural sector. Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero , a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
RNZ News
04-06-2025
- Business
- RNZ News
Pinky-red fleshed Fizz apples could soon hit the shelves
Snazzy Fruit's Fizz apple. Photo: The first pinky-red fleshed apples ever grown in New Zealand are about to be sold commercially. Several pallets of the unique local apples are on their way to international markets, and more growers are wanted as the demand for them is expected to explode. Called Fizz - the new apple variety was developed through the Plant & Food Research breeding programme and Snazzy Fruit has the licence to grow and sell the striking apple. Snazzy's managing director, Josh Parlane, says Fizz trees are being grown in Otago, Nelson and Hawke's Bay and the plan is to roll out many more hectares with commercial growers on board. "We currently have about 16,000 trees and have more going in the ground this season. There is also a grafting opportunity that we would like to discuss with potential growers in order to get quicker production in the years to come.' Josh Parlane says the apple trees will be grown on a step-by-step basis to carefully expand the number of apples that are produced to cater for the demand, and be sustainable for the growers. He believes they will be popular with any person who enjoys biting into an apple. "For me I thought wow - like I had tried literally hundreds of apples before - nothing quite compared to this one because of how unique it was. The berry tones, the strong flavour. It really is a stand out in that regard. "I thought this could really be a winner." Parlane said the apple's vibrant colour also contains anthocyanins, which have a range of potential health benefits including antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties. The first premium Fizz apples have recently been exported to Taiwan, India and the Middle East, but won't be available in the New Zealand market until next year, he said. He said a group of official 'tasters' all ageed they would pay up to 30 percent more for a premium Fizz apple as opposed to what's already available.
