DATA will change the way the agriculture industry does business in the future, according to the general manager of research at the Australian Farm Institute.
Speaking at last week’s Innovation Generation (IG) conference in Adelaide, Richard Heath said large retailers were looking at concepts such as blockchain technology to ensure better traceability of their food products.
“Walmart are among the world’s biggest food retailers and they can’t afford to have food killing people,” Mr Heath said.
“At present, the traceability with a product such as mangoes is around six and a half weeks, but with blockchain technology it could potentially be done in 2.5 seconds, so you can see why it is something they are looking at.”
Mr Heath said farmers needed to look at traceability whether they liked it or not.
“It is not necessarily something that will garner you a premium for your product, but it may well be required to keep access into particular markets,” he said.
“Having a fully traceable product will become part of the value chain.”
He said farmers might be able to take advantage of marketing opportunities presented by traceability.
“Through technology you will be able to demonstrate your environmental credentials and this could help value-add your product.”
Mr Heath said there were a range of ways farmers could demonstrate they were responsible producers.
“Give your provenance story, demonstrate the good things you are doing in terms of lowering water use through improved water use efficiency, technology will give you a means to quantify this through sensor measurements.”
He said along with proactive work undertaken by the grower to capture new markets, data might also be used for assessment by regulatory bodies.
“It may get to the level where you have to demonstrate through data you are using your water allocation effectively in order to keep that allocation.”