Orchards are being reimagined as part of a major program aimed at improving efficiency in resources and labour.
Bringing together scientists, engineers and economists, the five-year, $13.6 million program will establish research sites across the country to find out whether transitioning to narrower orchard systems could bring benefits for pome and stone fruits.
Narrow orchard systems feature 2 metre tree row spaces and have a narrow canopy that exposes fruit and leaves to suffucient sunlight to maximise yield and fruit quality.
This approach is recognised as being attractive to field workers and suited to robotics, automation and sensing technologies.
There is also the potential to use less labour, energy and increase the efficiency of inputs.
Hort Innovation chief executive officer Brett Fifield said the transformative research led by Agriculture Victoria was focused on boosting grower profitability.
"This future-focused investment has the potential to transform the way the horticulture sector designs their orchards," Mr Fifield said.
"It was recently estimated that workers could climb around 10,500m/hectare in a season to complete tasks such as harvest, pruning and thinning. Mount Everest is 8848m.
"With growers at the forefront of the program's aims, this research presents an opportunity to find more efficient to manage orchards that are more profitable, more consistent, more resilient and safer."
Research leader in crop physiology Dr Ian Goodwin from Agriculture Victoria said by establishing experimental sites across the country, the research team was anticipating gains in marketable yield as well as the accuracy and efficiency of sensing and robot orchard operations in the narrow row orchards compared to existing tree training systems.
This would include improvements in crop load estimation, pruning, thinning, pest and disease monitoring, and fruit picking, Dr Goodwin said.
"In addition to field experiments, we will also undertake an economic study to determine the profitability of transitioning to narrow orchard systems and will compare the benefits and costs to current standard practices within the industry," Dr Goodwin said.
Central Victorian apple and pear grower Jason Shields, Plunkett Orchards, said maximising yield, fruit quality and climate resilience while efficiently using labour and resources was a key challenge for the industry.
"This research will identify what our options are for our orchards going forward," Mr Shields said.
The multi-disciplinary research team is drawn from Agriculture Victoria, Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development WA, the University of Queensland, South Australian Research and Development Institute, NSW Department of Primary Industries and Plant & Food Research.
