Day: 6 December 2017

2016 Nuffield Scholar Matthew Abbott recently returned from his final international tour as part of his ‘life-changing’ Nuffield experience, where he focussed his attention on value adding through product branding. An organic banana farmer from Mena Creek in Far North Queensland, Matt gives an insight into the new technologies and branding innovations he discovered during his latest…

The tropical semi-arid conditions of the Ord River in Kununurra certainly has its challenges when it comes to growing bananas. But Western Australia’s largest banana producer—Kimberley Produce—has taken on the task with gusto and with confidence in the future is now expanding its banana operations even further.…

In October, a group of enthusiastic, young growers took part in a two-day visit to the Northern Territory, as part of a fact-finding Next Gen tour. The tour included a visit to a Panama TR4 trial site and the opportunity to network at the Nuffield Australia National Conference in Darwin. By…

By Tony Pattison, Department of Agriculture & Fisheries, South Johnstone Having soils that can overcome soil borne diseases, like Panama disease of bananas, is a major goal for banana growers. But can soil management, through changes in fertiliser, pesticide and ground cover practices have a big enough impact to reduce the…

By Stewart Lindsay, Queensland Department of Agriculture and Fisheries The outbreak of Panama disease TR4 in the North Queensland banana industry in March 2015 has generated a lot of interest among banana growers and marketers about the potential for new banana varieties with desirable pest and disease resistance. While banana varieties…

The banana industry continues to adopt Best Management Practices, with the 2016 Reef Report Card showing 62 per cent of Wet Tropics production land had improved their practice. Released in October, the latest figure was a considerable increase from 56 per cent the previous year. “The results show we’re going in…

New varieties were screened against Fusarium wilt Race 1 in the Australian subtropics and tropics as part of the ‘Banana Plant Protection Program’ project. Here we look at several promising varieties which were identified. By Jeff Daniells, Mike Smith, David Peasley, Wayne O’Neill and Andre Drenth THE DISEASE Fusarium…