Enhancing best practice in vegetable production and business management in the Northern Territory
This project was an engagement project to identify vegetable growers in the NT and build relationships with the all commercial vegetable growers of the Top End who are predominantly Vietnamese or Cambodian in heritage. The project endeavored to engage these growers by providing a dedicated engagement officer to be a stable and trusted point of contact on best practice farming and farm business practices. The project was in place for 3 years during which time the engagement officer updated and consolidated the existing vegetable growerβs data bases to reveal 153 active NT vegetable growers over that period. The project officer was able to use previous engagement with the growers as a departmental extension officer and to leverage on existing economic, social and cultural relationships to enhance engagement with these growers as described in the stakeholder engagement plan in this report. Initial surveys identified gaps in vegetable production best practice knowledge and implementation in the NT in the areas of pest and disease management, IPM strategies for the tropics, irrigation monitoring and scheduling and supply chain management. The initial surveys also found that business practices, including QA systems, were very basic and in need of modernization and direction. The initial project action plans were developed to target these gaps. Midway through the project the NT vegetable and melon industries were impacted severely in late 2014 with the identification of Cucumber Green Mottle Mosaic Virus (CGMMV) in melon crops in Katherine and early 2015 in cucurbit vegetable crops in Darwin. The project became a best practice biosecurity and market access business practices project. These biosecurity requirements severely limited the amount of on-farm group activities and farm visits by the project officer. Large melon and pumpkin producers in the Katherine region were completely shut down following detection of the virus on these properties in 2014. Every commercial cucurbit producer and every cucurbit crop known to NT quarantine authorities was tested for the virus so that interstate market access plant health certification could be obtained. The project played a vital role in connecting those growers who needed testing and certification with the NT Quarantine service throughout 2015. Four small Vietnamese vegetable farms in the Darwin Rural area were found to be infected with CGMMV in early 2015.