Edete Presicion Technologies for Agriculture to replicate the work of the honeybee in Victoria
Israeli technology will be rolled out across almond orchards in Victoria to mimic the essential role of the honeybee. Here’s how it will work.
ONE of nature’s hardest workers will be replaced in almond orchards across Victoria this year with the rollout of new Israeli technology that mimics honeybees’ work of collecting and distributing pollen.
Israel’s Edete Presicion Technologies for Agriculture has partnered with one of Australia’s largest almond producers, Select Harvests, to trial its artificial pollination technology in some of its Victorian orchards when the trees begin to blossom in August.
According to a Department of Agriculture study, 65 per cent of horticultural and agricultural crops produced in Australia require pollination services from honeybees.
But varroa mite – a species of mite the European honeybee is unable to tolerate and one that has killed most colonies in countries where it has spread – looms as a threat to the future of Australia’s honeybee population.
Australia is the last continent free of the tiny parasite, which can kill a colony it has infested within one to three years. This has led researchers to look into alternative pollinators as well as self-pollinating crops.
Edete’s commercial-scale trail will see pollen previously harvested from flowers loaded into an artificial pollinator, which looks like a mast that’s set atop a tractor that fires dry pollen on the trees as it makes its way down the orchard rows, allowing the trees to fertilise.
The technology uses a laser scanning method to accurately deposit the pollen and can operate during the day or night, in contrast to honeybees which can only work in daylight, when the temperature is above 15C and in dry conditions.
Almond Board of Australia chief executive Ross Skinner said the technology was one way of addressing the industry’s growing need for pollination services, “and it’s a safeguard against a biosecurity incursion for verroa destructor that might impact on the number of hives available for pollinating crops”.
Edete said trials have already been “successfully” completed in Israel, and the company was planning to rollout the technology in California, where most of the world’s almonds are grown.
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