Tender Advertisement #1276111

Request for Proposal: MU21007 Pest and disease management for the Australian mushroom industry
Horticulture Innovation Australia (Hort Innovation) is a not-for-profit, grower-owned Research and Development Corporation (RDC) for Australia’s $15.1 billion horticulture industry. Hort Innovation invests around $120 million in research and development (R&D) and marketing programs annually to provide benefit to industry and the wider community.
Hort Innovation is seeking a suitably qualified, experienced and capable delivery partner for the project: Pest and disease management for the Australian mushroom industry (MU21007).
This project is expected to build on the success made by MU16003 and harness on the above two key priorities to provide research and extension activities to deliver on-farm solutions for mushroom disease problems. The project is expected to consider all aspects of disease invasion by incorporating optimal hygiene practices with disease management plans to produce a healthy and profitable crop. The project will deliver information packages in the form of case studies, factsheets, short videos as well as direct grower engagements and site visits. The direct site visit will provide opportunities to understand a specific farm issue and identify vulnerability points of which management plans are based. In cases where direct site visits are not possible (e.g., access issues or inoculation experiments), the Marsh Lawson Research Facility should be used for demonstration studies.
This investment will primarily focus on:
RESEARCH SERVICES
• Conducting studies to better understand the conditions that promote major mushroom diseases.
• Developing a robust framework for disease identification through a series of factsheets, disease guides and short demonstration videos.
• Provide diagnostic capability to enable identification of endemic and exotic mushroom pests and diseases.
• Collaborating with national and international researchers to grow the industry's capacity across disease diagnostics, chemical ecology and biocontrol.
EXTENSION SERVICES
• Delivering direct grower engagement to raise awareness of the importance of farm hygiene in pest and disease control.
• Extension materials should include all the necessary information on optimal hygiene and sterilisation practices as well as conditions that suppress disease transmission.
• Extension materials to be developed for all major mushroom diseases including, but are not limited to, dry bubble, cobweb, Trichoderma aggresivum and mushroom virus X.
• All extension materials should be promoted through the mushroom communication project (MU21003).
Hort Innovation has prepared a Request for Proposal (RFP) document that provides background information, outlines the scope of services, the procurement process and the information required from interested parties.
The RFP may be downloaded from www.tenders.net (you will need to be a member of tenders.net to access this information).
The closing date for responses is 3.00pm (AEST), 02 May 2022.