Keep track of on-farm visitors, biosecurity tracking & tracing on your smartphone (webinar)

Transcript

Thank you all for attending today's webinar. First of all, I'd like to begin by acknowledging the nutritional owners of the land on which we are meeting from today. I'd also like to pay my respects to elders past and present. This, webinar is part of a series called Future-Proofing Horticulture in a Changing Climate.

We started the year off in March with a field day at Tatura which got washed out at the end, and so we've extended that, throughout, and we're going to be having these monthly webinars to continue the kind of legacy of that field day forward. Today we are looking at the issue of keeping track of visitors who come onto your property and the associated biosecurity and OH&S risks that are associated with that. So with that we've got Sam Elder from Onside, and as well, we've got Rose Daniel from AUSVEG who will be presenting and discussing these issues and how they, how these guys have tackled them together. Once we've heard from these guys then we'll probably have a, that we will have the Q&A session, so please stick your, any questions you have as we are going through in the Q&A function and then, and then we'll get to them at the end there. Also, just wanted to let everybody know we are recording this session, so just keep that in mind when, yeah. So thank you guys and I'll hand over to you Sam.

G'day everyone, thank you for joining us today. I'm going to share my screen in a moment and take you through a short presentation on Onside and what we're doing within the biosecurity space, both in Australia and also in New Zealand. And then I will introduce Rose and we will speak about a project that AUSVEG and Onside have within the biosecurity space, and we'll also have Mike Fielding join us, who is the CEO of Boratto Farms in Bacchus Marsh, and he will give some insight into their use of technology for biosecurity and food quality reasons and just the general sort of practical thinking behind where technology like can really benefit producers in this space.

Please send through questions as we go. I might see them come through and we'll cover them as I speak. However, we will get to them at the end and we'll have a bit of a Q&A as well, so you can ask questions of myself, of Rose, and also of Mike.

Great, so I'll share my screen now. Onside is a app-based farm management tool. It actually started in New Zealand and was the brainchild of a dairy operations manager. So, our founder grew up in the dairy industry and he was managing a number of properties and found that there was just real challenges with managing people across all those businesses, but also real opportunity to tighten up OH&S, biosecurity and other operational processes by digitizing how they happen.

So with that, Onside has worked very hard to create an application that's as user friendly as possible so that compliance is as high as possible. They really are that sort of toolkit in your pocket and it's using phone technology and then the ongoing data that's collected from people just doing their job day to day to do other really special things around biosecurity and compliance.

Now we're gonna be speaking about the biosecurity part of things here today. But we also do help a lot within OH&S and other areas. So Onside intelligence is actually our, very new and interesting product that is all to do with biosecurity tracking and tracing. Now we have an on-farm element to it, but also an industry-wide element as well, which I'll take you through.

Like I said, Onside that toolkit in your pocket and we cover off a number of areas and the aim is to digitize your day-to-day operations so that all of that data that's collected just from doing your job can then be used later on in really valuable and time saving ways. When it comes to the actual usage of Onside, the power comes from the network and so you need properties to be mapped, people to be checking in to properties and all of that activity going on so that you can then collect that information to, to use later on. So, I'll show you very briefly on my phone what I'm talking about in terms of what you're able to do with smartphone technology these days. So, when it comes to the actual application, I'm just starting to broadcast my phone screen. There we go. Great. So here within the app we have an orchard mapped out, so combination of digital maps, also with digital boundary mapping and other tools, we're able to create a digital footprint around properties so that when someone arrives at that property and they've got the app on their phone, they'll be reminded to check in just as you would do these days with a paper logbook. And then when they're checking in, they're able to agree to all of those terms and conditions that are needed to actually come onto a property. Now these are biosecurity requirements and also OH&S requirements. So, as I step through, we're able to collect answers to questions and act on those answers as well. So by incorporating phone technology, mapping technology, and all of the powers that those include, you're able to create a data footprint of what's going on around your property. So with that, we then put all of that information in people's pockets as well. So you've got both safety information and jobs that need to be done on the property.

Now, that's the app part of it, and we designed that to be user friendly and really valuable for people to use on the property so that they actually check in because they need it to get what they need to do, done. But what that does from a biosecurity tracking point of view is, there we go, is creates a network of mapped properties and then allows us to collect that data of movement around those mapped properties and surface that to industry bodies and government so that they can see the trends and patterns of people's movement. So you can see here that you've got contractors and suppliers that'll be moving between multiple properties at once. You've got the individual farms, orchards and vineyards that they're moving between. And then you're also gonna have third party data, say food, sorry, say fruit crates or the movement of vehicles, or livestock between properties as well. So with the collection of all of that, we're able to then map out when someone moves from one property to another, which then creates a network of movement between multiple properties and that gives amazing insight into the risks that are present within a geographical area or within a particular industry of actually where the bottlenecks of movement of people are so that we can work with government on targeting areas for tracing and tracking biosecurity incursions. But we can also work with industry on dealing with and responding to incursions that have taken place. So with that network, we get wonderful insight, and you can see here that there's multiple ways of visualizing that insight, either from direct movement or heat mapping, or even having regional response plans based on where exposure sites are.

Now a good example of us actually trying out this particular program was a partnership between new South Wales Wine, the Department of Primary Industry in New South Wales, and also the Southern New South Wales Innovation Hub. So what we did, there is, got a region of wine growers, sorry, of vineyards, in and around orange to all start using Onside for checking in visitors, for a nine month period, and then collected all of that information and data and used that in a, they called it a war game in terms of biosecurity. So that involved two days where on the first day the Department of Primary Industry, put together a team and did a simulated response to a, phylloxera outbreak within a particular vineyard. So they war gamed the scenario. They went around, draw the five km radius around that farm, interviewed people and did all the stuff that they currently do to try and respond to a known incursion. That was day one. Day two, they used the data that had been collected over the previous nine months, and it was astounding how deep their understanding of the actual risks to the area were once they were able to actually see the movement of people. So their current operation is to draw a five km radius around a vineyard and then respond and interview, and then subsequently broaden their search. With the info from Onside and the use of check-in, they were able to see that a contractor had travelled almost 300 Kms from one area to another. So their exposure zone was way bigger than they ever thought. And you guys would all you know, feel that's a no-brainer, but to actually have the data to show where that exposure was, is incredibly powerful for responding to outbreaks like that.

Now, we've got projects with multiple peak bodies and government departments between New Zealand and New South Wales. Oh, sorry, Australia. But it's our partnership with Ausveg that is of interest to you guys today, and that's why Rose has come along to today's session is to give some context around what we'll be doing with Ausveg and the scope of the project and what it'll mean for growers like yourselves in and around both Victoria and more broadly around Australia. So with that, I will jump in and introduce Rose to the group. You may have met her before at a number of other events or conferences. But let me just stop sharing my screen and we'll have a chat with Rose. So thanks Rose. Can you just explain to the group a little bit about your role with AUSVEG?

So I'm one of two farm biosecurity coordinators at AUSVEG as part of the Vegetable and potato Farm biosecurity program that's run through Plant Health Australia. So the other biosecurity coordinator is Shakira Johnson, who I think is also online. So our role is to put it fairly simply, is to improve the implementation of farm biosecurity practices to help reduce the risk of spread of pests and diseases onto farms and to make sure that those farm businesses are prepared in the event of an incursion. I guess the better the biosecurity practices, the better prepared those farms should be. We also work with government and researchers and other industry participants to make sure that the industry's prepared. So it might be research to understand certain pests better and have control measures in place to make sure that we can respond more effectively in the event that there is an incursion. Yep. Great. For, for the audience today, so within, the horticulture industry, like what, if you feel in your gut, like what's the biggest biosecurity challenge today at the moment? What does it look like? What's the thing that you're worried about?

I think this is such a massive question with so many different answers. It's, yeah, look, it's incredibly broad and it could be quite political. But I think some of the most important bits, I guess parts for growers, is to make sure and us as the industry body is to make sure that we've got the skills and the science available that's underpinning their practices, that growers can implement and our ability to respond to incursions there, and I think some of these are not just challenges, but there are opportunities, there's so much new technology available now that we can do this in a more effective way. Things like surveillance, making sure that we're conducting good surveillance so that we can detect pests and pathogens more quickly and respond more quickly. Making sure that we've got processes in place and frameworks in place to enable growers to continue their businesses. Business continuity so that they're not raising money when there are incursions in place, underway. And continuing to build those partnerships between the growers and the industry bodies and the researchers and government. So yeah, it's massively broad and I'm sure everybody on that's on this meeting could, if it give you another answer to that. So a lot of challenges, but I think even just improving the uptake in biosecurity. It's such a horrible word sometimes, just improving the uptake and making biosecurity part of people's everyday practices is probably the most simple thing, that it's not scary and it's not awful. It's just part of what you do. Like you don't leave a band aid lying around in your house. So it is a bit like that on a farm, you clean up and make sure you've got good hygiene and sanitation practices, and it's just a normal thing to do.

Yep. Cool. Yeah, good answer to a broad, complex question. You mentioned it's not a nice question to have to answer, but Yeah. No, it's massive. It's big. So anyway.

Yeah, good one. You mentioned technology and the role it plays. Look, today we're talking tech. What is it that, that sort of brought together, that, that AUSVEG and Onside project, and what does that project look like?

I've only been with AUSVEG for four months, so this all started before I joined. But, I think, when I first started with AUSVEG, Onside was involved in their Victorian vegetable innovation days and helped us, it was organized by AUSVEG Vic. But, help to, at the entrance point, we implemented biosecurity measures, so people needed to walk through foot baths and, where normally or frequently you would see a paper registration slip, we had Onside, had their app there and it was much easier to see who was coming onto site and probably provided some reassurance for those growers that were hosting the field events that they knew where people were coming from and if something did happen that there's the potential for traceability. I think the, I don't know the history of Onside and AUSVEG but from my perspective, there's, it makes it easier to have this kind of format to sign in visitors and one of the, so I guess in the AUSVEG biosecurity space, we've identified a number of risk pathways by which pests and diseases could come onto farms. And one of those risk pathways, or a couple of those are, vehicles, staff visitors, sorry, staff visitors to farms. So your, seed reps and all those kind of service providers that come onto farms. And the attractive thing about Onside is that it's, and these kind of apps is that it's provides not only the ability to register who's coming onto the farm, but also there's an opportunity to include into that sign on procedure, a couple of points about what the farm's practices are and what you need to abide by when you're coming onto farm. And that takes away some of the tediousness of doing that in person or, if you are not on site, you can still make sure that people understand what you need to do when you're coming onto that site, whether it be, are you parking in our, allocated parking, have you washed your boots, have you done this, where have you been? And so on. Whatever the farm's practices are. So I guess that's the attractive thing and that's what going forward, what some of the, the project that AUSVEG and Onside will be working on will be to incorporate that kind of farm biosecurity planning into the visitor registration processes.

Yep. Okay. Great. Great. Now, we've got Mike who has hopefully sorted out his mic, mike things. I can. Good work. I amaze myself sometimes. Yep. No, it's good. You weren't speaking first up. Could have been a bit of a challenge, but No. All good. So Mike is here. He's the c e o with Boratto Farms in Bacchus Marsh, and Boratto Farms has, look, you've probably gone through a bit more, more thinking than we necessarily know about the tip of the iceberg with your engagement with Onside, but you've started using technology for that biosecurity and food quality side of things. So I guess, can you talk us through what challenges you guys were facing and where you see technology stepping in? So technology like Onside and that sort of thing. Yeah.

Yeah. So clearly as mentioned, like biosecurity is a major issue, and we were looking to protect not only the industry but protect ourselves. So in a previous role, I was National supply manager for a large salad processor in Australia and I know and have seen firsthand the where of supply that is out there. And therefore, I think the protection is both for fellow members in the industry and also for growers, farmers as an individual entity. We're also looking through that source, we were lucky because Onside was used at the International Spinach Conference, which we hosted the trials day. So we were able to see how Onside worked and how easy it was for people to sign in and how that information was collectible. So from a technology point of view, we're looking at how we can improve efficiency and time management. How we can improve the tasks we do. And then par that will help us with the, the ever-growing buzzword, which is carbon footprint calculations. So we feel that we'll also be able to use that from a sustainability point of view. So we get a biosecurity, we get the sustainability point of view, the carbon footprint, and also we feel these days there's a certain element of detachment from the office to the people outside, because it, as farming progresses and becomes more data-driven, there's that kind of separation. So we feel that Onside this kind of facility helps improve the connection with all the two ICs, all the management team, all of that. The operators have that. The casual staff obviously sign in when they go to the sites. We have that. That creates that link and that attachment. What people are doing, how they've achieved what they've achieved. And it also allows reporting as well back. So it's a good use of technology because if somebody sees something, a fence may be broken, or irrigation, upstanding may be not working, rather than have to drive all the way back, which paradoxically could increase biosecurity issues, they can just do it on the app and just let management know, or the appropriate people know that can get repaired. And then once that's repaired, that can be actioned. So you're creating a bit paradox as well. You're creating a better link with the office by not having to go with the office as much like it. So we find that as well. So they're all things that we're looking at and we're also looking to get away from paper driven systems if we can. We're Fresh Care, Fair Farm's, audit compliant. But a lot of that is a, there's a lot of work in that. And if we can get into a more data-driven paperless system, that's what we're looking at. I'd also say Onside, like I say, we had the trial for the spinach, International Spinach Conference. We also like technology if we can be reasonably early into it, early adopters, because it allows us opportunity to maybe influence how we'd like to see that develop for our own particular circumstances. And our particular circumstances will also match up with majority of baby leaf and whole head supplies in Australia.

Yeah. Yeah. One thing I hear as I speak to growers is the number of systems that they're using. So there's always a number of different systems. What other technology are you guys using for that food quality side of things?

Food quality side. I mean me, my colleague here, Abby, really? because she does all our foods, but we tend to, it tends to be that kind of, as I say, we're Fair farms, Fresh Care, audited so it tends to be that gathering of information through there. Yep. But there is a detachment there, because some of that happens post situation almost. Whereas with the Onside thing we can find, you can take a photograph of harvest at that particular time. Keep a record of that information and quality that leaves circumstances of harvest. What was the weather like, et cetera. And all of that creates a non-paper based and live system that helps us with our food safety and technology. And then the other stuff that we are looking at, we're looking at mechanical and the laser weeding for the field, which also captures data. So that allows us to deal with predominantly weeds, but that'll log all that data about the crop and it'll also give you early insight into pest and disease problems that may be occurring. Yep, that'll all link in. So it, it is just creating a link and getting away from tick boxes and sheets and that. So that's what we're trying to do because I'll give everybody more credibility then. Yep. No, good one. Good one. Now I can see, I'll see whether in the chat, any questions have come through. But they're open.

I've got a question if I can interrupt, which just occurred to me while you about the New South Wales DPI wine industry project that you had. Yep. And one of the, I noticed a lot of the industries that have perennial crops that you know, are in the trees that are in the ground for many years, have been mapping their, where their orchards or farms are, and one of the things I've noticed with vegetables, and not, probably not so much where you are Mike, a lot of vegetable farms, vegetables obviously being an annual crop, they, some of their growers will lease land in around the place and there, so their farm isn't stuck as much as it might be in a fruit tree farm, it's an orchard or something. And so mapping where vegetable farms are can be a little bit more challenging than it might be in the orcharding fruit tree world. So I guess my question is, does that kind of traceability and having lots of people using an app like Onside where you can see the movement around the place, does that kind of almost circumvent that need to map an industry? Because for me or for, from an industry point of view, I guess for us to be able to, if there's an exotic incursion, to be able to respond quickly, it's really makes it so much easier to know where farms are and, so that way you can contact those business owners and so on and, get that, response happening more quickly. So I guess knowing where things have moved, like you showed on your map, has beneficial to that. So yeah, I guess my question's around whether that sort of that traceability you can replaces the need to map?

So from my point, if I look to that from a need to map, from a growing point of view, I think what it does, it speeds up the process. So if there is an exotic incursion, rather than having to go through long-winded paper trail, trying to find that, trying to interrogate where things have been. If it's all accessible, then I think that speeds up and that's gotta be good for the industry. Anything that can speed up and rebuild consumer confidence has to be good. Yeah. Yeah, I think that'd be my answer to that one, if that answers your question. Yeah. I guess it, if there's a number of mapping projects that different industries are doing or have done, and you can see where, I don't know, the avocado orchard are across Australia and so on, so I guess, and with vegetables, it, one, it's vegetables is massive. It's many different crops. But also, in some areas of Australia, they tend to switch between using land for vegetable to cattle or something else. So I guess this kind of traceability and knowing it, yeah, I guess my questions around that might be.. Some of that's a little bit, with Fresh Care and with the, and the audits, processor driven audits, it's, there's not a lot of jumping into land before it's prepared properly, so you have to have 12 months before you go minimum, before you go in after cattle, for obvious reasons. I don't think there's maybe the in and out approach that they used to be. It's more of a planned approach. And also a lot of these crops now are high value, high cost and require high levels of management. So the majority, a good percentage of baby leaf crops are grown with fixed irrigation. Fewer grown with linear and center pivots, but that also kinds of limits where you can go and where people want to go. But the mapping has to help, as I say, it has to help with speed of traceability. Ruling people in and ruling people out is the important bit. Yep.

Great. So we've got a couple of questions that have come through, and these ones are good sort of tech technical ones. So we've got one about how does on Onside work? So look, really it's how does a phone application work if there's no reception? Look, farming can be out, away from reception. You guys would probably be constantly pulling your hair out about certain issues with connectivity. But the way mobile apps are built is they can actually store information in the app, and then once you get into reception, it recognizes that and pings that information off, up to, the cloud. When it comes to on Onside, we've put a lot of work into storing all the key information that you need when someone's doing something when they're not connected. So timestamping incidents or timestamping movement and then that pings off to the cloud once you come back into reception. So it actually works really well. Also the app stores like map data and all that other stuff in there. So you don't actually have to have reception to use the app really well. And then the next one's to do with like data security and sharing data with other organizations. So that one comes into there's different sort of layers or tiers of data. You can have the base level of people's names, dates, numbers, all that sort of stuff that's protected by encryption. I wouldn't want to get into too much technical detail because I'm not the right person to be speaking deeply about that, but that's the storage and encryption side of things. But then when it comes to, say the movement or the check-ins at properties and then seeing if someone has checked into another property for the movement of a pest, that kind of thing, we have it anonymized when it comes to looking at the general movement of people. So we don't think of them as an individual. We think of them just as a person. They're a number. We have no idea who they are, but we know that there was movement from one spot to another. Now, legislation and the powers that be in the government actually have, laws in place around when you're able to actually find out who that person is. And they do that already with paper-based systems. So if you are recording movement within, within a log, they can actually, government has a regime where they can legally ask for that person's information so they can give 'em a call and find out and investigate that particular incursion. We just follow the preexisting legislation around when you actually share someone's information, for investigation into biosecurity issues. I hope that answers your question, Abby. It's a tough one when it comes to data security. Yeah. Okay. Now, in terms of seeing people, so Onside for recording, checking in and checking out of properties. So we don't show a farm manager where everyone on the farm is and you don't see them moving around like you're checking into Uber and you see the car driving around. It's not like that. We record that someone's come to the property, and then that individual on their phone can see where they are on the map because it's really useful to be able to see where you are, if you're heading to a certain spot on the property to do work. You need to know how far away you are so they can see that, but no one else can see their location. So it's not a tracking app in that regard. It really is the tracking of checking in to properties that, that is important for us. Yep.

Mike, you might be able to answer this as well. What kind of reports and data do you bring out of what you've collected? Is it a regular thing that you go, you are going back to look at, to help the business stay on top of things? Or is it more something that you use as a security, like as a, something that you can call upon if there is a need or does or do you use it as some kind of ongoing business, I guess reporting tool.

We're open, Andy, to use it as an ongoing business reporting tool as well. I said we're trying to link it into sustainability carbon footprint piece, we are trying to do that. And as I say that, I think that helps with the early adoption and the fact, I know on Onside guys have been going for a while in, in New Zealand and that yeah, but reasonably new over here so we can maybe help develop that, which may assist the industry because I think that kind data capture point is pretty good.

Yeah. Yeah. Fantastic. Sorry, I just saw another question pop up at the same time ,which is a great one, does everyone that comes onto the farm have to download the app, which is another question I was going to ask Mike about, do you mandate that everybody needs the app who comes onto your farm? Don't mandate it? We don't mandate it, but we obviously put out a, which in itself was a cleansing process, sending, a request to everybody who we use, could use, have used, will use. Yeah, we, I know it took colleague Abby about two days to send out and you're amazed how many people you accumulate. But we suggest to them they can do it on site or we suggest 'em if they want to download the app for ease if they come in multiple times, to do that. So we do both. Yeah.

Yeah. So I guess the answer to that question is that, yeah, if you want to, you need to download the app to use it obviously, but then as a business it's a value add if you do ask people to use it, yeah, that's right. That's right. So yeah, you don't have to have the app. So you can use a web link to, to log your details that you're coming to the farm. Or you can set up like a, an iPad in the head office if you want people to move through and fill their info out there. So yeah, you don't have to mandate that's how everyone does it. But I guess, like you said, Andy, there's a lot of really useful stuff in the app. We actually find with contractors, in regions that they want to go to properties, they like to go to properties that have an app-based check-in. Because it gives them the map, it gives them all of the OH&S stuff. It gives them all of that information and they can easily get in touch with farm managers from all the contact details that are in there as well. Yeah, we hear that contractors quite enjoy coming to properties that have the app because it makes it so much easier for them to just get started on what they need to do.

Cool. So Rose, probably a, I'm not sure if this is a tricky one or not, but what kind of stuff, what kind of information from industry perspective helps the industry understand when there is a biosecurity event? What's the base level info that you like to be able to get from a grower?

Initially it's just, although the location of their properties, that's why my question about the mapping, if we know where farms are and who to contact at those farms, that's, really helpful because then, you know who to contact.

And then I guess that it's really, it's not AUSVEG that leads a response, it's the government department within the state where the incursion happens. So we would assist. We're in a, hopefully in a position to assist the government agencies to, to connect with growers and feedback information that, that they don't have. So it's really talking to the farm business owners and working out where the properties are so that any surveillance that needs to be conducted can be conducted. And, early detection means a more rapid response I guess as Mike was saying. If you can find out where a pest is more quickly, then the response is more likely to be successful I guess. One thing, one thing I'd just add to Rose's piece there as well is, the health authorities are becoming more technical in that, in how they do stuff. And they do this, they have this tracking, this data-driven system. And I think growers would be amazed at how much detail they can pull out and how far they can go and actually look into things. And I think therefore, the industry itself has to try and keep pace with that as growers. We have to be able to match information, how people draw information, how they look at it. So I think that's something that the industry really needs to be aware of. It's quite a detailed process, if you get the wrong side of it.

Yeah. And by having that information and being able to be upfront with it, you're ring fencing the problems and minimizing impacts. So it's, starts to, yeah, really benefit everybody. And I liked what you said, Michael. Oh, sorry. Go Rose. Yep. I think what's quite interesting too is Mike also comes into this from a sustainability and also there's a lot of food safety coming up in Mike's comments as well, and I think there's quite a lot of overlap that makes it a little easier, it's not necessarily that there's biosecurity and there's food safety. Some of it, there's an overlap and it makes it a little easier to comprehend and manage as well. Some of these technologies and this kind of management of people and inputs and things through the, these kind of apps can help not just biosecurity, but other parts of the farm business as well.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I was really excited to hear about the idea, Mike was saying about carbon footprints and how that can tie into it all, and that understanding of, of the big data machine that can run and help you really analyse the business and see where efficiencies can be made is really exciting. I'm very geeky and I love it, so it's. You should have a look at, sorry, digress. You should look at Siemens SiGREEN Technology. That's, yep, that's that drawing all that's the sort of stuff that's going to draw all this together. Yeah. Fantastic. I have to take them on the shoulder in the future.

Sorry, Sam. No, I was just going to say one thing that's interesting on that is you mentioned the sort of big amount of data, and that can be a blessing and a curse. So for example, the amount of sort of compliance that's required and, speaking with farmers here in about the new compliance and so the added things that are built up, it is quite data heavy and the admin of collecting that, it can be huge in some instances. And so one of the things that technology can help with is and stuff, especially when it's on a smartphone, which sort of, becomes part of your day to day, is collecting all that information that's required just as you go about doing your business. Just as you go about doing what you need to do on the property, being able to passively collect that info to then be able to pull reports and submit for audits as you need. That's a really interesting piece within modern farming to think about because the admin that's required is huge and not every organization can, not every farm can have it's an employee dedicated purely to admin. And I think that's one thing to recognize as well, is you've got different, I guess different size organizations and where you can actually invest time into that admin part of it.

And so with the way that Onside, can Onside take the data that's not just the app data, but like over a monthly period and present that back to the grower as, in form that is easily digestible for them? So they're not yeah. That's right. That's right. So there's a number of different ways of collecting that data or that info and you can then periodically pull it out. So you can report on all kinds of things on a yearly or monthly basis. And yeah, you can do what you want with it, depending on how you need to present it, for compliance purposes. And that fits within OH&S as well. Because as not only is there the food quality, biosecurity and all that sort of stuff but then you've got OH&S, which is another admin heavy part of an operation and that can all be reported on as well. Yeah. Excellent. You don't need a, you don't need to bring a data scientist onto staff. No. Nah. If you can click a button and download stuff, you'll be all right. Yep. Yeah. And I think that has become, I think the biggest, the hardest curve of this technology adoption has been this new layer of visual presentation of the data that's being collected, because lots of these sensors are old. People have been collecting the data for a long time, but not necessarily being able to understand it. So interfaces like you were showing us earlier, and we're all getting used to checking in over the last few years and there's like lots of things that we can adopt from those principles that can be implemented in business that smooth out things. But I would've hate to have been the person that had got lumped with that big stack of paper that had to go through and traced back through something to find where the issue was at any given time. Yeah. It's, I can see all these things of benefits in that respect. But just touching on the workers side of things do, is it a tool that can be used for much of that kind of worker flow throughout like the harvest season when you've got a lot more people on farm or, yeah, yeah. Yeah. No, good question. The, I guess the way you use an app like Onside, it doesn't discern between whether it's an employee or a contractor or a seasonal worker. It's someone who's coming onto the property to do a job, and so you can, if they've got the app, they can, you can then divvy out tasks and jobs and you can organize the work that they're to do. Communicate that directly to them, and then they can go and do it, record it, and then you've got an auditable trail of what was done. So that's very useful in a lot of the communication with external workers and even for repetitive tasks where you can template out those instructions. But it fits that space between say the collection of say detailed like flow rates of spray and all that sort of stuff. That's, those systems are built beautifully for those reasons and they collect all that information wonderfully and that's good there, but there's that disconnect between getting someone to actually communicate what they've done, what needs to be done, where it is, all that sort of stuff. And I think Mike touched on it, it's that, that bringing that connection between say head office and the worker in the field, and being able to put that in their pocket on a phone and operationalize that information is, is where it comes into play.

Excellent. So you can really do that, connect out, like contact people as they are on your property and alert them to situations. Yeah, exactly right? Yeah. Yeah. That's right. That's right. Yep. Yeah. Think that's where one of the great things from the biosecurity perspective is too, if someone's coming onto a farm, firstly, you know that who's coming on, and then you could include a checklist, have you cleaned your boots? Have you, yeah. Have you done whatever? Just making sure that people have checked that they've done all that before they're almost allowed on site. So it just provides an element of reassurance that the practices that the farm has in place have been followed. Yeah. And around harvest time, lots of cars that are just off the side of, it's not like everyone's entering through a single gate. There is that kind of like mass entrance to the, to a property. So I can see how that say will works really well.

The thing I say on that as well, just in support of the guys on Onside, that is sometimes you buy these systems and they'll tell you'll do it and you got to figure out your own way of doing it, and invariably what happens then is you either can't, or you get frustrated and you just don't bother, so you don't end up using the system. But the support that we've had from the team has been phenomenal. Connor's been particularly good, because he obviously looks after ourselves, and very helpful in setting up the templates, templates that can be re repeated, which is good because that's a saving, time saving piece as well, and helping us to explore how best to use it. So rather than just a purchase and go, it's that, that follow up work, which is, will be important for the industry because farming's not a natural, not always a natural suit to be able to work through this kind of stuff. So I think that's a really worth calling out.

Yeah. Cool. That's awesome. That's great. I think that adoption curve is something that, that, that scares a lot of growers. So to know that the technology, there's someone behind them to support that, is really, yeah, key to it. All right. It's vital. I couldn't even get a microphone to work, so that's help I need, so Connor was there helping you try and get it to work before?

No, that's great to hear. Thank you for that and Connor does a good job. Does a great job. Yeah, we're getting close to time. I've put my contact details in the chat. If anyone wants to ask any questions after this session, I'm happy to talk on Farm Tech till the cows come home. Reach out and we can have a chat about all that sort of stuff. But does anyone have any final questions, before we wrap up?

Scott Botten from DEECA here as well, mate. I was at the VIC event and I was just wondering if you want to quickly chat. There was a lot of people on site there, so whether there's concerns about how large a volume of people that can handle at any one time. Yeah, no, that was a, that's a good observation. Yeah, Vic Vid look. To be honest, when we were setting up for it, we had a chat to our tech team because an, in like a single location, farms could be big places, but they don't normally have hundreds of people checking in at once. And so we did have to do some testing around the volume. But it handled it fine. It was all good. There was no technical issues for that size of operation, which was all good. That was 150-200 people at one time?

Yeah. Because if we, yeah, just thinking for some of the larger orchards during harvest, they may have a hundred, 150 people in one area at one time. There's a check-in process. Yep. Whether that will cause issues. Yeah. Nah, no, but that's a, yeah, good observation. Nah. So no technical issues on that front. And to be honest, probably the person who's operating the front office would love for everyone just to check in themselves as they arrive, as opposed to lining up and signing a form. Good question. There's probably a lot of technical questions, but, yeah. No, I'm happy to talk about all those things.

Cool. I just want to say thank you to you all for coming along and chatting today. I think it was really great conversation. We are going to continue to do these in the future, so there will be another one on the 31st of August at this point. I just stuck in the chat a link to the evaluation form, which is, would be fantastic if you guys could fill that out for me. But anyway, thank you so much for coming and it's been great insights. I really like this idea of having a chat about what goes on and how people use it. It's fantastic and thank you Mike, for being able to join. It was really good to hear from a grower, how you guys are implementing it. And I've got a hundred more questions for you as well. I really want to know more about the carbons footprint element of things. So Yeah, you won't escape that. And Rose, thank you so much from the industry perspective because yeah, it's, I think it's at that scale that we need to start, that we need to adopt these technologies. So yeah, it's fantastic. So thank you all very much.