There's plenty of research on why manuka honey's so useful from a medical and human health pointof view.
Equally we understand bees pretty well.
The missing part of the puzzle, ironically, particularly as it is a plant that's indigenous toNew Zealand is how to best grow the native.
But a newly formed consortium, the
It has pooled together $850,000, and has obtained matched funding through
Based on what might initially seem aspirational numbers, the consortium reckons it can produce 16times the current quantity of manuka honey (and with it the
Clearly MAF's bought the sizzle, and for that the industry and eventually the country may thankTaranaki's Neil Walker for putting together the sausage.
He's no stranger to research, and research applications. The recently retired Fonterra employeeobtained over 380 Foundation for Research, Science and Technology grants during his 35 years in thedairy industry.
He bought 200ha of hill country land in Nukuhau, Taranaki, a few years ago, looking to use if fora mosaic of uses. The longtime Taranaki regional councilor has already planted 110ha in trees,including for their carbon sequestering and trading component. He has also recently purchasedanother 40ha at Rangitatau West and will plant 30ha in manuka later this year.
Taihape apiarist Don Tweeddale put 85 of his 17,000 beehives on the Nukuhau property a couple ofyears ago to take advantage of the manuka stands, and being a polymath, Walker took a great deal ofinterest in the hives' performance.
“A normal beehive produces 35kg of manuka honey during the season,” he says. “We produceda total of 4750kg, averaging 55kg a hive.”
It inspired Walker, along with Wairarapa farmer Dan Riddiford, and Massey University’s ProfRichard Archer to some radical thinking.
“What if we maximized returns through plantations of manuka we asked ourselves,” he says?“What if we grew the manuka to maximize flowering and increased the length of flowering time?
From this, Walker figured it could be possible to double the amount of active ingredient in thehoney, double the yield of honey, double the number of beehives per hectare, and double the numberof hectares of manuka stands – hence a 16 fold increase for a market with an insatiable demand.According to Comvita’s Dr Nevin Amos demand is, in economic terms, extremely elastic.
At the same time, the group realised that there is no information about what sites, weatherconditions, sunshine and other factors influence manuka growth and production. This is particularlyso for manuka's active ingredient which is very variable around the country.
Hence, the initial concept application to MAF in Dec. 2009, the full (hundreds of pages) businessplan in July last year, and recent negotiations and acceptance as the 9th PGP project.
Comvita is looking at producing better cultivars as well.
“We’re also going to look to develop research tools,” says Walker. It would be good to knowwhat a manuka plant’s UMF factor could be before planting, and the group wants to have a set oftests that predicts that activity.
“We’re setting up projects to develop an understanding and discover all sorts of things wedon’t yet know anything about,” says Walker.
Which, all in all is a pretty good place to start, and for a native plant that not so long agowas considered a bit of a weed, a potential well worth exploring.
Given too that this native won’t require fertiliser and is a carbon sequestering crop itpromises to be one of most sustainable crops for some of our difficult hill country.
All power to the Manuka Research Partnership. It is a true value added crop.