Welcome to the first edition of Future Focus E-News

Future Focus E-News is the E-Newsletter for Future Focus: the horticulture industry strategic plan. Future Focus is the first strategic plan of its kind for horticulture. It will address the opportunities and challenges facing horticulture and give the entire industry a strategic path for future growth.

Future Focus E-News will be issued regularly to update you on Future Focus’ milestones. You can subscribe to this newsletter at the website. We encourage you to forward it on to others interested in the horticulture industry.

Future Focus is being developed collaboratively by 54 industry groups and companies with assistance from the Centre for International Economics. It will take the horticulture industry 18 months to complete the final plan. The Future Focus Plan will be released in November 2008 at an industry summit prior to the HAL Industry Forum.

Welcome to Future Focus

Formally known as the Horticulture Industry Strategic Plan (HISP), Future Focus has been
re-named and is now underway.  The information hub of Future Focus is its official website,  www.futurefocus.org.au.

Horticulture Australia Limited (HAL) is facilitating the development of Future Focus and has assembled an Industry Leadership Group to provide insight into the key issues facing their sector across the supply chain. Members of the Leadership Group are listed at  www.futurefocus.org.au/information/leadership-committee. HAL is responsible for the management of the plan. Future Focus Partners, from growers groups to retailers, can be found at  www.futurefocus.org.au/information/contributors.

The benefits of Future Focus will include:

• Gauging the impact on industry of major strategic opportunities and challenges such as export, water, domestic demand
• Creating a better performing industry than would otherwise be the case
• Generating a mechanism to allocate the industry’s strategic efforts into the highest pay-off areas
• Providing additional insight into what drives competitiveness and profitability in horticulture

The website, www.futurefocus.org.au, gives industry members the opportunity to submit questions and commentary on the Future Focus plan. The Future Focus team will review and respond to feedback. Visitors to the site can also download progress reports, the latest media releases and Future Focus E-News, the e-newsletter of the Future Focus plan.

Preliminary findings: the key drivers of horticulture

Future Focus has released its first discussion papers identifying what will drive the future of the horticulture industry. Industry response to the papers will guide the development of the strategic plan.

The initial research has identified horticulture’s common strengths and challenges and pinpointed the issues to which horticulture should develop strategic responses.

Preliminary findings from a macro scan of edible horticulture highlighted the critical issues of:

• Developing strong export markets
• Increasing domestic demand
• Improving productivity
• The water crisis and drought
• Labour costs

The report on the non-edible sector of the horticulture industry identified:

• Strong prospects to increase domestic demand
• Opportunities for product development
• The impact of water restrictions on the domestic market
• Export challenges
  

The findings of the preliminary report have raised a series of questions that will be posed to the industry via focus groups, workshops and industry consultation. These questions include:

• Is horticulture production truly as labour intensive as shown?
• What big drivers have been missed and why?
• What potential is there to increase demand and value in the domestic market?
• How well does the supply chain deliver products that meet buyer and consumer expectations?
• What strategies are in place to deal with a tightening labour market?

Future Focus invites your feedback on the findings of these reports, which pose a number of questions that will be considered when compiling the final Future Focus strategy. To submit your feedback, visit www.futurefocus.org.au/information/questions--answers.

“The real power of Future Focus will be its ability to channel the collective efforts of everyone involved in horticulture into one clear direction,” said John Webster, managing director, Horticulture Australia Limited (HAL), which is facilitating the process.

The Future Focus plan will encompass all members of the horticulture industry, including fruit, vegetables, nuts, nursery and turf along the entire supply chain.

A full copy of the preliminary discussion reports can be downloaded from the reports page on  www.futurefocus.org.au.

Questions & Answers

As an individual grower, how will I benefit from Future Focus?

Future focus will identify the key issues that impact on your profitability and others in all sectors of the horticulture industry – from grower through to retail.  Then we will undertake specific actions to address these issues.  In addition the individual industry R&D and marketing programs through HAL will be revised in light of the Future Focus plan so your levy programs will also benefit from this new direction.  Once we implement these actions then individual growers should have a more commercial environment to operate within.

John Webster
Managing Director
Horticulture Australia Limited