The Department of Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) visited the Growing Sussex region for a day’s tour and discussion with partners.
Kate Greenham, Head of Wireless Infrastructure Strategy, Brad McGuire, Technical Design Lead and Paul Clegg, Portfolio Lead toured two commercial growing sites and Plumpton College to hear about the project’s ambitions and share central government’s perspective on progress.
David Moore at Wick’s Farm, Barnham welcomed the group, together with members of WSCC’s project team into an all-year-round strawberry growing glasshouse to explain the process of vertical stack growing. The group heard about the current use of technology to monitor the environment and growing medium, a type of expanded clay called Leca.
David plans to use site-wide 5G coverage to better monitor and manage the site of glasshouses, automating some processes and making data driven decisions about growing practice.
Duncan Toms at The Green House Sussex, Barnham explained how the production of seasonal on-the-vine tomatoes will benefit from cameras and AI providing greater and faster visibility of pests and diseases. The vast empty glasshouses were in the process of a deep clean ahead of new plugs arriving in January for planting.
Principle Jeremy Kerswell welcomed the group at Plumpton College, Lewes together with Directors, Lecturers and IT Managers from both Plumpton and Brinsbury Colleges for an afternoon’s discussion. Key themes were the progress on forming partnerships between the commercial growers and the colleges, as well as between the colleges themselves. Shared ambitions around digital skills and data analysis and management were considered for joint technology use cases, putting into practice new methods of growing and monitoring in the ‘real world’ alongside academic settings.
DSIT commented on the strength of the partnership already forming and the drive by government to accelerate commercial investment by telecommunications suppliers in 5G in response to the demand of industry and sectors. Attention now shifts to shoring up contractual arrangements to install the connectivity networks at the four project sites as the new growing seasons commence.
Watch this space!
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GROWING SUSSEX
Led by West Sussex County Council and funded by DSIT, Growing Sussex is an exciting project to advance digital technology and data driven decision making in food, wine and plant production.
