Over those 60 years, Lincoln Agritech has transformed, from being initially focused on agricultural engineering, to researching and providing solutions to many of the world’s most pressing challenges. Climate change, environmental sustainability, protecting water, and sustainable production – our researchers are applying their minds to these issues, and more. In contributing to these impacts, we emphasise partnering and responsiveness.
Our research staff bring a diversity of skills. They are engineers, hydrologists, chemists, geospatial data analysts, materials scientists, software developers, physicists, agronomists, molecular plant pathologists, sensor specialists … and more.
We have broadened our sights in another way: we now apply our minds not just to New Zealand’s farming challenges but to global issues, and we collaborate with customers and colleagues across borders. For example, last year we joined one of the world’s largest research programmes, as a partner in a four-year Horizon Europe project and for several years our technology has been helping farmers worldwide use up to 20% less irrigation water, without loss of yield. Our world-leading irrigation design software IRRICAD is sold to over 90 countries across multiple continents.
Sixty years ago, it’s unlikely our first staff anticipated the breadth and depth of the research Lincoln Agritech would engage in. Likewise, it’s difficult to anticipate how the company will have grown and developed by 2084.
What is clear is that it will continue to apply some of New Zealand’s brightest research and development minds to the agricultural, horticultural, technological, and environmental challenges of the day, and deliver solutions that are truly world-class. We will also continue to emphasise partnering and responsiveness.
Richard Gordon
Interim CEO
