With the Paris Olympics still fresh in the memory and the Paralymic Games now underway, the Food Agility team has been reflecting on our favourite moments from this spectacle of sport.
It’s a tough choice. Obviously, we became instant experts on sports like rhythmic gymnastics, canoe slalom and modern pentathlon, many of us spent late nights and early mornings cheering on Aussie medalists, marveling at Snoop Dogg’s outfits, and even learning how to do the splits.
But after much debate these are our top five.
Australian Cameron McEvoy won the 50m freestyle at Paris in just 21.25 seconds. He ditched the conventional approach of swimming laps for training, instead focusing on land-based activities and even weight training in the water. McEvoy told A Current Affair “A lot of my training, the majority of it, is with some kind of parachute or weights strapped to my back and it is effectively bringing the gym into the water.”
We like thinking that’s outside the box - innovation is at the heart of what we do at Food Agility looking for new technology and different approaches to solve some of the big challenges in agrifood. The Farm-wide Wi-Fi project developed new antenna arrays technology turning farm vehicles into roving Wi-Fi devices, tackling the problem of connectivity which is a key issue for agtech adoption. The use of real-time sensors and eDNA in our Transforming Shellfish project is helping oyster growers manage production and reduce harvest closure days.
Paris 2024 aimed to set new standards for sustainability for global sporting events, with the goal to reduce the greenhouse gas emission footprint by 50 per cent compared to the London and Rio games. It increased the plant-based foods on the menu, reduced single-use plastics and embraced the principles of a circular economy.
Sustainability is a big focus of our work with projects to measure, manage and validate sustainability credentials. For example, the AgTrace Australia initiative which is supporting data-sharing to improve accuracy and confidence in ESG reporting, a project to develop an accurate and affordable way to estimate soil and vegetation carbon in the Rangelands, and research to optimise carbon and nutrient management.
The haul of 53 medals makes Paris Australia’s most successful Olympic campaign and the achievements of all our athletes should be celebrated. Behind each athlete is a team- from coaches and families to nutritionists and healthcare professionals all working to help people overcome challenges and achieve their Olympic goals.
Teamwork is highly valued at Food Agility, and we strive to cultivate it in our projects, bringing together multi-disciplinary teams from universities, government and industry to harness digital technologies and advance Australia’s agrifood sector.
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With many of us working remotely, the Food Agility team also loves friendly competition - since we couldn’t make the trip to Paris we came up with our own ‘Olympic’ event. We were each allocated nations to barrack for and set a challenge to see who could learn the language, experience the culture and snap the most selfies while watching the Games.
More than 10,000 athletes from more than 200 countries competed in the Paris 2024 Olympics – a global event that highlights sporting achievements.
The Olympic motto is ‘Faster, Higher, Stronger – Together’ and we believe that working together can deliver far greater results than innovation in isolation. The Global Smart Farm Network is a good example, with 20 commercial-scale farms involved in the ideation, calibration and validation of emerging technologies. The aim is to foster a global culture of collaboration to support agtech development and adoption. Food Agility is pleased to be part of the network with the Global Digital Farm at Charles Sturt University in Wagga Wagga and we’re looking forward to welcoming other of the network to the Digital Agrifood Summit from 29-30 October (psst have you booked your ticket yet?)
Well, we couldn’t break it down without including her.
No doubt our list will grow as the Australian Paralympic team competes for gold, Aussie, Aussie, Aussie – Oi, Oi, Oi.
What did you take away from the Olympics?
