Australia: Researcher honoured at World Potato Congress

A potato industry researcher is only the second Australian to be honoured at the world potato congress. Australian horticulture researcher and industry stalwart Kevin Clayton-Greene was honoured with a prestigious industry recognition award at the ninth world potato congress in Beijing, China. Dr Clayton-Greene, who worked as operations general manager for major potato and vegetable producer Harvest Moon until 2012, was nominated by vegetable grower peak body AusVeg. He lives at Penguin and is now biosecurity adviser to AusVeg.

Dr Clayton-Greene has advanced and evolved the Australian potato industry to improve production output. His work helped Australian retailers market potatoes to consumers and introduced a new range of varieties to growers. AusVeg chief executive Richard Mulcahy said Dr Clayton-Greene has had a distinguished career. He prepared more than 30 refereed research papers and had written hundreds of horticulture industry articles.

“His efforts in biosecurity and plant health have gone a long way to safeguarding Australia from pests and diseases not currently present, as well as in educating growers on how to best manage current issues and reduce the risk of incursions,” Mr Mulcahy said. “His work in this space has been crucial in keeping the destructive zebra chip disease and fresh potato imports from New Zealand out of Australia. AusVeg was delighted to nominate Dr Clayton-Greene for this award.”

Source: Perth Now