Agriculture and Plant Sciences

Tasmania’s temperate climate and fertile soils is a perfect environment for agriculture. As an island state, Tasmania also remains largely bio-secure, boasting an absence of many major pests and diseases found elsewhere in the world.

Agriculture is a successful industry in Tasmania with major exports including vegetables, fruit, dairy products and meat. Our cool, temperate climate also enables Tasmania to produce world-class grape vines and hops for boutique wines and award-winning beers.

Tasmania’s agricultural industry is not only limited to food and beverage production. Tasmania is the largest producer of the opium alkaloids, codeine and thebaine, producing 50 per cent of the world’s legal poppy crop for the pharmaceutical market, with an area of close to 20,000 hectares sown to poppies.

Tasmanian research organisations and businesses in this sector include:

• Botanical Resources Australia
• Tasmanian Alkaloids
• School of Plant Science, University of Tasmania
• Royal Tasmanian Botanical Gardens
• Tasmanian Institute of Agricultural Research
• School of Agricultural Science, University of Tasmania.