Director, ACPIR, UniSC
Professor Steven Underhill specialises in subtropical and tropical postharvest horticulture systems in developing countries, based on poverty alleviation and livelihood development outcomes.
His current research program focuses on the South Pacific (Fiji, Vanuatu, Samoa, Tonga, Solomon Islands and Kiribati) where he works with smallholder farmers to improve their postharvest handling and quality management systems. Working closely with colleagues at the Fiji National University, the University of the South Pacific, the Secretariat of the Pacific Community, and the World Vegetable Centre, Taiwan, much of his research is conducted in the Pacific.
Ongoing research covers a diversity of research topics from sensor-based postharvest handling assessments, postharvest infrared thermal imagery, smallholder farm postharvest capacity building, through to dwarfing-orientated genetic research in breadfruit. All collectively orientated towards supply chain development in transitional economies and wider food security/poverty alleviation benefits.
Prof Underhill is currently Professor of Horticulture and Director of the Australian Centre for Pacific Islands Research (ACPIR) at the University of the Sunshine Coast, holds a Principal Research Fellow position at The Scientific Research Organization of Samoa, is an Adjunct Foundation Professor of Horticulture at the School of Natural Resources and Applied Sciences, Solomon Islands National University, and an adjunct Professor of Horticulture at the Fiji National University.
In 2010, he was awarded an Australian Day medal for services to Queensland Primary Industry. He is currently a member of:
• International Society for Horticultural Science commission – Quality and Postharvest Horticulture
• International Society for Horticultural Science working group – Litchi, longan and other sapindaceae fruit
Fiji, Vanuatu, Samoa, Tonga, Solomon Islands and Kiribati
