The award-winning creators of popular children’s character ‘George the Farmer’ have unveiled a new book to coincide with South Australia’s record apple harvest.

‘Hailstorm Heroes’ is the tenth children’s picture book released by Limestone Coast duo, Simone Kain and Ben Hood, since launching their educational, agriculture-based brand in 2015.

With a focus on weather events, technology and food waste, ‘Hailstorm Heroes’ was inspired by a 2017 Hort Innovation marketing campaign encouraging consumers to purchase blemished or bumpy apples.

The highly successful campaign was developed in response to a severe hailstorm which impacted apple orchards across the Adelaide Hills and Limestone Coast, resulting in major losses for growers.

“The Hort Innovation campaign encouraged consumers to support growers and the economy by assuring them the apples were still tasty despite some climate battle scars,” Ms Kain said.

“We wanted to share a solutions-based, community-oriented story about the simple apple while also weaving in a food waste message – and with Australians wasting 7.3 million tonnes of food each year, it’s an important message.”

The engaging tale follows George the Farmer’s children as they create the ‘Hailstorm Heroes’ marketing campaign at their school in order to help out local growers. And as with other George the Farmer titles, there are some local links within the story; the star apple growers, Sid and Elizabeth, have been named after the children of local Kalangadoo growers Glenn and Alicia Tucker.

‘Hailstorm Heroes’ will be accompanied by a paddock to plate video that was filmed at Lenswood in the Adelaide Hills during late March as part of the federally-funded $5m ‘Kids to Farms’ project, in collaboration with Primary Producers SA and Apples and Pears Australia.

Set for release in early August, the video will be supported with a Virtual Reality (VR) experience and complimentary curriculum-aligned educators guide for Foundation to Year 4 students. Resources on chickpeas, forestry and dairy will also be available, with most of the video and Virtual Reality resources being filmed in the Limestone Coast.

“We are proud to be showcasing local produce and growers to a national audience,” Ms Kain said. “The positive responses that we continue to receive from parents, teachers and kids really does make us so excited for the future of George the Farmer – there are so many stories that we can share.”