2 minute read
WELCOME TO Cane Matters
Welcome to our Winter edition of Cane Matters.
The weather has not been kind this year, between flooding in northern New South Wales and unseasonal rain across much of Queensland, which has caused delays to the harvest across multiple districts.
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Over recent months, SRA has held a series of events, including five field days across our footprint. In this edition, you’ll find coverage of the field days plus interviews with a number of our researchers who delivered presentations. Our teams have also been active at regional shows and an industry booth at the Brisbane Ekka.
Other events this quarter included the annual Women in Sugar conference, at which SRA was a sponsor. Along with our coverage of the event, we chat with three women in sugar, Maryann Salvetti, Lisa Parker and Teresa Fox, about their passion and confidence in the future of the industry.
In other developments, the first shared industry vision and roadmap has been released outlining an exciting future: Sugar Plus - fuelling the future of food, energy and fabrication. The roadmap has been a collaborative effort involving industry representative organisations and extensive engagement across the industry supply chain. Read about the roadmap and the opportunities being explored for the future on pages 14 to 17. We also examine a feasibility study into green hydrogen and compostable bioplastics to understand how the economics stack up. On the varieties front, we look at how SRA26A is performing in the Herbert for local farmer Chris Bosworth. The variety showed similar sugar yields to the popular Q208A and Q240A in field trials, with higher CCS and equivalent yield and an excellent disease resistance profile to major diseases in the district.
Social licence is increasingly important in the agricultural sector, and we explore findings on research into community trust in rural industries to understand shifts in community expectations.
It’s a bumper edition - happy reading.
You can reach me at cweis@sugarresearch.com.au if you have feedback or story ideas for our next edition of Cane Matters.
Cathy Weis Head of Strategy, Insights and Engagement
BOARD VISITS FAR NORTH
The SRA Board has continued its series of regional visits, meeting at Meringa checking in with the SRA team, and undertaking an industry visit to Mourilyan.
Visiting South Johnstone, Directors heard from local growers and the mill about productivity and profitability challenges.
A local expect analysis (LEA) process is under way in the region in an effort to identify causes of yellowing crops, declining yield and CCS in the area over recent years.
After meeting with representative organisations, Directors and members of the Executive team caught up with local growers and milling representatives over a barbecue lunch, hosted by Joe Marano.
(Top) SRA Director Peter Russo on barbecue duty with Mourilyan farmer and CANEGROWERS Innisfail Chairman Joe Marano. (Bottom) Innisfail CANEGROWERS’ Deb Telford with SRA Chief Executive Officer Roslyn Baker.
