NGN – Demonstrations of residual summer weed control for the Mid North, South Australia

Reference number: PROC-9177085

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Release date:: Friday 26 July 2024
Closing time:: Friday 23 August 2024, at 05:00 PM ACT local time
Enquiry deadline:: Friday 09 August 2024, at 05:00 PM ACT local time
Industry briefing: Refer to Clause 10 RFT Terms and Conditions on how to register.

Summary

NGN forums in the Mid and Upper North highlighted summer weed control costs as an important area of concern. Summer weed control can be costly, with some growers reporting three to four passes in order to conserve moisture and nutrients for the following season. This investment will assist growers in making informed summer weed management decisions around the utilisation of knockdown and residual herbicides in summer fallow situations and how they stack up against regional practice. The investment will also link into other investments to leverage their impact and ensure that growers are aware of best practice summer spray management and limit off-target damage to other crop types in the region. This investment will assist in more effective and efficient use of herbicide products and will allow growers to potentially reduce herbicide costs and the number of boom spray passes in a given season, while also increasing benefits of retained soil moisture and nitrogen for following crops.

Offer Period

Offers will remain open for acceptance by the GRDC for a period of 6 months after the Closing Time.

Document Contact and Enquiries

Attention: Lyndal Gordon
Grains Research and Development Corporation
Email: Lyndal.Gordon@grdc.com.au

Make all requests for further information or clarification in relation to this procurement in writing (email) prior to 9 August 2024.

GRDC will publish all requests and responses to requests on the GRDC website under Questions and Answers at the bottom of this webpage.

Consortia Responses

GRDC will not accept Tenders from Consortia.

Lodgement of Tender

Submit your Tender response electronically through the Grains Investment Portal.

Description

NGN forums in the Mid and Upper North highlighted summer weed control costs as an important area of concern. Summer weed control can be costly, with some growers reporting three to four passes in order to conserve moisture and nutrients for the following season. This investment will assist growers in making informed summer weed management decisions around utilisation of knockdown and residual herbicides in summer fallow situations and how they stack up against regional practice. The investment will also link into other investments to leverage their impact and ensure that growers are aware of best practice summer spray management and limit off-target damage to other crop types in the region, namely horticulture.

GRDC is seeking a service provider to address summer weed control through delivery to two herbicide demonstrations conducted in small plot trials to compare the efficacy and longevity of control of summer weeds. These demonstrations will build on the information delivered through the current investment with Hart Field Site, HFS2306-002SAX: NGN – Spray workshops to optimise application and reduce the drift in the Mid-North of SA, and include discussions around application equipment, set-up and weather conditions (e.g. droplet size, inversions and new sprayer technology including ‘green on green’).

This investment will assist in more effective and efficient use of herbicide products and will allow growers to potentially reduce herbicide costs and the number of boom spray passes in a given season, while also increasing benefits of retained soil moisture and nitrogen for following crops.

Outcome

Outputs

Output 1.

Title: Delivery and analysis of summer weed control demonstrations.

Description: In summer of 2024/25, deliver a report detailing findings from two trial sites, one in the mid north region and one in the upper north region of South Australia, demonstrating a variety of summer weed control herbicides and mixes, including common farmer practice and novel strategies often seen in the northern cropping zone for managing fallow.

Details:

The demonstration sites and target weeds to be determined through coordination and involvement of local agronomists and growers. Sites are to be chosen with known background populations of key summer weed species of importance to the region.
Should the spring/summer be dry and unconducive to weed germination irrigation will be considered.
The effectiveness of knockdown and residual herbicides when applied in summer will be validated and compared. The herbicide treatment list is to be developed in coordination with the GRDC Investment Manager and limited to registered products.
Treatment impacts on the following winter crop will be quantified. Trials will be sown to a winter crop to monitor the safety of the chemistries used in the treatments and grain yield impacts. Data will be collected for all treatments, while extension activities will ONLY include those treatments where all label requirements relating to plant backs has been met. Crop safety data collected may include:
- Crop vigour
- Bleaching/damage
- Herbicide residue level testing through NSW DPIRD
- Establishment counts
- Final grain yield
Final reports will include an economic analysis to understand return on investment of each herbicide application.
Trial details and results will be uploaded to the GRDC Online Farm Trials website.

Output 2.

Title: Extension and communication activities.

Description: By February 2026, delivery of extension and communication activities targeted at growers and advisers to increase understanding of summer fallow weed control.

Details:

A summer spray event (field day/workshop) will be delivered at each of the trial sites, covering the following:
- Existing resources and discussion points from HFS2306-002SAX (NGN - Spray workshops to optimise application and reduce drift in the Mid-North and Upper North of SA), specifically efficient and effective spray applications, including droplet size, inversions and new sprayer technology.
- Utilise and demonstrate the Summer Weed tool developed by CSIRO (CSP2201-005RTX).
Utilising the validated results from Output 1, written and technical content will be developed into a Factsheet, or Case Study, targeted at growers and advisers. This will include the details of the most effective herbicides for controlling summer fallow weeds and a financial comparison with other control tactics to inform grower decision making. The publication will be formatted, published and promoted through GRDC, WeedSmart and other communication channels
Key results and conclusions will be publicised through local grower groups, and other GRDC media channels.

Proposed Budget

Proposed Contract & Term

GRDC will contract under the terms of the GRDC Standard Two-Party Research Contract.

The schedule(s) attached to the contract will detail the project details: the outcomes, outputs, milestones, budget, participating personnel and required intellectual property.

The template contract containing the proposed terms and conditions is available from the Application resources page on the GRDC website.

It is anticipated that any resultant contract in relation to this procurement will commence with a proposed term of 6 Months.

Conditions for Participation

The following are mandatory conditions with which a Tenderer must comply to participate in this procurement process:

The Tenderer must be a single legal entity or recognised firm of partners
The Tenderer and any proposed subcontractor must be compliant with the Workplace Gender Equality Act 2012, the Modern Slavery Act 2018 and any other applicable labour laws and standards in the jurisdiction in which they operate.
The Tenderer and any subcontractor must not have a judicial decision against it (not including decisions under appeal) relating to employee entitlements and who have not paid the claim.
The Tenderer and any subcontractor must not be named on the Consolidated List, being the list of persons and entities who are subject to targeted financial sanctions or travel bans under Australian sanction laws, as maintained by the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade.

Minimum Form and Content Requirements

The following are the mandatory content and format requirements that the Tenderer must complete and provide to participate in this procurement process:

Submit Tenders using the Grains Investment Portal.
Write Tenders in English and express any measurements in Australian legal units of measurement.
Budget details must be submitted on the ‘GRDC Budget Template’ provided in the Grains Investment Portal.

Evaluation Criteria

In the table below are the Evaluation Criteria that the Tender Evaluation Team will use to assess the value for money of all Tenders.

No	Type	Weighting
1	Technical – Qualitative evaluation criteria related to non-price factors such as methodology, project plan, track record, experience.
1a	A clear and thorough plan to achieve the project outputs, specifying: Method to be used with proposed treatments (including anticipants statistical analysis capacity). Proposed Milestones Proposed locations of field experiments (if required to deliver project outputs). Proposed workshop locations and agenda. Budget (defining the funds sought each year of the project and the potential investment from all parties). Project structure and management arrangements.	60%
1b	Demonstrated track record of the project team, including: Relevant achievements of the project leader in providing leadership, co-ordination, management, monitoring and evaluation and the timely delivery of high-quality outputs. Relevant technical knowledge and experience of all key personnel (including proposed subcontractors) in the research area. Relevant achievements in delivering extension and investment with impact. Ability of the project team to collaborate with the relevant research organisations and industry personnel to build on the research (national and international) already undertaken in this area.	35%
1c	An Overview of your approach to data management in accordance with GRDC RD&E Data Management Guidelines, including: Existing data that you intend to use during the project and any potential restrictions on its use, including in publication or commercialisation of the intended project outputs. How all data will be managed during the investment. New valuable data that will be created during the project and the Approved Repository where it will be stored. Note: We recommend searching the GRDC Data Catalogue for data that could be used in your propose work, either by negating the need to generate new data or by adding to analyses being carried out.	5%
2	Price - The tendered budget.	N/A
3	Risk - Risks inherent in the application including the degree of compliance with the draft contract and any actual or perceived conflict of interest.	N/A
4	Australian economy - The economic benefit of the procurement to the Australian economy.	N/A

Lodging a Tender

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