Strategic partnerships

Strategic partnerships go beyond business as usual and require GRDC and its partner organisations to make a strategic commitment to invest in capacity and capability that delivers outcomes beyond those achieved by GRDC’s standard RD&E investments. Strategic partnerships capture the strong advisory and technical expertise of our research partners, and sometimes create a new entity overseen by appropriate governance and agile management.

Strategic partnerships create an innovative platform, challenge the status quo, leverage international expertise and respond to industry opportunities and challenges. Through strategic partnerships, GRDC and its partners are investing for ambitious and clear outcomes, which may have longer lead times and higher risk. Strategic partnerships are also characterised by a co-design approach that ensures outcomes meet the strategic objectives of all partners, with co-contributions reflecting genuine commitment and alignment. Strategic partnerships are usually approved by the GRDC Board.

These include:

Centre for Crop and Disease Management (CCDM)

CCDM creates enduring grain grower profitability through the delivery of innovative and adoptable fungicide resistance management and genetic resistance tools.

Established in 2014, CCDM is based at Curtin University in Perth and involves the alignment of strategic objectives and co-investment of resources and human capability by GRDC and Curtin University. The current phase of GRDC’s strategic partnership with CCDM started in June 2022 and is focused on increasing grower profitability in disease-challenged and fungicide-limited cropping environments.

For more information visit the CCDM website or the GRDC investment page: CCDM.

Australian Grains Genebank (AGG)

The AGG unlocks the genetic potential of grain crops in Australia by accelerating cereal, oilseed and pulse crop improvement for the benefit of Australian grain growers. The facility was opened in 2014 as a significant long-term commitment between GRDC and the Victorian Government and is located at the Grains Innovation Precinct in Horsham.

The AGG has a mandate to acquire, conserve, maintain and distribute genetic resources to plant breeders and researchers to underpin the development of more resilient and productive grain crop varieties for the benefit of the Australian grains industry. The current phase of the AGG started in 2022 with a $30 million joint investment between GRDC and Agriculture Victoria within the then Victorian Department of Jobs, Precincts and Regions.

For more information visit the AGG website or the GRDC investment page: AGG.

Analytics for the Australian Grains Industry (AAGI)

AAGI is a five-year strategic partnership aimed at harnessing analytics to drive the Australian grains industry’s profitability and global competitiveness. A co-investment between GRDC and strategic partners Curtin University, University of Queensland and University of Adelaide, the initiative aims to unleash the potential of statistics, machine learning, data fusion and analytics for Australian grain growers.

GRDC has committed $36 million over five years to AAGI, which complements a $56 million co-investment from the initiative’s three strategic partners.

For more information visit AAGI page or the GRDC investment pages for AAGI investments with: Curtin University, The University of Queensland and The University of Adelaide.

National Grains Diagnostics and Surveillance Initiative (NGDSI)

NGDSI is a strategic partnership with co-investment from GRDC, along with five state departments:

Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development, WA (DPIRD)
South Australia Research and Development Institute of Primary Industries and Regions South Australia (SARDI-PIRSA)
NSW Department of Primary Industries (NSW DPI)
Queensland Department of Agriculture and Fisheries (QDAF)
the Department of Energy, Environment and Climate Action, Victoria (DEECA).

NGDSI has co-investment worth approximately $50 million over the next six years. This initiative has been developed to deliver investment across four biosecurity and diagnostics themes:

Adoption of modern quantitative polymerase chain reaction (qPCR) and high throughput sequencing (HTS) platforms as diagnostics standards for the Australian grains industry.
In-field or near-field diagnostics systems advanced and implemented for near real-time identification of biotic threats.
Biosecurity risk profiles – pests and communities.
The gathering of global and local intelligence and understanding of climate variability to model changes in risk profiles of exotic and endemic species; and understanding grain communities’ preparedness and acceptance of biosecurity measures.
Forecasting seasonal occurrence, magnitude and distribution of diseases and pests.

For more information visit the GRDC investment pages for NGDSI investments with DPIRD, SARDI-PIRSA, NSW DPI, QDAF, and DEECA.

Unlocking Soil Potential Strategic Partnership (USP)

The USP investment is a $15 million strategic partnership between GRDC and NSW DPI over five years (2023-28) and is designed to lift and shift the grains production frontier by ‘unlocking’ access to water and nutrients in constrained NSW cropping soils. This partnership aims to improve soil management through the use of existing knowledge and traditional technologies, combined with the development and commercialisation of next generation soil technologies, (currently at various stages of technology-ready levels), to address multiple soil constraints across six sub-regions.

Herbicide Innovation Partnership (HIP)

HIP is an initiative of GRDC and the crop science division of Bayer. Its key objective is to provide Australian growers with new technologies to manage herbicide resistance. The private-public partnership was formed in 2015 and, since then, has delivered promising results in the identification of chemistry candidates for new sustainable herbicide modes of action. HIP’s objectives are long-term, as it takes a minimum of 10-12 years to bring any compound through the pipeline to commercial development, which then takes an additional 3-5 years.

HIP’s second phase commenced in 2021 with an additional $36 million in GRDC investment until 2025. The second phase has continued the search for new modes of action, along with field testing at various global locations, including Australia, to ensure efficacy under Australian conditions. As part of this phase, 10 Australian weeds have been subject to testing by Bayer under glasshouse conditions, while additional species are taken into account within field testing in Australia.

For more information, learn more about HIP.

RiskWi$e

RiskWi$e (the National Risk Management Initiative) is a five-year, $30 million national investment by GRDC that will run from 2023 to 2028. RiskWi$e will help Australian grain growers better manage risks such as drought and market volatility. It will give growers and their advisers the tools to evaluate potential risks and rewards and develop holistic and integrated approaches to risk management.

RiskWi$e was developed in response to grower needs. It is one of the largest ever grower-facing initiatives undertaken by GRDC. It is led by CSIRO, in partnership with more than 25 grower-based groups from across the country, six action research group leads and ten research partners.

For more information visit RiskWi$e page.

Data Partnerships Initiative

Managing RD&E Data is an area that is rapidly evolving in Australia. In this vein, GRDC is actively engaging with our research partners to build on their expertise with data management and to improve data management across the RD&E investment portfolio. A key element of this effort is GRDC’s investment with 12 research partners in an 18-month, $2.8M ($1.9M GRDC cash) Data Partnerships Initiative.

The next phase of the Data Partnerships Initiative will engage with the rest of GRDC's research partners and researchers in the implementation of the GRDC RD&E Data Capture and Storage - Guidelines for Research Partners. It will likely see a broad approach to support the diverse cross-section of research organisations and researchers that interact with GRDC to uplift their data management skills.

For more information visit the GRDC investment page: Data Partnerships Initiative or the GRDC RD&E Data page.

WA Agricultural R&D Collaboration (WAARC)

WAARC was launched in 2022 with the aim of developing a successful, efficient research collaboration that delivers positive outcomes for WA growers and agriculture more broadly. WAARC will target some of WA’s unique challenges and opportunities, with GRDC leveraging its grower networks to ensure every investment under WAARC is aligned to grower needs and driving enduring profitability.

WAARC is a joint initiative of the WA Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development, CSIRO, Curtin University, Edith Cowan University, Murdoch University, University of Western Australia and GRDC. With WAARC, GRDC has invested $10 million for WA-focused grains research from 2022 to 2025 on investments that meet grower objectives and are good value propositions.

For more information visit the GRDC investment pages for WAARC or visit the WAARC website.

growAg

growAG is a collaboration between the Australian Government Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry and all of Australia's 15 Rural Research and Development Corporations including GRDC. It provides a gateway to Australia’s agrifood innovation system where people can explore, find and connect with world leading agricultural research, unique technologies and commercialisation opportunities online in one, easy-to-use location.

All the information on this platform is free to access and allows investors, corporates, startups, researchers, industry, government and universities from Australia and around the world to locate information and opportunities to deliver innovation back to the farm and the food supply-chain.

For more information visit the growAG website or explore GRDC’s investments on growAG.

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