INNOVATIVE APPROACHES TO ENHANCING SUGAR INDUSTRY PRODUCTIVITY AND PROFITABILITY: THE CONTRIBUTION FROM CRC SUGAR

Enhancing Productivity is one of three research programs within the Cooperative Research Centre for Sustainable Sugar Production (CRC Sugar). The program was established to undertake research and education to improve the profitability and international competitiveness of the Australian sugar industry through the development and adoption of novel management practices across the raw sugar industry value chain. The program has drawn heavily on seconded staff and resources from BSES, Bundaberg Sugar, CANEGROWERS, CSIRO Tropical Agriculture (now Sustainable Ecosystems), CSR, James Cook University, Mackay Sugar, Sugar North and the University of Queensland, supplemented with SRDC cash and competitive project funding, and complemented by five staff funded using the CRC Program cash grant. Research is broadly divided into two themes: on-farm management practices and whole-of-industry management issues related to the production and supply of cane. Within each research area, activities have sought to add value to the research and expertise of the several joint venture parties. Enhancing Productivity (Program 3) has made a significant contribution in several key areas including the development of improved ways of utilising limited irrigation water supplies; gathering important information for improved decisionmaking on managing time-of-harvest, crop age and season length; identifying opportunities for managing the sugar yield of early harvested crops; developing a more rigorous approach to the collection and storage of industry experimental data; improved methods of crop forecasting; significant advances in understanding the constraints to productivity in the wet tropics; and the identification of more profitable cane supply arrangements. The novel research approach adopted for exploring alternative cane supply options has significantly changed industry thinking on the role of a whole-ofindustry systems approach for achieving better use of industry resources and sustained international competitiveness. Also the collaborative and participative approach to R&D followed by many Program 3 activities, where industry and researchers work in partnership to explore different options and develop and implement solutions, is likely to be increasingly used to evaluate and manage change as the problems to be solved assume greater complexity.