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Centre for Agricultural Engineering

The Centre for Agricultural Engineering delivers applied, practical and profitable research solutions that strengthen agricultural productivity and address environmental management challenges in Australia and overseas. 

The Centre’s research focus includes irrigation and water resources management; farming systems innovation; energy efficiency and renewable energy; bioresource recycling; robotics, automation and machine vision. 

Themes and Projects

For over 30 years, the Centre has been working with industry to develop more sustainable and efficient ways of using water sustainably to grow crops and support the environment. Irrigation research is conducted across a wide variety of agricultural industries nationally and internationally. 

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Title: Automated Broad-acre Irrigation Optimisation  

Leader: Associate Professor Joseph Foley  
Project Team: Dr Malcolm Gillies | Dr Alison McCarthy | Dr Simon Kelderman | Ralph Shippam, TIA, University of Tasmania 
Project Partners: Cotton Research and Development Corporation | Dairy Australia  
Funding Body: Australian Government, Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry 

UniSQ’s Centre for Agricultural Engineering is completing research on broad-acre surface irrigation, large centre pivots and lateral moves, to automatically optimise irrigation events with novel technologies developed by our Irrigation & Water Management team.

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Title: Dry Season Irrigation for Marginal and Tenant Farmers  

Leader: Erik Schmidt  
Project Team: Michael Scobie | Lidya Agustina | Dr Jochen Eberhard | Ralph Shippam | Rupak Sarkar, UBKV (North Bengal Agricultural University) | Mohammad Mainuddin, CSIRO | Santosh Mali, Indian Council for Ag Research  
Project Partners: IWMI, International Water Management Institute   
Funding Body: ACIAR Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research 

UniSQ’s Centre for Agricultural Engineering is supporting irrigation development in the Eastern Gangetic Plains, which include the Nepal Tarai, Bihar and West Bengal regions, and is one of the most densely populated, poverty-stricken belts in South Asia. The Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research is investing in research aiming to improve the livelihood of women, marginal and tenant farmers in the Eastern Gangetic Plains, through improved water use and increased dry season agricultural production.

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Title: Direct one-step measurement of broad-acre crop evapotranspiration
 
Leader: Dr Simon Kelderman 
Project Team: Associate Professor Joseph Foley | Associate Professor Nigel Hancock  
Project Partners: CRDC, Cotton Research and Development Corporation  
Funding Body: CRDC, Cotton Research and Development Corporation   


Direct one-step measurement of water vapour flux from broad-acre irrigated cropping is a focus research area for the Irrigation & Water Management team at UniSQ’s Centre for Agricultural Engineering. The Cotton Research and Development Corporation is supporting this post-doctoral work of Dr Simon Kelderman to further refine sensor selection and deploy his novel system in commercial fields to allow industry to obtain direct crop evapotranspiration rates.

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Leader: Michael Scobie  
Project Team: Erik Schmidt | Dr Pamela Pittaway | Dr Guangnan Chen 
Project Partners: Former Queensland Department of Resources, now Queensland Department Regional Development, Manufacturing and Water | CRDC, Cotton Research and Development Corporation  | Gwydir Valley Irrigators Association 
Funding Body: CRDC, Cotton Research and Development Corporation   


The largest loss of water in the northern Murray-Darling Basin is the evaporation and seepage from on-farm water storages, and the Irrigation & Water Management team at UniSQ’s Centre for Agricultural Engineering remains keenly focussed on this “wicked” problem. The Cotton Research and Development Corporation is supporting this work to determine alternatives and further refine real commercial options for regional water managers across Australia to reduce this stored water loss.

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Title: Demonstrating and integrating irrigation technology for cotton

Project Lead: Assoc Prof Joseph Foley
Project Team:  Assoc Prof Joseph Foley, Dr Jochen Eberhard
Project Partners: CRDC – Cotton Research and Development Corporation
Funding Body:  CRDC – Cotton Research and Development Corporation

Project focusses on enhancing the uptake of advanced irrigation management technology across irrigated grower communities with a three-pronged approach for: actively engaged grower cohort through demonstration and peer interaction, dedicated on-farm agronomic service providers who are continuing to seek more understanding of these irrigation technologies, and industry’s very active extension networks busily dealing with a wide range of broad industry challenges.

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Title: Advanced Field Sensing

Project Lead: Assoc Prof Alison McCarthy
Project Team: Assoc Prof Alison McCarthy, Dr Derek Long, Dr Yiyi Xiong, Dr Jochen Eberhard
Project Partners: CRDC – Cotton Research and Development Corporation; Department of Primary Industries
Funding Body:  CRDC – Cotton Research and Development Corporation

Development of a novel suite of automated machine vision tools that reduce reliance on workforce labour for agronomic scouting to potentially increase productivity and improve crop management decisions involving pests, crop growth, crop rotations, patch management and irrigation scheduling. The project will be delivered by engineers at UniSQ, and agronomists, entomologists and pathologists at QDPI.

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Title: Australian Cotton Disease Collaboration (ACDC) - Irrigation and nutrition management to reduce cotton wilt disease incidence and machine vision system development to detect and differentiate verticillium and fusarium wilts

Project Lead: Assoc Prof Alison McCarthy
Project Team:  Assoc Prof Alison McCarthy, Mr Isaac Halling, Assoc Prof Joseph Foley
Project Partners: CRDC – Cotton Research and Development Corporation, Department of Primary Industries
Funding Body:  CRDC – Cotton Research and Development Corporation, Queensland Department of Primary Industries

The expected industry outcomes and impact are that Australian cotton growers will have an improved understanding of the interactions between irrigation, nutrition and disease incidence for Verticillium and Fusarium wilt in both furrow and surface irrigation systems. This will contribute to reduced yield loss through understanding improved wilt. management options, increased water use efficiency when irrigating with a higher soil water deficit and increased profit through reduced fertiliser application and reduced disease incidence.

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Title: Advancing the adoption of climate-smart, innovative irrigation control technology for the cotton and dairy industries

Project Lead: Assoc Prof Alison McCarthy
Project Team:  Assoc Prof Alison McCarthy, Assoc Prof Joseph Foley, Mr Isaac Halling
Project Partners: CRDC – Cotton Research and Development Corporation; Ag Logic; Swan Systems; University of Tasmania
Funding Body:  CRDC – Cotton Research and Development Corporation

This project will develop a novel suite of automated machine vision tools to reduce reliance on labour and increase repeatability pests. The first 15 months will explore tools that could be used including infield insect activity for spray decisions, crop growth for canopy management, and diseases for crop rotation management. After the feasibility and impact of each tool is evaluated, ranked and a pathway for development identified, at least two of the tools will be refined and implemented in software for commercial adoption.

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Title: Water balance scoping study for Northern NSW/Queensland

Project Lead: Assoc Prof Joseph Foley
Project Team:  Assoc Prof Joseph Foley, Dr Malcolm Gillies, Dr Simon Kelderman
Project Partners: CRDC – Cotton Research and Development Corporation
Funding Body:  CRDC – Cotton Research and Development Corporation

A desktop scoping study for research into the measurement techniques for a full season water balance of siphon-less broad-acre irrigation systems is to be conducted.  A review of siphon-less irrigation system designs most commonly deployed across Northern NSW/Queensland will be completed through interaction with key designers and leading growers. 

 

 

The research team delivers outcomes by combining agricultural sciences, agricultural inputs and practices, agronomic production databases and precision agriculture technologies to efficiently manage agronomic and livestock production systems.

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Title: Cassowary Coast Reef Smart Farming 

Leader: Debra Telford | UniSQ leader: Professor Bernard Schroeder  
Project Team: Associate Professor Troy Jensen | Bruen Smith | Debra Telford | Peter Becke | Maria Solis | Renee Cluff (CANEGROWERS Innisfail) | Dr John Pickering | Sam Moore (Evidn) 
Project Partners: CANEGROWERS (Innisfail) | Evidn  
Funding Body: Great Barrier Reef Foundation (GBRF) through Terrain NRM  
 
UniSQ Centre for Agricultural Engineering is partnering with CANEGROWERS Innisfail and Evidn Pty Ltd in a GBRF-funded project that aims to improve nitrogen-use efficiency (NUE) in sugarcane production systems.

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Title: Automated Small Plot Cotton Trial Picker  

Leader: Associate Professor Troy Jensen 
Project Team: Bruen Smith | Tim Johnson 
Project Partners: Cotton Seed Distributors (CSD) | CSIRO  
Funding Body: CSD | CSIRO

The purpose of this project is to develop a new automated on-board weighing system for a commercial 4 row seed cotton picker. The system will be developed for the existing JD7760/CP690 pickers.

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Title: Integrating soil and water management in vegetable production in Laos and Cambodia 

Leader: Dr Alice Melland 
Project Team: Dr Jochen Eberhard | Erik Schmidt 
Project Partners: Cambodia Agricultural Research and Development Institute | Clean Agriculture Development Centre | National Agriculture and Forestry Research Institute | National University of Laos | University of Tasmania  
Funding Body: Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research (ACIAR)

This project aimed to improve soil and irrigation water management in Laos and Cambodia to achieve sustainably improved vegetable yields and households’ economies. Laos and Cambodia are developing economies seeking to improve crop yields for domestic consumption and export markets.

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Title:  Are trends in silicon update a reason for concern?

Project Lead: Prof Bernard Schroeder
Project Team:  Prof Bernard Schroeder
Project Partners: SRA - Sugar Research Australia
Funding Body:  SRA - Sugar Research Australia

Investigating if trends in Silicon uptake are impacting crop performance, identify how various soil chemical properties may influence Si availability and if changes are required to soil and/or plant tissue assay critical values to ensure adequate Silicon nutrition.

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Title:  Long-term soil health trials to assess farming system opportunities and impacts

Project Lead: Prof Bernard Schroeder
Project Team:  Prof Bernard Schroeder
Project Partners: SRA - Sugar Research Australia
Funding Body:  SRA - Sugar Research Australia

Assessing farming systems and residue management practices through monitoring of soils over time, assessment of sugarcane productivity, economic analysis of practice change and modelling (APSIM) to understand potential longer-term outcomes across a wider range of environments.

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Title:  Air Operated Sample Probes

Project Lead: Assoc Prof Troy Jensen
Project Team:  Assoc Prof Troy Jensen, Mr Bruen Smith
Project Partners: GRDC - Grains Research & Development Corporation; Grain Trade Australia
Funding Body:  GRDC - Grains Research & Development Corporation

Comprehensive modelling and field trials targeting 10 different grain receival sites will be conducted to validate the effectiveness of the existing and newly proposed protocols. Project aims to identify whether a sampling issues negatively affects grower profits.

The research team explores alternative energy, waste recovery and energy efficiency options that enable industry to generate self-sustaining energy systems and ultimately cater for their own energy needs. A key area of research focus is the conversion of agro-industrial waste into profitable clean energy with a focus on biogas and biofertilisers from organic waste.

 

Title: ARC Research Hub on Nutrients in a Circular Economy (ARC NiCE Hub)

Leader: Professor Bernadette McCabe  

Project Team: Dr Diogenes Antille (CSIRO) | Dr Serhiy Marchuk | Dr Jochen Eberhard | Ms Seonmi  

Project Partners: Pyrocal Pty Ltd | Logan City Council | Urban Utilities | Queensland Department of Environment and Science | University of Technology Sydney | University of Melbourne  
Funding Body: Australian Research Council as part of its Industrial Transformation Research Hubs scheme 

The University is a key partner in the NiCE Hub and is working with water utilities, Government departments, energy and resource companies, agricultural and horticultural businesses and local councils to investigate the value of biofertiliser from a range of organic waste streams.

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Title: Pilot to Paddock (P2) Innovative on-farm water, energy and nutrient technologies and practices for Australian Dairy, Egg, Pork and Cropping industries  

Leader: Dr Stephan Tait 

Project Team: Dr Peter Harris | Dr Serhiy Marchuk | Torben Grell | Professor Bernadette McCabe 
Project Partners: University of Queensland | University of Western Australia | Agriculture Victoria | Department of Agriculture and Fisheries, Queensland | Scolexia Consulting 
Funding Body: Australian Government Department of Agriculture, Water and the Environment as part of its Smart Farming Initiative program. 
 

The University is taking the technical lead in this nationwide research, which is focused on taking manure from various agricultural industries and finding the best ways to turn it into valuable products that can be re-used back on farm.

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Title: Advancing regional agri-food waste valorisation Advancing regional agri-food waste valorisation | Fight Food Waste CRC 

Leader: Professor Bernadette McCabe 

Project Team: Dr Peter Harris | Lee Williams 
Project Partners: Toowoomba and Surat Basin Enterprise | Toowoomba Regional Council  
Funding Body: Fight Food Waste CRC 

Toowoomba is home to significant agricultural and food processing sectors and the project offers a unique opportunity to explore existing technologies to produce an income stream from waste. The project aims to map the quantity and quality of waste products that end up in local landfill and explore technologies available for converting it into high-value products such as energy and solid or liquid fertiliser.

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Title: Pilot-scale production of granulated organomineral fertilisers on the Queensland Darling Downs

Leader: Professor Bernadette McCabe 

Project Team: Dr Diogenes Antille (CSIRO) | Dr Serhiy Marchuk 

Project Partners: Queensland State Government | Fight Food Waste CRC  
Funding Body: Waste to Biofutures Fund, Queensland State Government 

Funding from the Waste to Biofutures Fund has enabled the procurement of a lab scale granulator to develop specifications for novel, enhanced-biofertilisers that meet the requirements for field application using standard farm equipment (physical properties) and nutritional needs of crops (chemical composition).

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Title:  Evaluation and demonstration of Ugold and Urval efficacy in field trials

Project Lead: Prof Bernadette McCabe
Project Team:  Prof Bernadette McCabe, Dr Peter Harris, Dr Serhiy Marchuk
Project Partners: University of Technology Sydney
Funding Body: University of Technology Sydney

To demonstrate the processing technology at two geographical sites and three different location types (workplace, mobile, public), and demonstrate the fertilising power of novel urine-derived products in field-scale trials located in peri-urban agriculture settings and in urban parklands in two different geographical areas.

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Title:  Addressing Topsoil Deficit Through Circularity: BHP Mitsubishi Alliance

Project Lead: Prof Bernadette McCabe
Project Team:  Prof Bernadette McCabe, Dr Peter Harris, Dr Alice Melland, Dr Jochen Eberhard
Project Partners: BHP Mitsubishi Alliance; Landloch; Pyrocal
Funding Body:  BHP Mitsubishi Alliance

The project will take a novel circular economy approach to address topsoil deficits by investigating thermal carbonisation of mine and local biomass wastes to create biochar soil amendments that will make subsoils and spoils suitable for mine rehabilitation.

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Title: Guidance for on-farm greenhouse gas (GHG)

Project Lead: Dr Alice Melland
Project Team:  Dr Alice Melland
Project Partners: Zero Net Emissions in Ag CRC
Funding Body: Zero Net Emissions in Ag CRC

Development of guidance on protocols, methods and metrics informing a national standard for quantifying GHG emissions and removals in agricultural systems, to ensure that a common approach to GHG accounting is applied across Australian agriculture, in quantifying farm emissions and the mitigation value of CRC innovations.

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Title: Sustainable future fuels: Advancing duckweed feedstock

Project Lead: Dr Peter Harris
Project Team:  Dr Peter Harris, Dr Serhiy Marchuk
Project Partners: The University of Adelaide; Active Research
Funding Body: Department of Education - Australia’s Economic Accelerator Ignite Program

Aims to develop and test technology for producing duckweed using residue from anaerobic digestion (digestate) of dairy manure, and evaluate the duckweed as a source of biomass for biofuel production in Australia. Modelling results will be used to estimate potential economic value and gauge the value add duckweed contributes to Australian biofuel biomass feedstock estimates.

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Title: Pre-treatment of suitable solid wastes for improved anaerobic digestion

Project Lead: Dr Peter Harris
Project Team: Dr Peter Harris, Prof Bernadette McCabe
Project Partners: AMPC - Australian Meat Processor Corporation; The University of Queensland
Funding Body: AMPC - Australian Meat Processor Corporation

Undertake laboratory testing to crosscheck with several UQ outcomes. Incorporate new feedstocks into UniSQ-developed decision support tool 'ADAdvisor'. Contribute to the development and delivery of a training package for operators of anaerobic digestion equipment at red meat processing facilities.

The team develops advanced robotic sensing technologies to enhance autonomy in crop production, biosecurity and animal welfare on-farm, with aims for on-farm adoption in the commercial farm conditions of today. The team also provides leadership on the integration of sensing systems with agricultural robotics into the future.

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Title: Machine vision monitoring of chicken welfare

Leader: Dr Cheryl McCarthy
Project Team: Dr Derek Long
Project Partners: AgriFutures Chicken Meat Program
Funding Body: AgriFutures Australia

Technologies to estimate weight, uniformity and behaviours of meat chickens are being developed by UniSQ’s Centre for Agricultural Engineering and a commercial partner, which will assist farmers to meet production goals as well as monitoring chicken welfare.

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Title: Moon to Mars initiative

Leader: Dr Cheryl McCarthy
Project Team: Dr Cassy Percy | Professor Peter Brett
Project Partners: Australian Space Agency
Funding Body: Australian Space Agency through its Moon to Mars Demonstrator Feasibility Grant

UniSQ’s Centre for Agricultural Engineering is developing novel machine vision technologies to monitor food plants on extended space missions and has recently completed a project for the Australian Space Agency.

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Title: Time motion analysis in the deboning of beef carcasses

Leader: Professor Peter Brett
Project Team: Dr Basem Aly
Project Partners: Oakey Beef Exports
Funding Body: Oakey Beef Exports


Video analysis has been undertaken of the time taken for skilled butchers to achieve specific cuts from a beef carcass on a production line. The outcomes of this project will allow Oakey Beef Exports to evaluate the many improvements made on the production line since the 1960s and maintain a sustainable and competitive position in the meat processing market.

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Title: Machine vision for improved pest management in cotton
 

Leader: Dr Alison McCarthy 
Project Team: Dr Derek Long | Dr Yiyi Xiong 
Project Partners: Queensland Department of Agriculture and Fisheries  
Funding Body: Cotton Research and Development Corporation 
 
UniSQ’s Centre for Agricultural Engineering has developed an app ‘PestDetect’ that uses the smartphone’s camera and image analysis to detect and count silverleaf whitefly, leading to improved insect sampling in cotton crops. A follow-on project is targeting further priority crop attributes for crop protection.

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Title:  Plant monitoring payload for ISS (International Space Station)
 

 

This project uses access to the International Space Station (ISS) provided by industry partner Axiom Space to fly a fit-for-purpose plant chamber and demonstrate machine vision algorithms for plant health by UniSQ.

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Title:  Tactile Sensing and AI for Robotic Beef Cutting

Project Lead: Dr Basem Aly
Project Team:  Dr Basem Aly
Project Partners: FaBA – Australia’s Food and Beverage Accelerator; The University of Queensland; Kilcoy Global Foods
Funding Body:  FaBA – Australia’s Food and Beverage Accelerator

This project aims to develop a robotic demonstrator for performing high-value beef cuts in the processing environment. The enabling technology for this development is tactile perception as the primary sensing method, potentially supported by additional sensors such as vision cameras.

The research team leads and directs the adoption of ag tech across a range of agricultural industries to improve profitability and farming practices.

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Title: Changing the Game - Resilience to seasonal variations and drought through ag tech

Project Leads: Justine BaillieMichael Scobie  
Project Team:  Dr Sayma ShammiMr Corey PlantMrs Toni Gillis
Project Partners:  SQNNSW Innovation HubTosari Crop Research Centre 
Funding Body: GRDC - Grains Research and Development Corporation 

Project Website:  Changing the Game

To validate digital agriculture and automation at a commercial farm scale to inform decision making and assist to manage the risks associated with seasonal variations and drought preparedness in the grains industry through activities at Tosari Crop Research Centre.

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Title: Real-time machine vision VRT and grain cart automation validation
 

Assessment of the benefits derived from two ag technologies and industry readiness to adopt within the Australia grains industry - operator assisted leader follower technology in harvest operations and Augmenta as a platform to provide real time agronomic assessment and application of variable rate nitrogen in winter wheat crops.

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Title:  Increasing extension capacity pilot in Southern Queensland

Project Leads: Michael ScobieJustine Baillie
Project Team:  Dr Charlie Aves
Project Partners: SQNNSW Innovation Hub
Funding Body: GRDC - Grains Research and Development Corporation

Establishment of a pilot program to improve extension adoption of grains industry research on the Darling Downs and ensure effective and co-ordinated approach to engage and connect with grower advisors and other research providers and facilitate local extension and adoption activities including workshops, targeted training and demonstration trials.

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Title: Smart system for evaporation on polymer deployment

Project Leads:  Michael ScobieJustine Baillie
Project Team:  Dr Derek LongErik Schmidt, Dr Pam PittawaySarah Seton
Project Partners:  Gwydir Valley Irrigators Association
Funding Body: CRDC - Cotton Research and Development CorporationGRDC - Grains Research and Development Corporation

Trialling and assessment of the use of drones for automated sensing and control operations for the application of polymer evaporation suppressants on water storages.

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Title: Optimising Floating Solar Covers for Evaporation Mitigation

Project Leads:  Michael ScobieJustine Baillie
Project Team:  Assoc Prof Guang ChenErik Schmidt
Project Partners:  CRDC - Cotton Research and Development Corporation
Funding Body:  CRDC - Cotton Research and Development Corporation

Undertake a series of configurations and optimisation assessments for floating photovoltaics. These assessments will determine the most cost effective system of floats and panels to i) optimise power generation ii) maximise evaporation mitigation and iii) minimise cost within the Australia cotton industry.

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Title: Profitable pulses in Pakistan

Project Leads: Justine BaillieMichael Scobie  
Project Team: Dr Dipika DasProf Shahbaz Mushtaq
Project Partners: Pakistan Agricultural Research Council
Funding Body: ACIAR - Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research

To adopt a co-innovation approach, engaging farmers, researchers, policymakers, and private sector stakeholders to develop sustainable solutions for strengthening pulse production systems and understanding farmers and (potential) market opportunities in Pakistan.

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Title: Ripple Effect

Project Leads: Michael ScobieJustine Baillie
Project Team:  Corey Plant
Project Partners:  Grower Group AllianceAustralian Government DAFFThe Natural Heritage Trust
Funding Body: Grower Group Alliance

This project is funded by a grant from the Australian Government’s Natural Heritage Trust Climate-Smart Agriculture program.

Project WebpageRipple Effect
This project is a national, grower-led project designed to improve water security, biodiversity, and climate resilience for Australian farmers. Project activities will involve developing demonstration sites to quantify the potential of evaporation mitigation technologies.

Industry and collaborators