Soil CRC Conference wrap up

The 2022 Soil CRC Participants Conference was a long time coming. After three failed attempts over the past two years, we finally gathered over 150 Soil CRC Participants in Adelaide, South Australia from 23 to 25 August.

It was an informal start to day one, with project team meetings and our cohort of 30 PhD students participating in workshops led by PhD Program Manager, Dr Cassandra Wardle.

Day two of the Conference was a jam-packed program hearing from research projects, program leaders, farmer groups, industry groups, government representatives and PhD students. It was wonderful to see Soil CRC Participants and those from outside the Soil CRC with an interest in hearing about our research, all together.

We heard from Soil CRC Patron, the Hon Peneleope Wensley AC who delivered her address via video link.

The keynote address was delivered by Ben Barlow, Managing Director of New Edge Microbials (NEM). He shared his vision for Australian agriculture, highlighting the global issues of reducing synthetic fertilisers and chemical inputs and the need for commercialising biological solutions.

He believes the next frontier in farming will be the confluence of science, technology and innovation and sees that the global environment has already started to embrace science based biological farming techniques.

“Agriculture is science and science is agriculture. Nothing can be done in laboratories, factories and farms that is not underpinned by science.”

He sees that taking all the research and putting it into a product is a huge challenge. NEM’s focus is on development and commercialisation, on taking that pot trial and replicating it on an industrial scale.

Ben finished by urging the audience to create partnerships that are “harnessing the best science to support sustainable farming and a healthier planet” which is NEM’s corporate purpose.

A South Australian focus saw presentations from Kathy Ophel Keller, from SARDI and four local Soil CRC farmer groups.

Following that were eight presentations from Soil CRC project leaders, supported by each Program Leader giving an overview of progress in their research program. These research updates provided a taster of the in-depth research taking place and started many conversations in the breaks.

As is often the way, these breaks provided a fantastic opportunity to network and collaborate. Everywhere you turned, it seemed that there was another in-depth conversation about soil and working together. So many have said that the connections they made with researchers, farmer groups or industry were the most valuable take away from the Conference.  

In the afternoon, six PhD students presented their research in five minute presentations that were very impressive and highlighted the important contribution of the Soil CRC PhD cohort. The day finished with two interesting and informative panel sessions focusing on the future opportunities for the Soil CRC from an industry and farmer group perspective.

Day three of the Conference was more internally focused with some valuable project updates on adoptability and soil data governance. Program workshops and a Program Leader panel rounded out the final day.

You can watch all the presentations from Wednesday 24 August here.

Overall it was a terrific couple of days of talking, listening and connecting. Now, let’s get planning on the next one!