The following impact assessment addresses investment by CRDC in a cluster six sustainability projects.

Sustainability can be defined as a measure of a cropping system's capacity to sustain itself in the long-term without destroying its natural resource base. This has implications not only to maintain or increase the system’s productivity over time by enhancing or protecting its productive resource base (e.g. soil, vegetation, water quality and biodiversity) but also by demonstrating its responsibility as an industry sector to other parts of the community. This is particularly important to the cotton industry as it is a relatively intensive cropping industry and uses significant amounts of water and chemicals.