This project (‘Data Rules’) grew out of the ‘Accelerating precision agriculture to decision agriculture: Enabling digital agriculture in Australia’ (P2D) project, which evaluated the current and desired state of digital agriculture in Australia. There were 13 key recommendations made, one of which highlighted the need for agricultural data governance to be developed. This Data Rules component of the broader ‘Growing a Digital Future for Australian Agriculture’ research project represents a response to the P2D recommendations around establishing data rules (i.e. governance). Specifically, this project used desktop analysis and consultation with key stakeholders to identify issues around the collection, management and sharing of agricultural data. The aim of which was to develop a data rules framework and action plan – a framework and action plan that will create an enabling environment for digital innovation in Australian agricultural industries.
Agricultural data must be managed like any other asset. This requires strategy and best management practice. Importantly there needs to be a clear direction and sense of what needs to be achieved through the collection, use and sharing of agricultural data. The aim of an Agricultural Data Strategy, which is yet to be developed at a National level, is to guide the creation of an enabling environment where Australian agricultural industries are able to produce and share high quality data outputs. This is important because the adoption of digital technology plays an important role in achieving the $100 billion in farm gate output by 2030 as set out by the National Farmers' Federation (NFF). Importantly, too, an Agricultural Data Strategy will bring more than just economic benefits to the sector, as ACCC Commissioner, Mick Keogh observed, on 16 September 2019 in his speech to the National Forum on Growing a Digital Future for Australian Agriculture (‘A national vision for digital agriculture’) a digital and data strategy will also bring improved environmental outcomes including land management and water use. The benefits will also extend beyond the farm, with some of the biggest gains in value likely to be generated along the supply chain, from the farm to consumer.
In addition to a National Data Strategy, creating an enabling environment to facilitate agricultural innovations will help manage data as an asset and ensure best practice for Agricultural Data. This is the focus of this Report and, establishing agricultural data rules is a crucial first step in ensuring the whole of the Australian Agricultural Industry develops best practice in the collection, use and sharing of agricultural data while ensuring farmers’ legal, ethical and security concerns are addressed.
The key pillars and components of Agricultural Data Rules: Enabling Best Practice are presented in Figure 1.

Digital technologies could lift the gross value of production (GVP) of the Australian agricultural sector by $20.3 billion, and the broader Australian economy by $24.6 billion (Perrett, Heath, Laurie & Darragh, 2017). While agricultural digital technologies are already well advanced and available in the marketplace, research has revealed that adoption and utilisation remains low across the industry (McKinsey et al., 2017; Skinner, Wood, Leonard & Stollery, 2017; Zhang, Baker, Jakku & Llewellyn, 2017). To achieve the $100 billion industry goal by 2030 (National Farmers Federation, 2018), the industry needs to embark on a digital transformation journey.
 

To ensure that the journey of digital transformation is purposeful and effective, it is important to first undertake an assessment of the industry to identify areas of digital strength and areas for development. The development of a digital maturity index and assessment tool is considered a necessary first step for digital transformation. CSIRO has developed a world-first digital maturity index and assessment tool specifically for agriculture, which encompasses five key pillars.

This project aims to integrate the latest information on carbon, climate change and emissions management into the cotton industry’s extension efforts.  By up-skilling industry information providers, incorporating information into myBMP and developing carbon farming campaigns with the aim of improving resource use efficiency and reduce land sector emissions.

An investigation of the viability for an avoided emissions project under a potential Emissions Reduction Fund (ERF) method found significant economies of scale are required to offset current high transaction and audit costs. A potential aggregation of ten farms in the lower Namoi resulted in a negative project return at the baseline Australian Carbon Credit Unit (ACCU) price of $10 over the seven-year project life. However, such a project could become more viable in the future if ERF participation transaction and audit costs are reduced and/or the ACCU price increases to more suitable levels. 

Farmers applying nitrogen fertiliser at optimal crop requirement levels can reduce the carbon footprint of their cotton and achieve economic benefits at a crop enterprise level irrespective of ERF participation. Using a nitrogen budgeting approach, and therefore applying nitrogen fertiliser at optimal levels over a large area through repeated crop cycles, can offer savings when compared to an application above maximum yield requirements. 

Six factsheets outlining the opportunities, benefits and risks for cotton growers interested in participating in the ERF have been published at http://www.cottoninfo.com.au/publications/carbon-cotton-and-emissions-reduction-fund  

Four irrigated cotton gross margin budgets for 2014-15 were published on the NSW Department of Primary Industries (DPI) website at http://www.dpi.nsw.gov.au/content/agriculture/farm-business/budgets/cotton.  

The CRDC Annual Report 2023-24 outlines progress against the first year of the CRDC Strategic Plan 2023-28, Clever Cotton.

CRDC undertakes an annual survey of cotton growers to gather information about farming practices and growers’ views on research, development and extension. This information helps to inform CRDC about the benefits of the research it invests in. Change in industry practice can be quantified by comparing information across the surveys conducted over the past 20 years.

A rapidly expanding poultry production industry with associated poultry litter (PL) is located in close proximity to high yielding irrigated cotton in the Murrumbidgee Valley of south eastern Australia. Estimates indicate that ~200,000 wet tonnes of PL generated in the district annually, contain about 3500 tonnes of plant available N, 1440 tonnes of P, 3360 tonnes of K and 76 tonnes of Zn, as well as micronutrients, liming effects and carbon. These amounts alone are sufficient to support approximately 12,000 ha of high yielding irrigated cotton production when a 250 kg fertilizer N ha-1 rate is applied. Since urea is synthesised from fossil fuels via the Haber process and inorganic P fertilizers are mined from finite resources, there are environmental advantages to being able to use the abundant nutrient rich poultry industry wastes generated locally as an alternative fertilizer. Since the poultry industry needs to dispose of the wastes and freight distances are relatively short (within 50km) there is also a potential economic advantage for farmers. However, there are unknowns for farmers when using PL compared with mineral fertilizers. The main issue is caused by product variability and therefore unpredictability of performance in high yielding irrigated systems. Typically farmers are applying ad hoc amounts of PL, mainly for longer term soil sustainability outcomes in addition to mineral fertilizers, without clarity on tangible productivity benefits. 

Using on-farm commercial scale field trials and small plot studies the project has investigated how PL generated around Griffith, Leeton and Darlington Point, NSW can be managed most effectively in a number of farm case studies, examining particular scenarios that are most applicable to soils and farming systems of the southern cotton growing region, namely:

1. How nutrients contained in PL may substitute for urea-N and inorganic P to optimise yield, lint quality, N efficiency and soil health on Transitional Red Brown Earths and Grey Vertosols, typical of the Riverine Plain. Estimating rule of thumb cost benefits using  2018-2021 cotton, freight, fertilizer and PL prices.
2. The effectiveness of PL in restoring fertility and reducing field variability in heavily cut areas of landformed fields for incorporating PL spreading into precision application programmes. 
3. Tracking the fate of fertilizer N when applied in combination with PL amendment to determine improvements in NUE and using in situ field probes, the impact of PL on temporal nutrient availability. 
4. Investigating the impact of PL on improving P nutrition for cotton in soils prone to sub-soil sodicity. 
5. Soil health under poultry litter amended and non-amended cotton systems of the Riverina

The Spring 2024 edition of Spotlight brings you the highlights from the Australian Cotton Conference and the announcement of the Cotton Industry Award winners, showcases the partners in CRDC's new $13m Australian Cotton Disease Collaboration, and takes a look at cotton's new digital strategy.

It also looks at regenerative agriculture, farm biosecurity, fatigue management, farm safety and more!

This Guide provides you with a comprehensive summary of the key cotton crop protection issues, and is brought to you by CRDC and the Australian cotton industry's joint extension program, CottonInfo.

Electric weed control was an effective weed management strategy. Control of broad leaf weeds was easier than grass weeds at higher operation speed. However, at the recommended speed, control of grass weeds was as effective as herbicide application even in the viticulture production system that contained mature, dense, wet plants (and wet topsoil), and where control should have been poor. There is an industry based ‘understanding’ that electric weed control would be less effective when surface soil moisture was high, and this was confirmed in 2023 when treating mature, dense annual ryegrass at 2 km h-1. However, our research demonstrated that weed control in moist soils can be achieved with appropriate application speeds.

The level of control varies between weed species, as for any weed control technique. Plant age reduces control, as does high plant density or the tendency of plants to shade and protect smaller plants. For some species, electric weed control is superior to herbicide. For example, while both electric weed control and herbicide caused senescence of the above ground biomass of cape tulip plants, double applications of electric weed control were more likely to prevent growth of the bulbs in the subsequent year. More research is required to test electric weed control against a wider range of species, but this weed control technique is more versatile than most individual herbicides.

Electric weed control was successful at reducing weed biomass without affecting the soil biota. The soil microbiome was not affected by electric weed control in the viticulture trials or the trial on rhizoctonia. While the DNA sequencing used in the viticulture trials cannot categorically rule out damage to the soil microbiome (as the method can sequence both dead and live DNA), there was no change to the microbiome between sampling times. It is highly unlikely that no change would be observed between sampling times if the microbiome had been affected by weed control treatments. There was little direct impact on nematodes, although reduction in weed and root biomass can affect nematode populations in the long term. Rhizoctonia, which is physically attached to the weed roots, was not damaged by very slow and repeat application of electric weed control. No damage to the soil microbiome is good news for organic growers, such as in the viticulture industry.

This technology is not designed for inter-row weed control in broad acre crops, but our research has demonstrated that inter-row electric weed control does not damage the crop in the neighbouring rows. We trialled electric inter-row weed control in conditions designed to maximise crop damage, when the crop growth stage was at anthesis, and the surface soil was moist. Inter-row electric weed control applied to younger plants, with technology specifically designed for this use pattern, is likely to be a highly safe and effective form of in-crop weed control. However, further assessment with technology specifically designed for inter-row weed control is required to confirm these findings.

Fire risk from the machine was not evident in winter and spring. Fire risk when operating in completely dry residue (i.e., in summer or autumn) was much too high to allow use in these seasons in southern Australia as assessed in experimental conditions and on a viticulture estate.

Assessing the power applied during each experiment indicated that power varied due to weed presence (i.e., compared to bare ground). Further, weed density and speed of operation has been identified as valuable to examine. In 2023, analysis is occurring to determine the effect of weed biomass on the power output and fuel consumption of the machine. Analysis will also determine if this technology can be used to create a ‘map’ of weed incidence for future application in precision agricultural systems. However, further data manipulation is required before the analysis can be completed.

Applying electric weed control with the XPower with XPU applicator at 2 km h-1 had a high application cost of $210.55 ha-1 with 10.48 L h-1 of diesel used. While such applications may not be cost effective, they may be justified in certain situations where the value of controlling the weeds outweighs the cost of electric weed control. For example, when herbicide resistance is high, near waterways or irrigation channels where chemical use is restricted, or for organic growers. Alternatively, there may also be scope to combine the technology into fully automated agricultural systems which would reduce the application cost by over half to $85.55 ha-1.

While research is ongoing, this project has demonstrated thus far that the XPS unit is a viable tool for spring weed control in Australian viticulture/horticulture and will find an immediate fit into these systems. Likewise, the XPU will contribute effectively to urban and industrial weed control in Australia.