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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.
The Spring 2025 edition of Spotlight captures a season of progress and partnership in Australian cotton. This issue leads with the announcement of the Australian Cotton Industry Data Platform build – a $7 million CRDC initiative with KPMG Australia – set to streamline data management, boost traceability and prepare growers for future market demands. Growers are encouraged to get ‘data platform ready’ as the build phase begins.
Spotlight also introduces the Future Cotton project, a major four-year collaboration between CRDC and Qld DPI, focused on driving productivity, sustainability and biosecurity through targeted research and extension in key regions. Updates from the Australian Cotton Disease Collaboration (ACDC) highlight new research tackling major diseases, with advances in diagnostics and AI.
The edition also celebrates industry achievements, including the 2025 Australian Cotton Industry Awards (congratulations to CRDC Chris Lehmann Young Cotton Achiever Awardee for 2025 Grace Griffiths!), and welcomes two new Innovation Brokers to the CRDC team. Other features include practical advice on carbon and nitrogen management, the benefits of bankless irrigation, new biodiversity resources, and the impact of CRDC Grassroots Grants in building grower networks.
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.
In 2014 the Central Highlands Cotton Growers and Irrigators Association (CHCG&IA) partnered with Biosecurity Qld and the Cotton Research and Development Corporation (CRDC) to purchase and install 9 weather stations in key locations within the Emerald cotton growing and irrigation area. The weather station data is broadcast via the OzForecast website with data retained by the CHCG&IA. The CHCG&IA engaged Pat Menkens from Menkin’s Irrigation a professional weather and water technology provider to locate the stations in a strategic manner to gain the best coverage for users. The network has been a valued asset by growers, industry support organisations and community across the Emerald cotton growing Area. The grass roots/on the ground value this network provides members of the CHCG&IA is ongoingly noted. Our members share feedback on the networks functioning and clear reiteration for the maintenance and expansion of the network to be a key objective of the CHCG&IA via formal email notices and verbal feedback in members meetings. Furthermore, our members request that the weather station network to be improved with fixing and replacing parts of the stations which have naturally expired/degraded over time. This it to ensure the network continues to operate in its entirety and foster a greater range of people across our industry who gain value from it.
Northern growers and agronomists visited Emerald in May 2024 to observe & learn how the CQ Farming system (particularly Long Season Cotton ie 2 flowering periods) has adapted and changed to climatic conditions. This was an extremely successful exchange of learnings, lessons, discussions and ideas between growers & agros. In return, 6 x growers, 1 x Agronomist and 2 x Industry Reps all from the CH Region travelled to the NT & WA in April 2025 to build on discussions from the May 2024 visit and learn of the North's adaptations to their farming system, particularly in areas of crop destruction, crop management in the long season cotton farming system, biosecurity, RMP, cover cropping and irrigation systems. It was a very successful tour as you will see below.
The present study investigated the effect of Gibberellin (GA) and Salicylic acid (SA) on cotton during germination at high temperatures. Extreme temperatures have made the cotton seed germination and overall crop production challengeable, particularly in heat-prone regions like the Northern Territory (NT). Seed germination is a major developmental stage which is sensitive to heat stress, and enhancing thermal tolerance via priming treatment has proven to be an efficient approach. In the present study, cotton seeds were pretreated for 24 hours with GA and SA 100 ppm solutions and a control (water). Primed seeds were allowed for germination under laboratory conditions with oven temperatures set at 25°C, 30°C, 35°C, 40°C, and 45°C. Seed germination percentage, days taken for root and shoot emergence (first,50% and final), and root and shoot lengths were recorded. The ANOVA results revealed statistically significant temperature and treatment interaction (p<0.05) on final root emergence days, all shoot emergence days, and root length. Even though, germination percentage, days taken for first and 50% root emergence, and shoot length were not statistically significant, some trends were observed. Overall, GA primed seeds resulted in the fastest root and shoot emergence across all temperatures. However, GA priming exhibited a reduction in germination percentage and root and shoot lengths at elevated temperatures. Seeds primed with SA resulted reduced germination parameters at all temperatures, which might be due to the concentration-dependent hormonal imbalances. In contrast, control outperformed both hormonal treatments. It resulted in the highest seed germination percentage, highest root and shoot lengths, and facilitated root and shoot emergence days, particularly at elevated temperatures (40-45°C). These findings concluded that hydropriming is a potential and cost-effective method to promote heat tolerance during cotton seed germination. It is recommended to conduct further research, including field-based trials with the consideration of other growth stages, to validate the results of GA and SA priming on cotton seed germination at elevated temperatures.
This project was to develop insight into the future of rainfed cotton systems by developing an understanding of soil carbon and water use efficiency across a number of current rotation options.
The project included:
There is an appetite for understanding more about soil organic carbon and the benefits of managing a rainfed cropping system to accumulate soil carbon.
Rainfed cotton growers still indicate that they don’t understand how soil organic carbon fits into their farming system and are unsure of how to make evidence based, on-farm decisions specifically around soil organic carbon. Likewise, despite the uptake of technology to monitor soil moisture growers and their advisors are unsure how to use the data to make on-farm decisions. This project was to look at the interaction of soil organic carbon and water use efficiency so this constraint to adoption needs to be addressed.
The rainfed cotton industry could benefit from further investigation in to:
This project, while a good start, requires further investment to realise the full value of the work already completed.
As technology improves and research learnings are ground truth in commercial systems the development of simple to use tools will be critical to facilitate integration of these profitability and sustainability concepts into current rainfed cotton cropping systems.
Aligned with the principles of the Community Trust in Rural Industries (CTRI) program of research, Voconiq has worked to deliver a longitudinal social licence research program focused explicitly on the cotton industry from 2020 to 2023.
The national community research initiative within the Australian cotton industry sought to develop an in-depth understanding of community perspectives regarding the sector. Its primary objectives are to monitor and compare key indicators related to community attitudes, trust, and acceptance of the Australian cotton industry over time. Additionally, the program aims to explore emerging issues, such as perceptions concerning water usage.
The More Profit from Nitrogen Program (MPfN) has been a five-year partnership, commencing in 2016, between Australia’s four most intensive users of nitrogenous fertilisers: cotton, dairy, sugar and horticulture. Comprehensive research and development was conducted to increase nitrogen use efficiency (NUE) across the four sectors whilst improving profitable and sustainable use. By better understanding the influence of contributing factors upon NUE in farming systems, MPfN has generated greater knowledge and understanding of:
Research and extension activities were supported by $5.889 million funding from the Australian Government Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry (then Department of Agriculture, Water and the Environment) as a part of its Rural R&D for Profit program, with a further $9.757 million cash and in-kind contribution from the partnering RDCs, research organisations and collaborating partners.
MPfN was managed by CRDC, in partnership with Dairy Australia, SRA and Hort Innovation. The eleven research projects were delivered by nine lead research organisations:
Activities were supported by a further 24 collaborating partners, overall encompassing 93 interacting research, technical and PhD candidate positions.
Forty-five field sites were used in the research effort, from Darwin in the north to Hobart in the south, supported by laboratory experimentation, analysis and systems modelling. The research has delivered or informed new N fertiliser formulations, application and measurement technologies, decision support tools and best management practice guidelines.
MPfN continuously produced progressive outputs that were embedded into industry programs, reducing lag time between research and adoption by cotton, sugar, horticultural and dairy producers. Over the Program’s duration, 173 extension activities were conducted that engaged with over 16,000 farmers, service providers and commercial advisors, as well as national and international researchers. These included industry and science conferences, field days, training workshops and webinars. 165 communication campaigns reached 478,000 people, through industry articles, videos, podcasts, websites and social media. Project materials developed included peer reviewed journal articles, industry best management practice (BMP) guidelines, economic case studies and decision trees/calculators totaling 84 outputs. Importantly, the teams of the MPfN Program conducted or participated in 77 collaboration activities with over 1500 other industry, research and commercial stakeholders, to ensure relevance, efficient delivery and consideration of aligned research.
In June 2021, the MPfN Program delivered the final technologies and decision support resources that will significantly contribute to increased industry NUE in coming years. As the outputs and outcomes of the research effort are extended through industry programs, it is anticipated that farmer uptake and adoption of recommendations and guidelines will gain momentum.
The MPfN Program legacy promises to be a significant reduction in environmental impact from nitrogenous fertiliser use whilst delivering greater sustainability and profitability outcomes for Australian farming businesses.
Weeds reduce agricultural productivity by competing for resources, and weed management is one of the largest costs faced by crop growers. Weeds are constantly evolving, and changes in weed types and their characteristics require ongoing adaptation of management. Farming systems also evolve, introducing new weed management challenges and opportunities. This dynamic nature of weed management often leads to shifting demands for research, development and extension specific to weeds and local farming systems. This study, funded by the Grains Research and Development Corporation (GRDC) and Cotton Research and Development Corporation (CRDC), aims to inform R&D investment priorities and industry at a broader scale. Given the wide range of weeds, agroecological zones (AEZs), impacts and management demands across variable seasons, it is not simple to identify where and in what form the largest costs are incurred. The last major study of the distribution and economic impact of weeds in Australian cropping systems (Llewellyn et al., 2016) began more than a decade ago and drew upon data from the period 2010 to 2014. The study focused only on grain production, and the overall cost of weeds to Australian grain growers was estimated to be $3300 million. The results of this new study represent the most comprehensive national analysis of the cost of weeds to Australian broadacre crop production. The study covers the 14 major GRDC-defined agroecological zones across the western, southern and northern regions, and the major crop types of wheat, barley, oats, canola, pulses, grain sorghum and – new to this study – cotton. This report outlines the study methods and then presents the results for the cost of weeds in grain crops, cotton crops and, finally, the cost for grain and cotton crops combined. The analysis is based on a modified, broadened and updated version of the national weed impact model used in the 2016 study. It includes the costs of yield loss due to in-crop weeds, water and nutrient use by fallow weeds, weed contamination, off-target herbicide impacts and weed control. Weed control costs, such as herbicide and non-herbicide practices, include seed technology costs attributable to weed control. Inputs used to represent cropping and farms in each AEZ have been informed by newly available data sources, including the GRDC Farm Practice Survey results; national herbicide resistance paddock survey data, including weed presence and density assessments; proprietary Kynetec annual herbicide farmer panel data; Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) production data; GRDC National Variety Trial yield results; Australian Pesticides and Veterinary Medicines Authority (APVMA) herbicide sales values; regional crop planning guides; and a panel of regional agronomy and weed management advisers, including cotton weed management experts.
