CRCNA project on delivering a sustainable cropping system in the Northern Territory ready to go

A Plant Industries of the Department of Industry, Tourism and Trade (DITT) led partnership will address the basic requirements of sustainably growing cotton and grains in rain-fed conditions. This will be achieved by conducting a series of trials on commercial cotton farms in the Northern Territory (NT).

The trials will include crop establishment, rotation and cover crops, nutrition management, and pest and disease monitoring and management. Alongside the trials, the project will map the soil and water profile in the potential cotton growing areas in the NT. In addition, the project will conduct scenario-planning workshops to understand the economic and environmental impact of the project recommendations.

The project will work with Aboriginal land councils to scope social, economic and environmental suitability for commercial broadacre cropping on parts of Aboriginal land. The project will build capacity of the growers, researchers, and Aboriginal land councils for identifying and addressing the evolving challenges of the NT cotton and grain industry.

This project is part of the CRCNA’s Cotton, Grain and Cattle (CGC) Program, with funding from Cooperative Research Centre for Developing Northern Australia (CRCNA), Northern Territory Government, Cotton Research and Development Corporation (CRDC) and Grains Research and Development Corporation (GRDC). Specifically, this project will be implemented in conjunction with DITT’s Livestock Industries led ‘Enhanced cattle production systems enabled by cropping’ project. Together, albeit implemented independent of each other, these two projects will demonstrate the impact of an integrated farming system on sustainable productivity and profitability of the Northern Territory farmers.