In this episode, I had the opportunity to catch up with my colleague, business partner and good friend, Dr Rohan Rainbow, who has been a leading voice in the implementation of agricultural technologies in Australia for over 30 years. His early childhood journey moved him from suburban Melbourne to farming in rural Victoria, followed by South East South Australia and then settling in the Clare Valley in South Australia. He completed his PhD with The University of Adelaide while working on his agricultural research at SARDI, followed by work as an independent consultant, plus executive officer to both the SA No-Till Farmers Association and establishing the Society for Precision Agriculture Australia, then research investment with the Grains Research & Development Corporation. In 2014, he established his consultancy Crop Protection Australia and in 2018, with myself and Leecia Angus, established AgTechCentric.
Our discussion started with his formative years on farm and how his PhD in soil physics and mechanics set the scene for how engineering parameters can improve crop establishment. In moving into research management, we noted that adoption and extension are easily overlooked in tech transfer circles and yet, are critical to the success of any new technology or practice. Rohan talked of the importance of field days, and the themes that came through were the need for clear value propositions for new technologies, particularly in the context of significant capital expenditure and/or practice changes needed for technology adoption. Rohan reinforced an observation Spiegare blogged about around venture investment in agtech in 2020; that not everywhere is the same – soils, equipment, people –for starters! We then talked about early adopters and the merits of ‘first vs fast followers’ in agriculture. We noted that someone has to go first in order for there to be a fast follower!
We then explored Rohan’s motivations to establish himself as an independent consultant. Recognising the need for technical advice into regulatory and policy discussions, he has worked closely with Grain Producers Australia and, more recently, CropLife Australia on a range of issues. We also discussed the Precision to Decision Report that Rohan led in 2018 – a report that contributed to the foundations of agtech adoption and investment in Australia. We discussed the AUD 20.3 billion potential value identified that agtech could release, progress toward realising that ambition and some of the dynamics in agtech solutions, data stewardship. and satellite markets that have unfolded since the publication. We also touch on the tech transfer challenge around the need for all the components to come together to deliver value.
We conclude our conversation with a discussion around pesticide access in Australia, and the market and regulatory dynamics that are arguably setting Australia at a disadvantage in accessing cutting edge approaches to crop protection and weed management. Rohan’s final thought is quite poignant from an Australia agriculture perspective, in that, Australian growers are quick to adopt technologies that work for them, because they have to!
Transcript
CB: Hello everyone, and welcome to Tech Transfer Talk. My name is Cameron Begley, Managing Director of Spiegare, and joining me today on the program is a very long-standing colleague, and indeed, good friend of mine, Doctor Rohan Rainbow. Rohan, hello.
RR: Thanks for having me, Cameron.
CB: Oh, Rohan, it’s been in the back of my mind for some time and I’m really thrilled we’ve got a chance to get you on the show. And in all honesty, I think the timing is somewhat perfect with the various forces at play that we’re going to talk about around AgTech and regulation and all these sorts of contemporary issues. I’m interested. Rohan, how did you get into the tech transfer space, given you’re a boy from the Clare?
RR: Well, actually a little bit earlier than that. I actually grew up as a farmer’s lad on the farm and, in fact, my father was a chartered accountant with Coopers and Lybrand, which is now PricewaterhouseCoopers in Melbourne. He was actually an audit executive and with Ford Motor Company. So, got a really good head for numbers, my dad, but then he got a bit tired of the corporate life and sold the small mansion in Mont Albert, Melbourne, and bought a farm with it. The first one was in Robinvale, and then we expanded to one at Kalkee, just north of Horsham, and then ended up in southeast South Australia at Francis. But, yeah, I certainly did my apprenticeship on the farm at quite a young age. I think I started driving tractors at the age of ten or something like that. I’m not sure.
CB: Okay, fantastic. So, you’ve got the Wimmera in your veins at the end of the day.
RR: Yeah. The Wimmera and bit of Mallee, and yes, I certainly grew up getting a very deep understanding of farming. And, you know, what drives rural communities, and also with a dad that had a very good head for numbers. So, you know, I had business acumen and making a profit, and those sorts of things just bashed into me from a very young age.
CB: So, you did a doctorate in soil mechanics?
RR: Yeah. It’s, it’s all physics and mechanics, actually. It’s a discipline of agriculture engineering. But principally it was around trying to help, I suppose, alleviate the issues we had with, in those days known as direct drill, but today we know it as no-till farming. Basically, people would plant their crops, and they wouldn’t come up very well. I spent 15 years of my life as a research scientist, basically working through all the issues and engineering parameters that we could use to basically improve crop establishment. And, you know, the outcome that is today, we have 85% adoption in this country. So, job done.
CB: Absolutely. So, Rowan, then you made the brave move to come across to Canberra for the Grains Research and Development Corporation, and I get the impression that that’s where the tech transfer journey really started for you.
RR: It certainly did. I was working, I suppose, with growers and industry and actually working with the commercial sector a lot, just in terms of what it actually takes to actually get some of these technologies in play, that growers could use as part of the no-till system. And spent a lot of time actually, both in my research career and post, working with a number of the major chemical companies, just working as part of the system as weeds were a big issue for growers and helping them work through that. But anyway, you know, I had this headhunter came knocking about three years in a row, and eventually I said ‘yes’ to come to Canberra and ended up managing the national crop protection programs. The crop protection manager, eventually the senior manager of plant health and, you know, had had a quite a considerable portfolio of projects in the end. Right through from the plant breeding, through to plant biosecurity, through to crop protection, and all the technologies associated with that. So yeah.
CB: I think the adoption and extension piece, is easily overlooked when it comes to tech transfer. I think it’s a thing that everyone gets excited about the research and the outcomes, but if it’s not actually taken up by producers, then the tech transfer journey is not complete. And I’d be interested in what your learnings were from your time doing the no-till extension and adoption work, which is really important, and how that carried through into the crop protection role that you had at GRDC. How did how did that learning carry over?
RR: Yeah, there’s a whole series of components that actually led to that. One was actually seeing that there was a viable technology, for want of a better word, seeing it with their own eyes. And, you know, field days and crop walks and various events. And I shouldn’t go past the beer and barbecue at the end of each day, where a lot of the actual discussion about what they’d seen had gone on, and a lot of discussion about whether the technologies were actually viable was discussed. But yeah, essentially. Well, that’s fine, but having a viable technology actually works. Having a really clear value proposition: does it pay? Because at the end of the day, you have to make money out of these things in the farm business. And with a lot of technologies we were looking at, there was some pretty, you know, significant capital costs. You know, basically had to not only change the way planted, the tractor and type of equipment that used to plant with, but you had to change your whole farming system. It was quite a profound change for many people. And there was as much a networking exercise, to provide a bit of hold handing, hand holding and encouragement, just to deal with the nuances of the local level, because not every where’s the same. You know, soils are different, crops are different. And yeah, it was really a quite an interesting challenge. And then, you know, just equipping them, people with the skills to actually implement this because it was a profound change to the way we farm today. And thankfully, you know, the industry has done it because quite literally, you know, the series of droughts we’ve had over the years and farming wouldn’t have stayed viable.
CB: I think that’s really interesting that seeing the tech is viable and the way that you did that market intel through a series of relationships and, you know, over a beer or crop walkthroughs or whatever it happens to be, it’s a way of actually getting market intelligence, for want of a better word, of what looks good and what doesn’t. But I also think that you’ve hit on some really important points around the notion of the capital cost, and there are some big numbers involved when changing over equipment that need to be accounted for in any practice change or operating costs. And I get the sense sometimes that gets a little lost.
RR: Yeah. And that capital cost actually starts at harvest because the way that you harvested your crop and the way you dealt with the straw and you know, everything, you know, the residue coming out of the crop, out of the back of the harvester was the start of that process. And, so in some cases, some harvesters were inadequate, and people had to change those and you know, change the planting equipment, the tractors that-we went to a system of controlled traffic to minimise the wheel compaction in the fields as well. So, there’s a whole mechanical issue around that as well. And it was actually a significant amount of engineering involved in all this. And then you had to make all the various components all work together and work with your crop protection tools, you know, your your herbicides, insecticides, and fungicides, and make the system work to an extent that would actually deliver a profit, so yeah.
CB: Absolutely.
RR: The bottom line is a key part of this.
CB: Well, I think you’ve summed up the elements of tech transfer there, that it’s got to work and it’s got to deliver something to the bottom line. Otherwise, these things, as good as they might be, don’t actually get there in the end.
RR: The big challenge is getting my father to change the way…
CB: So, it’s interesting you raise that, Rohan, because I think there is a, I’ll call it a generalisation, that farmers or producers-be a little bit broader than this, producers have an inherent reticence to change. And I’d be interested in your view on that. Like, you know these communities as well as anybody I’d suggest, how do you view that generalisation?
RR: Yeah. Well, it’s interesting. My father, you know, sadly has passed away now, but he was an early change, early adopter, because he saw a need to change to stay commercially viable. And so, he was running the numbers. And he was one of the very early people going to no-till. But we had a lot of problems with that. And there’s actually through my research career, you know, the evolution of the openers or soil or point openers that we use to put the seed in the ground. And then, and the covering device press was these sorts of things that, that was that. My father was quite a late adopter of those. And I had to convince him of the merit of that technology. But ultimately the challenge is, I suppose, getting producers to sort of work through this process of change, and quite rightly, growers are cautious about change and should be. Some of the most profitable farm businesses today, like there’s 16,000 say grain businesses in Australia. 4,000 of those produce 80% of the Australian crop. And sadly, rightly or wrongly, they’re the businesses that actually count and will be the businesses that will be here in another 20 or 30 years.
CB: So, do you think just to close this idea off of that notion of being cautious and you’ve just said, you know, they should be cautious. Is it that 25% that produce 80% of the crop, do you see them as the cautious ones, or do you see them as the more in the in your father’s mould of being prepared to try things as they run the numbers?
RR: Yeah, and it’s actually the most profitable ones aren’t the early adopters, it’s the close followers.
CB: Ah, that’s really interesting.
RR: This is because they see what’s working, what’s not working. They run the numbers and then they implement it pretty swiftly.
CB: That’s a very live debate, I think, around the world at the moment around first mover versus fast follower. So, it’s very interesting in this blog.
RR: Yeah. And my dad was in the fast follower category. Like, he wasn’t the first in no-till, but he, once he worked out what paid, he just went with it with a vengeance. So, it’s…
CB: So, in your role with GRDC then, and you touched on the intersection between your no-till experiences and the need to deal with the herbicide, insecticide, you know, the chemistry practices, notionally and generally speaking, the fast followers, are the more successful, the more profitable, very generally speaking. Where do you find those that are going to come with you and be the early adopters or the innovators? How did you find those guys at GRDC? Cause you need someone to go first in order for someone to come second.
RR: That was probably the wonderful thing, I had a massive national/international contacts list of growers, scientists, innovators, when I came to Canberra. And I leaned heavily on those contacts for many years. It was a really important part of, actually having quite deep relationships with the pesticide registrants as well, the machinery manufacturers. Many of them I still talk to this day. The machinery sector is an industry I’ve had a long history with, and it’s an important part of the way we farm today. We are just increasingly going to become more mechanised, more automated, as we go into the future. And to stay financially viable and implement the more sustainable farming practices that we need to. That, it’s just part of the equation.
CB: Rohan, it’s interesting you spoke about that network or the Rolodex that you had of contacts around the world and that phrase ‘relationships’, which I think pops in every episode at the moment, about these things are driven by relationships and driven by a deep knowledge of things. And here we are, talking about first mover partnerships. And you raise the issue of relationships. And I gather they’re not just with producers, but you’ve mentioned equipment suppliers and registrants, which for those that aren’t in ag are the companies that register new insecticides, fungicides, herbicides, those sorts of actors. So, the relationship thing then carries you through GRDC. And then ten years ago, you walked.
RR: When I was at GRDC, I had the Chairman of Grain Producers Australia, Andrew Weidemann. He’s a wonderful farmer from down Rupanyip, in Victoria, and he would ring me, probably every second day, around advice in terms of how to deal with a lot of the issues that we’re having, both technically and in terms of implementation. There were some significant regulatory challenges to the way that we could actually use some of these technologies. And in the end, I just decided my time would be better served actually working more closely with the peak industry body itself. In effect, you know, providing them with support on a technical advisory basis to their board. And I did that for just under ten years. Some of the very significant issues that the industry was facing were issues, particularly around regulation for a whole range of technologies, you know, not just pesticides, but biosecurity and machine technologies and these sorts of things. But also, the other challenge that was very apparent to me, is Australia is a very small market globally for technologies and products and pesticides and these sorts of things. And we needed to do something different and talk to the government about how to drive investment in technology innovation to Australia. And I was better able to support industry that way, actually by exiting GRDC than staying.
CB: Yeah. That’s fascinating, Rohan. Then as you came out of GRDC in 2014, quite unrelatedly, there was not causation, just correlation, I left CSIRO and we started to team up on a number of projects. And this is where I think I really got to appreciate the depth and breadth of your networks and expertise, Rohan, over the years. And I’m really keen through a tech transfer lens to sort of talk about a few of these things. And along the way, we’ll talk about the formation of AgTechCentric, which is a project we’ve been working on in the background. But the first thing that we really did together, post our corporate lives, was a really interesting project from your work with Precision to Decision. I’d be interested in what you found and then, how you reflect upon what you found versus a little bit of where we are today in this space. So firstly, what did you find?
RR: Yeah. So, it was actually quite a significant amount of work. A number of agencies involved in pulling various reports and studies together, right through from what drives digital use and adoption by industry; through to what are the potential drivers economically; what are some of the communication or shall we call it, data communication challenges, i.e. mobile phone connectivity and these sorts of things. Basically there’s, worked out there’s about $20.3 billion worth of unrealised value that the industry is not capturing at the moment from digital technology. And some significant opportunities arose. And one of the really big chunks of that was automation, and that potentially will capture, it’s estimated around 7.4 billion. So, about a third of that value is, potentially, just automation.
CB: We’re now six years on, how do you look back at that project in that report? And how much of that 20.3 billion do you think the industry’s managed to put in its pocket over the last six years?
RR: Yeah, it’s a really good question. Two of the key areas that we’re struggling with: One was data connectivity, in-field data, because most people mightn’t realise that 45% of producers in Australia weren’t actually even carrying a mobile phone because they had no in-field connectivity. So, people say, ‘Oh, you just use an app’ or these sorts of things. But the reality is that field connectivity is not great. They’ll have connectivity at their house or homestead, generally, via satellite or various other means, but field connectivity essentially in rural Australia is poor. The other challenge that working through it is this whole area of what we call ‘data trust’. The bigger concern was, is who has, or what are the third parties through the use of digital systems software, the systems on the tractors and harvesters and those sorts of things, what other third parties are getting a look in to actually see what’s actually going on in their farm business? And so, there’s an element of concern there, whether it be regulators looking at how they’re farming; whether it be the banking sector looking at how they’re farming; whether it be the agribusiness side that’s actually looking to see what they’re using; whether it be the grain buyers or growing marketers actually knowing who’s got grain, basically, you know, and playing the market accordingly. So, and of course, big multinationals at a global level are getting that type of insight with the various systems they have. And so, this issue of data trust is, ‘Who’s actually looking at my data?’ And there are benefits both ways. And there has to be an understanding between the grower and any other third-party agencies that are actually accessing that data.
CB: Are those issues resolved, might be too strong a word, but are we starting to get past those issues in Australia six years on, or are those issues still foundationally challenging?
RR: It’s a good question, Cameron, because on the data connectivity side, if I could just use two main, you know, the two big brands of tractors and machinery, harvesters and the like. John Deere has actually built a partnership with Starlink or, and they’re now in the process of rolling out satellite connectivity for tractors. So, that basically gives a quantum leap in the ability to provide in-field support and data connectivity, and opportunity to provide remote monitoring of that equipment, which leads into automations and other discussion. Case New Holland Industrial, or CNH Industrial, has got a partnership now with Intelsat, which is mainly been more around, sort of, communication satellite technology primarily, rather than sort of just general home use. But again, two major companies building global partnership networks to in-field connectivity, of which once you’re in the tractor, you can just connect your phone through the Bluetooth and problem solved. And so, that’s going to give a quantum leap to growers, right through from providing, not only the data they’re collecting in the field, remote diagnostics when you’ve got a problem with the piece of equipment, tractor; ability for the dealer to monitor functionality of that equipment, to the extent that you know, if something goes wrong, they can actually order the parts ready in time for when they do the next service and these sorts of things. So, there’s a lot of efficiencies and benefits that come with that. On the data trust side, it’s a really important issue to understand that we actually need investment into the digital tools and technologies to enhance the ability to make business decisions. And to drive that, you also need to benchmark how your business is comparing to other businesses. And so, this need to both have good quality data and also this ability to share some of that data actually provides real value for better decision making on farm.
CB: One might argue, superficially perhaps, Rohan, there’s an extraordinary number of AgTech startups out there offering very various variations on a theme around, how I can help you with your data and how I can make sense of your data, etc., etc. So, is it that none of them have solved the problem, or that they’re all only, partly, I mean, they’re partially solving the problem…What’s missing then, in 2024, when so many of these AgTech startups have arisen over the past six years?
RR: Yeah. So, there’s been a lot of investment globally in this space. No, no, well, more of the investment has been occurring in North America. The challenge is that they’ve tried to extrapolate some of those systems that have been developed for the most, you know, the corn soybean system in the US into the Australian market. And for want of a better word, they’re just too expensive. Like, some of those software systems, effectively, in Australian business context, when I mapped them, were costing up to about 15% of net profit of the business, just to use and implement that in the business. And it’s just way too expensive. Questionable reliability about helping make better decisions, certainly at that price.
CB: So, going back to our $20.3 billion that you tabled in 2018, getting the sense Rohan, that not a lot of it’s been captured yet.
RR: No, that’s right. I should point out that financial report came from the Australian Farm Institute, and they did a terrific job in in pulling that study together. The number was actually so large that a lot of people didn’t believe it. I’ll share with you; I believe it’s actually a conservative figure.
CB: Okay.
RR: I think there’s the opportunity to actually capture more than that. But some people say that’s such a large number, it can’t possibly be right. But I very clearly believe that that’s a very conservative, realistic target to capture.
CB: That’s interesting. The market view, your view where AFI landed. But very roughly, that’s about a thousand bucks a hectare, isn’t it?
RR: Well, basically, if you look at the Australian market, we’re worth you know, it depends on the season, somewhere between, you know, this is whole of agriculture, somewhere between 65, maybe up to 70, 75 billion currently. And that, you know, the National Farmers’ Federation put this target out there of reaching 100 billion. This is actually one of the key areas…
CB: To get you there…
RR: Which will deliver a good chunk of that improvement.
CB: With the challenges you’ve described around connectivity and data trust, and the connectivity is being partially addressed with the equipment manufacturers. It would seem then that there are some interesting tech transfer challenges in all of that, in that it took an integrative approach. And you mentioned earlier the components have to come together. So, here we have in the Precision to Decision, to make AgTech work the components have to come together. So, it’s connectivity with machinery. And in the case of data, probably algorithms and software matching more closely to the market specificity. And the market can, sort of, the production conditions. And you also made the point earlier, not everywhere is the same and not everywhere is the same in Australia, let alone anything being the same in Australia versus North America, LATAM or Europe, for want of picking a few jurisdictions.
RR: Yeah. So, over the course, since that report’s come out, one of the areas that actually has made significant gains, shall we say, is the area of satellite imagery data.
CB: Yeah. Okay.
RR: And that, I’ll share with you, is quite a game changer. Principally, because the resolution is now higher. The spectrum of data that they can collect, the hyperspectral sensors they use is greater. So, they can, for want of a better word, differentiate more what’s going on in the crop through that data. The cost has come down significantly of accessing that data. And the last part is the regularity of collecting that data has also improved significantly, just because the sheer number of satellites that have actually launched to collect these things. It’s been a bit of a game changer. And so, we now have a situation where we’ve actually got very rich sources of very good, reliable satellite imagery at low cost. It’s quite regularly can use for making good decisions. And for some of the technologies, particularly for fertiliser management, weed mapping, various other sort of areas where the imagery that you capture, can essentially generate a decision point for a business. We’re at the point now where we can actually implement those very quickly. And if I could just mention one of the companies I think is outstanding in their field, and this area is Data Farming—Tim Neil.
CB: Yes, we know Tim.
RR: He has done an outstanding job of developing a platform that is both low cost and efficient and delivers a very strong value proposition for growers. And it integrates with their software systems on their machinery. So, what’s really important is that the use of that data will actually build the trust in using these systems. And we’re seeing that, just the area of use now is just staggering. So…
CB: So no, that’s really great example of positive change. And just to sort of round out this automation AgTech conversation, is you made the point there of a number of forces around resolution spectrum with lowering cost, frequency of scanning being done, did we see those things six years ago? Did we see them coming? Did we see the curve dropping on cost as dramatically as it has? Or has this sort of caught us a little bit by surprise from an industry perspective?
RR: Yeah, I was always of the belief that the field connectivity issue would get resolved through technology, and it has. I was always of the belief that the imagery and data and sensors and all these sorts of things we have will improve, and they have. What I didn’t expect is the cost to come down quite so quickly.
CB: Interesting.
RR: And I actually think that the good thing that has happened, is that there’s been a very competitive global market in this space, which has helped drive that cost down. And I think that’s probably one of the key things, particularly for a country like Australia, is we do need choice, and we do need competition in the market to deliver cost effective outcomes in industry. If you have, you know, just one company that has the magic solution everyone wants, they’ll price it accordingly to what the market will bear.
CB: That’s an interesting segue, Rohan, about one company just having the solution because it brings to mind the issue of chemistry and pesticide chemistry, and from an Australian perspective, I would couch it as the increasing lack thereof. So, we, and you and I talked about this off air many times, but with your work through the AgVet Collaborative Forum and more recently, a little bit of work you’ve done with CropLife around the pesticide outlook, I’d be interested in the tech transfer, and this is a tech transfer conversation, of course, is so you’ve got molecules on patent, ‘Oh, we know how those work, you’re entitled to get your money back through the patenting’, but we’ve got to get some molecules into Australia, and there’s some really pressing reasons why. And I’d be interested for you to share your views on these problems.
RR: Yeah. Well, many years ago when I was back at GRDC, it was abundantly clear to me that one of the challenges for us in this country, and why we weren’t seeing access to some of the new molecules, is because Australian pests, weeds and diseases weren’t on the global discovery priorities list. And so, that was a strategy I wrote and, you know, got over the line and, you know, consequently, unfortunately, I left before I got to sort of see that right through to the end. But that is now the Bayer investment. We’re a small market here, and this is one of the key challenges I saw. What we actually had to do is shift global investment into Australia’s priorities. And I think that’s one of the challenges we’ve got to understand, is that we actually have to shift the dynamic to make it easy to do business in Australia. And so, there’s a regulatory component to that. We need to make it easier for those companies to invest here and do business. We actually need to support it with delivery platforms. They have to be technology growers can actually use and implement in the field, in the paddocks, and so you actually have to map it or match it to our engineering or tractor or, you know, spray capability that we have. And most importantly, we actually have to ensure that they work as part of a functional system. And it’s usually, basically, if I look back at my career, I’m probably a systems scientist is probably best way to describe it. It’s not just one thing that delivers the benefit, it’s actually a whole series of components. And the problem is if one of them wrong, it’s like a house of cards or, you know, playing Jenga, like the whole thing falls down on you. So, it’s really important to understand those systems. And I think that’s one of the reasons why tech transfer can sometimes be challenging, because sometimes it’s not just doing one thing, it’s doing six things at once. And actually, helping producers and their advisors importantly, because I actually found I had to probably work as much with the advisory committee on those systems as I did actually with growers themselves to help them understand how it would actually fit within the advice that I provided to growers and actually help equip them so, you know, that they knew how to deal with the issues or and could foresee what issues their growers are going to have with the changes. So, it’s a really important component. So, I actually think that with tech transfer, working with the advisory community is actually just as important as actually working is working with the grower community.
CB: Rohan, I’d tie that back to your comments earlier about the extension and adoption world, where those advisors and producers, that’s their universe, and bringing them along as part of change or the introduction of new technology. With the pesticide chemistry challenge in front of us and the investment of GRDC with Bayer around herbicides is a good example. But why is it that it’s so hard to induce these companies to bring their active ingredients here? Is it simply the scale of the opportunity versus the cost of doing it? Is it just that simple?
RR: There can be some real challenge in terms of how you actually build the market fit. And I think one of the key things is actually, just understanding what is actually, the actual need. What is the demand? For the first time ever, in Australia had a consolidated list of what the actual industries needs were by industry. So, all of a sudden, the pesticide registrants had a complete list of what was actually needed and required not just by one industry, but 7 or 8 different industries. And then aggregating that demand, they can say, oh, there’s now on a single industry, there’s not enough value in investing, but across the seven there is. And so, all of a sudden, you’ve actually built a much more scalable opportunity. Some of those industries were intensive broad acre. Some were extensive broad acre. Some are horticultural. Some are viticultural. So basically, by building the market scale, provides a viable opportunity for companies to bring new technologies. And there’s a number of products that actually came out of that program, to this day, of being breakthrough technologies for this country.
CB: So, the Australian challenge here, and I’ll just focus on Australia, because it’s really what we’re talking about, is working together to build a case for a market demand, that then induces the registrants or the molecule owners to enter the market. And the tech transfer piece in that, strangely is. as simple as building the market intelligence and a path to market for a technology.
RR: Yeah, absolutely. It’s understanding what the market demand is. Actually, one of the other things we did way back, about 12, 13 years ago when I was at the Grains Research and Development Corporation, is actually had a number of impact assessments done. Because I had the issue that people were like squeaking wheels saying, oh, this issue is bigger, this issue is more important, and it’s very hard to, sort of, put it all in context. So, we actually did some impact assessments for weeds, pests and diseases for all the crops. And the outcome of that is, that it clearly identified where the major pain points were for industry. It also for the first time ever, in fact, we spent collectively well over $1 million on all these studies. Collectively, it actually gave a clear case for where the need was for these solutions, for these issues. The pesticide registrants themselves actually use these documents in their business cases to compete for the global investment pool to bring technology to Australia. So, it’s not just that we’re a small market, it’s that the companies trying to bring technology to here are competing with all the other countries in the world—South America and Asia and Europe and North America and other places, for the same pot of money. And they’ve got to put their own business cases to actually build the case, to bring investment to this country. And so, documents and having that intelligence, you know, really assisted. And I got a lot of feedback from those companies that it actually provided them with great assistance in actually building a much stronger case for bringing increased investment into this country. That I think actually having a clearly defined value proposition for the investor, in terms of what the need and demand and what the potential value it’s going to deliver to a producer, is really important, because from that, you can start to build models around investment and return and these sorts of things.
CB: Yeah, absolutely. I guess with all of the perspectives and experiences, both on the agvet chemistry side and with the automation side, there came a day where yourself and I and Leecia Angus, thought we might want to get in there and try and help get technology into the market.
RR: Well, we realised that there’s a lot of technology Australia is missing out on. Collectively between the three of us, we’ve been able to look globally at what technologies are out there that probably had no intention of ever coming to Australia.
CB: I think that’s very fair. So…
RR: But yeah, we could see where there’s value.
CB: For the listeners, Rohan and myself and our very good friend and colleague, Leecia Angus, have a company that we co-own called AgTechCentric, with the express intent of bringing technologies to Australia that would not otherwise find their way here. And unfortunately, we can’t talk much more about it right now because we’re right in the midst of field trials and negotiations on different things. But I must say that it has been, not only an interesting journey of tech transfer working through the very issues Rohan and I’ve been discussing today, but also just building those partnerships. What do you see as the tech transfer challenges over the next 1 to 4 years for the producers and the ag industry in Australia? What do they look like from your vantage point?
RR: Well, one of the key questions, of course, is going to be ‘will it actually deliver value to my business’, that it actually has to make a return? Look, it’s interesting, quite recently I did an analysis in terms of actually how many autonomous machines are actually out there globally, and its between 800 to 1,000 machines in what you call tractor-sized autonomous equipment and larger. So, it’s not a big number in Australia, it’s, you know, probably 55, 65 machines in total. So, it’s not a big number today, but going forward, it’s understanding, I think, where the pain points are to our business, and how those technologies can actually enable us to farm, actually in a different way, as a system that actually overcome those pain points. That might be ability to deliver new biochemical, biological, pesticide crop protection products, in a different way to the way that we actually apply it today. In a way that’s either more sustainable, more cost effective, giving better efficacy, these sorts of things. It could literally mean that we can actually have much more sophisticated rotation systems than what we have today. Our ability to go back on a previous year’s crop with greater degrees of accuracy is a key part of that. We’ve already seen that to some extent with autosteer, which, you know, Australia is the…
CB: World leader.
RR: They were the first in the world to develop and commercialise autosteer, and we’re actually the world leader in terms of adoption, too. So, Australian producers, when they work out a technology that delivers value, easy to implement and pays, adopts those technologies very quickly, because we have to.
CB: Rohan, you could argue with the stump jump plough, we were well ahead of the game, long before we were talking about tractors. So, with that, Rohan, it’s been terrific talking to you and the insights you’ve shared around tech transfer and adoption have been fantastic. So, Rohan, thanks very much for joining us on the podcast.
RR: Yeah, thank you so much for having me, Cameron. Enjoyed it. Thank you.