South Australian grain growers are set to benefit from a raft of new research thanks to investment from the Grains Research and Development Corporation (GRDC) and the South Australian Grain Industry Trust (SAGIT).
SAGIT is investing a total of $2.36 million in new projects this year. Contributions from other collaborators, including GRDC's contribution of more than $400,000, brings that figure up to $3.12M.
GRDC's co-investment supports four projects to establish new markets for noodle wheat, mitigate frost risk, provide gross margin/risk data to growers, and explore the potential of lentils.
Acting Senior Regional Manager - South Courtney Ramsey said the projects in which GRDC has co-invested are highly relevant to growers across South Australia.
"We have co-invested in projects that align with GRDC's RD&E strategy to deliver value to growers," she said.
Our ongoing partnership with SAGIT has delivered great results in the past and we've worked together again to identify research ideas to tackle local priorities for grain growers.
An Australian Export Grains Innovation Centre-led project aims to establish a new high-value hard noodle wheat market in SA. This project seeks to increase returns for growers by boosting and stabilising the demand for suitable Australian Hard wheat varieties intended for premium noodle markets in Asia.
Ag Excellence Alliance has received co-funding to update the SA Farm Gross Margin/Risk Guide for 2026, 2027 and 2028. The guide will give growers data to inform their crop and livestock business management decisions.
AgXtra is leading a project which will evaluate and compare the safety of various herbicide treatments and use on lentils on typical Upper South East and Murray Mallee soils.
The project will see whether lentils are a suitable option in cereal-canola dominant cropping systems and on soil types where faba bean and lupin rotations are limited by profitability, marketability and scalability.
The research will also investigate the yield comparison between lentil varieties at Malinong to address barriers to adoption of new varieties in the Upper South East.
Lastly, a project led by the South Australian Research and Development Institute (the research division of SA's Department of Primary Industries and Regions) will explore novel frost risk mitigation strategies for lentils.
The team will test if products like hormones (to help flowers recover) and bactericides (to protect from microbes) help lentils recover better from frost, compared to not using these products.
SAGIT Chair Dr Andrew Barr said GRDC's co-investment helped boost the 2025 project offering following the 2024 drought.
"The drought meant there was a below-average harvest and, as a result, SAGIT's income was clearly affected," he said.
We got more than 60 applications for new research projects and without GRDC's co-investment, we would have only been able to fund 20 of those. From SAGIT's point of view, we are delighted with the working relationship we have with GRDC and the mechanism by which we can co-invest in areas of shared priority.
