Q&A Digital Innovation in agriculture TICKY FULLERTON: Welcome back. Thank you very much for joining us to the morning panel on digital innovation in agriculture. I'm Ticky Fullerton from Sky News.

I noticed that the acting Prime Minister-- I was listening quite hard. I don't think he said "innovation" once. And I think there's a reason for that, obviously.

There's a great obviously appeal at a grassroots level for something simpler. And I think of the word innovation now as rather tired, myself, and a word a bit like sustainability, when health seemed a lot better. So that said, it can take away from what the word actually means, and how important it is to Australia's economy.

We've got a fantastic panel today. I'm going to introduce them, get each of them to chat for literally a couple of minutes on what they're passionate about in this space and what they bring to it. And then we will go for a discussion. And after about three quarters of an hour, I'd like to open it up to the audience. And please, let's have a great discussion if you've got anything specific or anything more broad that you think are the holes in the supply chains, where innovation is needed, please, please bail it up. And we'd love to give a toss around here.

So to our panel. If I can start on the far left. Dr. David Henry is the principal research scientist at CSIRO, and research leader of the Digital Agriculture Initiative. So very well-placed. His focus is on the development, application, and precision of remote digital technologies for which I mean on animal and vegetation sensing, virtual fencing-- so control of animals, right across dairy, beef, sheep, mixed farming, and most importantly, how to capture value. So that's David.

Secondly, Richard Heath is general manager of research at the Australian Farm Institute, which is what it says it is. Richard grew up at Gunnedah on a family farm, Liverpool Plains. And he managed cropping operations for 20 years. We're talking wheat, barley, chickpeas, all the way through to cotton.

He's been an early adopter of new farming technologies. Every farmer says that, though. Extensive farm consulting roles as well, working with GRDC, advising on research priorities for grain growers.

Then we come to Jane Weatherly, who's worked for MLA-- Meat and Livestock Australia-- for almost a decade, and is CEO of the National Livestock Identification System-- NLIS-- which lots of you will know then. Jane is to lead the transformation of NLIS, which will do drive the delivery of the industry's value chain digital strategy.

Jane's based in Tazzy. She's worked for Rabobank, the UNI, as an extension officer for the DPI, all-around meat. And of course, has a family beef breeding operation on Bribie Island.

And then we come to Angus. Angus Taylor, of course, almost a local, Canberra here. Assistant Minister to the Prime Minister with special responsibility for cities and digital transformation. Cities and beyond, I would imagine.

Last year, Angus authored an essay-- "The Promise of Digital Government"-- which was published by the Menzie's Research Centre. And obviously, his lecture's not far from here, previously very involved in agricultural business strategy, partner with McKenzie's and with Port Jackson, and founded a number of small start-up businesses in agribusiness himself.

And finally, Dalene Wray is OBE Organic Group's general manager. Began with the company in 2004, and I guess has lived the paddock-to-plate dream. And that's way out in the channel country, isn't it, where there are no chemicals. And you also spent five years in Hong Kong, where you managed the company's expanding business in the region and in the Middle East.

So please welcome our panel.

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Right. Angus, can I kick off with you? Cause you're so used to it. What do you want to get out of this panel?

ANGUS TAYLOR: Well, look. You know, I've been passionate about the impact of data and agriculture for many years, Ticky, and for as long as I can remember, really. And I've used data sets from ABARES throughout that time, from the Bureau of Meteorology. And one of the things that's really exciting in this space is just this flourishing of new sources of data to draw our practises in agriculture.

We have a huge imperative in agriculture, I think, to continue to find new sources of productivity. We've gone for many years in agriculture where productivity hasn't been what it could have been, and also finding new markets, finding ways of-- like ABARES-- finding ways into new markets. But central to all of that, I think, in this age is data and how we use it.

We are, I think, at the beginning of that journey, not the end. I think we've got a long way to go. But it is one of the most exciting areas of modern agriculture, in my view.

And as I look at it, it turns out I got my staff to look at how many agricultural data sets the federal government has released, open data sets. Turns out there's 2,991.

And this is one of the great stories of open data, I think, not just in Australia, but the world, because our focus in Australian agriculture has been about getting as much data out there as we can. I don't think we've always been as good at using it, for finding ways of using that data in clever ways as we could. But I think we're getting there. And whether it's soil data or weather data or water data, it's land use data, we are, I think, now on the cusp of starting to use that data in ways that will really drive productivity.

And I think that's-- talking about how we do that is the key thing for decision.

TICKY FULLERTON: Indeed. And who owns some of that data.

ANGUS TAYLOR: Oh, absolutely.

TICKY FULLERTON: Yeah. All right. When I looked at all of you, I thought Dalene has the organic beef. Jane labels them as such. David makes sure they're virtually fenced in. Richard

gathers the data together. And Angus makes it all happen. And we're going to talk beyond beef.

But Dalene, where do you come to this? Because you're almost at both ends of the chain with the supply chain in the middle. So what do you want to see?

DALENE WRAY: I'm really excited about the opportunity to share some of OBE Organic's journey from a little town in Thargomindah, population 120 years ago when a group of farmers came together. And they wanted to build a sustainable future for the next generation. And I think that's part of what many people in the room want to do today.

OBE Organic is a great example of the benefits of collaboration and cooperation to build sustainable supply chains. And I see a lot of that going on between government and industry now.

For those of you that know me, you'll know that I work on the principle that there's always a better way. I'm not backward in coming forward. And I'm embracing new opportunities.

I'm passionate about improving the animal well-being of the animals in our value chain. So what's interesting there is we don't own the animals. So producers choose to supply their animals to us. But I believe I have an obligation to contribute to their welfare.

And that comes from a little bit from-- for those women in the room that have had kids. I had really awful pregnancies. And I think, wouldn't it be exciting if I as the general manager of a little organic supply chain OBE could contribute to the well-being of pregnant cows in Australia. And now having a platform like this to do that is really exciting for me.

TICKY FULLERTON: Terrific. Jane.

JANE WEATHERLEY: So I guess so what I'm most passionate about and always have been is definitely the red meat industry, and looking at different opportunities and ways that we can make our producers a lot more profitable, and also make their life a lot easier. I guess growing up on a beef property as well, it's definitely in my blood. And I'm well aware of the challenges that producers have every day to tray and stay afloat and be profitable.

But I guess in my current role now, I'm really privileged to be able to have the oversight of our integrity systems for industry, which is NLAS, and livestock production assurance and national vendor declaration. And they're basically data collection systems and data storage, and provides that assurance to our customers domestically and overseas that we're producing the safest, most ethically produced product that we can.

So I guess digital ag and data systems to me provides the game-changer for how we actually can strengthen the systems far beyond what they are currently to help our industry stay much more ahead of our competitors to really look at how we can help our supply chains to be a lot more efficient and agile in their decision-making as well, and understand how we can really target productivity improvement overall.

TICKY FULLERTON: OK. We'll drill down on that too. Richard.

RICHARD HEATH: Thanks, Ticky. So like Angus, my passion has always been the data and the information that comes at of technology, and how that can be used to improve farm businesses. A bit of my background-- when I was at school, I was never going to be a farmer. It was the last thing I was ever gonna be.

Angus may remember. I was at college with him. I had long hair. I was all about being a rock star. And agriculture was the last thing on my mind.

So when I went back to the farm, I felt like I had a lot of catching up to do. I was never part of the aggie crowd growing up. And I saw data and information coming technology as a way of proving my decisions and providing that evidence and I felt that I didn't have instinctually, to justify the crazy things that I wanted to do to the rest of my family.

And I still think that we suffer a little bit in agriculture from the focus being on the hardware as such, the fad-- the drone, whatever it might be, rather than the potential of the information coming from those technologies to really understand your business and make improvements in your business. And then all the other things that can flow from that. Things like animal welfare that Dalene was talking about, like traceability. There's just so many more impacts that go beyond what you really understand the potential of the information that's coming out of the technology.

TICKY FULLERTON: David, you are the government's centre for ideas.

DAVID HENRY: Oh, no pressure. Thanks, Ticky. I think not dissimilar to everybody else in the panel. But sometimes I reflect on-- you know, we carry around our phones. We use our phones. Everyone's using iPads and other tablets. We go to the doctor and marvel at modern medicine, and hopefully travel on modern aircraft to conferences around the place.

But on the news you see things like the first drone delivery of a pizza in New Zealand, or the guy who from his spa bath went and got a sausage from Bunnings and got heavily fined, I believe, for doing exactly that. But we do get caught up, I think, as Richard said, in the technology and the hardware. But underneath that, there's real opportunity.

So how do we actually harness that opportunity? How do we marry the capability we have in data science, the ability to sense the environment and sense things and bring it all together and interrogate data, and actually use that to value Australian ag, whether it's productivity, sustainability, or right through the supply chain.

TICKY FULLERTON: OK. Can I start back at the grassroots, with perhaps a question for-- well, all the panel-- but Richard, and then perhaps Angus now. In the cities and in certain parts of Australia, this whole word "innovation" is being talked about as a threat to jobs, not as something that actually is going to keep people in work, particularly those who are currently in work. How do you convince people on the land, people in rural agribusiness areas, that innovation is not going to replace them?

RICHARD HEATH: I don't think there's any doubt that digital technologies and agriculture are going to lead to a changed workforce. We're gonna need different skill sets. It's not necessarily going to mean that there's going to be less jobs. But there's going to be different jobs.

Now the bit that I see out of that is the positive aspect that it's actually attracting a whole lot of people to agriculture that haven't been interested in agriculture before. If you go to agricultural technology shows in the US, for instance, where it's a bit more mature in terms of a lot of the data products that are available, the number of Silicon Valley startups that are there seeing an opportunity in agriculture to participate and bringing that intellectual capacity that would have gone into somewhere else in the economy otherwise I think is a fantastic opportunity for agriculture. And we need to harness that and--

TICKY FULLERTON: So that brings people in.

RICHARD HEATH: Yeah.

TICKY FULLERTON: What about people on the land taking up innovation?

RICHARD HEATH: One of the really big changes in new technology is the way that it is embedded in everything that we do in a much more instinctual way so that the capacity to use the new products is available to everyone. The capacity where I talk about a changing workforce, we're going to need new people to develop the products and to service them and so on.

But to actually use them, it's one of the big challenges compared to technology and software of say a decade ago is that you don't need a computer science degree to learn how to use them. They are-- it's like the apps that we know on our phones. They're designed so that a five-year-old could pick it up and learn how to use it.

So I don't think there's any need to think that it's going to replace people.

TICKY FULLERTON: Hm. Angus. What do you think? Because of course, it also sometimes involves spending money to bring this stuff in up-front costs. Now we hear farming's doing very well at the moment. Maybe now is the time to take advantage of this.

ANGUS TAYLOR: Yeah. Look, my own view is farmers have always been pretty quick to innovate when they can see an opportunity. You put a group of farmers together at a barbecue, and it won't take them very long to be talking about a new crop that someone's trying or a new practise that someone's trying. And there'll be this scepticism. Is it working? Is it not working?

But they're pretty quick. And Australian farmers have always been quick. They understand innovation. They typically like it.

They're sceptical about new fads. And so they should be until they're proven. But I don't think that's where our problem is. I think they will always adapt pretty fast. There's things we can do to accelerate that.

I think generally the pushback on innovation comes from the towns and the cities where you've had manufacturing dropping from 20% of the economy to of the employment to 10 over the last 20 or 30 years. And if you're truckie, and you hear this about automatic vehicles and automated headers and so on, they're sitting there thinking, geez, I'm next.

So that's where I see-- and politically, I see the towns is where it's not the farmers. It's the towns. Now I think-- I did a piece of work a number of years ago looking at the future of agricultural resources in Australia. And one of the really striking things is these are two sectors where we can be world beaters. And we can actually create world class organisations that can do both data and applications--

TICKY FULLERTON: So what's got to happen? I mean, Barnaby Joyce was saying he doesn't accept the big corporate farm. But he doesn't like it.

ANGUS TAYLOR: I think we can get caught up in that debate. I mean, most family farms are looking a little bit more corporate in their management approach these days, anyway. And there's shades of grey in that debate.

But the important point for me is we need to celebrate the entrepreneurs in this sector who are creating really great applications, like Richard's organisation does some of this work.

TICKY FULLERTON: So how much of virtual fencing does exist around the place?

DAVID HENRY: Well, I don't know if you want to jump straight to virtual fencing. It's an interesting one around automation in that virtual fencing is essentially a technology to automate the movement of animals around the landscape. The industry feeds back and suggests this is a game-changer. This is a truly disruptive innovation.

TICKY FULLERTON: I mean, it sounds like it.

DAVID HENRY: It's being commercialised currently by a start-up company out of Melbourne. So it is due for commercial release at the end of the year. And the government authored their own R&D for profit programme, as we've MLA and AWI and Dairy Australia, and Pork Limited have all invested in the technology around capturing value from it, because they see the industry benefit.

But what I was going to respond to this conversation was, there's always that temptation to jump to automation or robotics, and replacing humans in the process. But Australian farming is not prescription farming. It is very difficult to predict even a unit of nitrogen on a crop, what impact that will be, because of the variability in the system.

So I like to think of some of those innovations as underpinning decisions-- making them easier, more timely, managing that risk, rather than necessarily replacing people in the system.

TICKY FULLERTON: Mm. Have you got specific examples of how that happens? When that happens?

DAVID HENRY: There is, for example, there's a yield profit project in the grains industry that helps farmers to understand the potential yield of a grain crop so they can better manage risk looking forward.

There's a product-- a pasture predictor product-- out of the Sense-T project in Tasmania, which again, is about predicting forward to help farmers understand what the situation is

likely to be to inform decisions. Not to replace them, but to actually inform decisions in there in the decision-making process.

TICKY FULLERTON: Right. Can I move to the whole idea of the supply chain? Because so much of agriculture at the moment is about exporting and about gearing up both within Australia, I suppose, but particularly across border and making sure we market things to the best of our abilities. So what are the challenges there for you, Dalene?

DALENE WRAY: There's lots of challenges. But I see more opportunities. I think one thing that we've recognised at OBE is the danger of excessive selfishness. And we sat back and we started to think about what happens if a number of projects or all projects that we undertook, OBE didn't get the primary benefit from it. And perhaps the next person in our supply chain didn't, but someone else in our supply or value chain did. And it's actually fundamentally changed the way we think about projects. And it's been really powerful.

And we're hopefully going to see some really powerful, positive influences on the well-being of our animals, because we are doing projects where OBE Organic doesn't receive the primary benefit.

TICKY FULLERTON: And how does the digital innovation side flow into that? I mean, presumably you're able to monitor and work out--

DALENE WRAY: So what we need to do is get everyone engaged in our value chain. But the projects don't happen with the person next to you in the value chain. But we need them to be working with you on different projects, but realising that there are other people that will kind primary benefit. And you may gain secondary or benefit in one or two years' time.

TICKY FULLERTON: Yeah. And how's that work? How do you monitor that?

DALENE WRAY: So a project that we're involved in is an animal well-being project, which we hope will the animals on the properties will be healthier in the future. In a couple of years' time when we're competing in America, for example, for retail accounts with farms from South America, we will hopefully have a data set and a project that proves that the animals in the OBE value chain or the organic beef supply chain in Australia are potentially healthier than animals in other supply chains around the world. And that potentially gives us a competitive advantage.

TICKY FULLERTON: And you will use this identification system that Jane's got to help you do that.

DALENE WRAY: Certainly. The RFID technology in ear tags in cattle is integral to this project.

TICKY FULLERTON: OK. Do you want to just explain a little bit more, Jane, about what it is?

JANE WEATHERLEY: So, well, so the nationalised stock identification system is all about the traceability system that we have for our industry. So for cattle, we'll check the individual movements of animals from property to property, or property to processor utilising RFID technology. Just an ear tag.

TICKY FULLERTON: Is this different from other places around the world? I mean, when we're talking about innovation, how innovative is it?

JANE WEATHERLEY: Well, once upon a time we were definitely leading the world with this technology in our systems. But certainly now many countries, or our competitors, have really caught up with implementing very similar systems to what we have now.

TICKY FULLERTON: That a good thing?

JANE WEATHERLEY: Well, it means that we're going to lift out game in terms of what we're doing and how we're providing that assurance to our markets overseas.

TICKY FULLERTON: So what about this whole issue, which can be a problem of compatibility of data, that you know, somebody overseas is looking at Australia. They're looking at South America. Everybody's got their own identification systems. But you know, apples and oranges.

JANE WEATHERLEY: It's an interesting point, because an example that we've got is our meat standard's an Australian programme. So MSA, which is basically our eating quality programme--

TICKY FULLERTON: And that's been around for a long time, hasn't it?

JANE WEATHERLEY: A long time. Yeah. So we've got the world's largest database on meat-eating quality data that a lot of other countries are now moving towards as well. So once upon a time, we used to hold that very close to our chest and not want to share it with anyone. But now the opportunity of data sharing is now there. We're now looking at what the opportunity is to actually set up an international database of eating quality research and development information so that we can start to mine that and understand where Australian product might be well ahead.

TICKY FULLERTON: Now does that involve you getting into some sort of sharing agreement with your equivalents?

JANE WEATHERLEY: Yeah, it does. It's sort of interesting the process that you go through to start negotiating, because one of the greatest challenges is just how you actually describe meat consistently around the world. So we might have one cut that we talk about that will be totally different to how Poland or China might describe it. So it's a long road. But I think that we now are definitely on it to--

TICKY FULLERTON: Presumably from your end, Dalene, that it comes back to at the end of the day what the customer who receives both options, the feedback from the customer. Now can you get feedback from the customer like that?

DALENE WRAY: Yeah. And I think what's really important here is that our customer are retailers. And their customers are consumers. And so we're delivering the information that our retailers need to get consumers in their doors.

TICKY FULLERTON: Mm. All right.

Richard, can I come back to you? What needs to happen, do you think, for primary producers to get involved, to exploit the whole space?

RICHARD HEATH: There is a really critical step here. And I can connect the last discussion with this one as well, in terms of the appreciation of the value that's added to data as it goes beyond the farm gate, and the trust that that's going to happen. So the value of the pieces of technology that are collecting the data in the first place, yeah, they're gonna continue that productivity growth story as they're applied on farm in the specific circumstance that they're designed for.

But most of those pieces of technology are just going to continue the incremental game that is the story of precision ag and productivity growth as a result of that.

The step changes-- potential step changes-- are gonna come from when that data goes well beyond the farm gate all the way through the value chain, and then comes back to inform the producer on things like what part of the property the best yielding carcasses have come from, and how consumers have reacted to that. Because then that starts to change your whole business system, rather than the way you just do one particular thing on farm.

There's really, really big trust barriers to get over to convince farmers that that's going to happen, that there is a value proposition in doing that. At the moment we don't have the value proposition to back that up. It's all based on potential. And until--

TICKY FULLERTON: What about the dairy industry? Wouldn't they want that sort of thing after the debacle that they've been through?

RICHARD HEATH: Well, I mean, that's a good example, unfortunately, of the-- almost every ag industry in Australia has this tension between the processing side and the production side. And to really make data flow well through the value chain, we need to get over that tension. And we need to have systems where data that is collected through the processing stage is visible and portable to the farmers that produce it in the first place. So that there's a trust relationship that are built.

DALENE WRAY: I've got a good example here. I think it's making it relevant to producers. So there's a great technology that I know a very small bit about-- the NRM Spatial Hub. And that was originally designed for farmers mapping lots of things using spatial innovation.

And so you think, OK. That's good. It can map slopes. Yeah, that's great for farmers, because it can tell us about water run-off and we can plan things. And so perhaps there's not the uptake that you would expect from producers.

And we said, what if it could solve workplace health and safety issues? Ah, how can it do that? Well, could it map all slopes on the property over 30 degrees? Yes. OK.

So could you pull that information out, give it to farm workers on an app and tell them they're not allowed to ride their motor bike or four-wheeler down that slope. Oh, yes. It could do that. So it could prevent accidents on properties with this information. OK. Yeah. Now I want to be involved in that. So it's making the information relevant to producers.

TICKY FULLERTON: And presumably it's all-- Angus, it's all about transparency as well. I mean, I know going back to the dairy situation-- I think Mick Keogh is here as well. And he's been doing a lot of work on it on the ACCC side. But it's about trust, transparency, and then ownership of that data and access to that data.

ANGUS TAYLOR: Yeah, yeah. I mean, trust in a agricultural supply that's critical to get investment. Integrity is critical to getting new markets opened up, which is what OBE's doing, of course. And transparency is critical to getting trust. And if you look at the dairy industry, it's one of the tougher ones, a bit like sugar, perhaps, because you're so reliant on one or a small group of processes. And so building that trust between the processor and the farmer so that both are prepared to invest in growth is challenging, which means price transparency, in my view, has to be very, very well thought through.

And we've had, I think, errors on that here in recent times. And the Kiwis, I think, have led the way on that. I'm a bit biassed, because I was involved in that process. But getting that transparency is absolutely essential.

TICKY FULLERTON: So David, just going to trust in terms of whether innovation can end up being more expensive than when you didn't have it at all. If I give you the example of, say, the John Deere tractor-- these computers on wheels. Now if you're a farmer, and you have a tractor in the field, and a wheel comes off or-- sorry, not to get terribly technical-- but something goes wrong.

You find yourself in a situation where in the old days, you'd have been able to probably fix some of the stuff yourself with a good spanner and a whatever. These days, you're now locked out by a big company who has all the IP over all that computer technology. How do you convince people that this is indeed the way of the future, and they're better off?

DAVID HENRY: I think the John Deere one is an interesting example. In the US we're saying a lot of trends, for example, going away from people trying to hold on to data and making it open and making it freely accessible, with of course, rules around who you give permission to and data security and privacy. But we're seeing an open data sort of principal coming out.

John Deere is an interesting one in terms of if you looked at the precision ag sales data, you would probably suggest that gee, this thing's taken off. But in fact, it's because it's embedded in the equipment. So of course, the sales people will say it's taken off. But is it actually being used?

And that's a different issue. There again, it comes back to the discussion we've just had about the relevance and the value proposition for it. So like any business or purchasing decision, it's the return on the investment that you make. So you can say that you're going to get a return on that investment.

It's not so much the cost. It's the return on that investment. And hopefully you can still fix the tyre if it comes off

TICKY FULLERTON: Jane, how does the whole trust and sharing of data work in the area that you're in?

JANE WEATHERLEY: Well, certainly I guess in our industry, we've probably had a history of being quite conservative just around individual data. Certainly in my days as an extension officer where I'd walk up to a beef group and suggest we do some benchmarking. And that would mean they'd bring on their figures, and go through them and do a bit of comparative analysis of how they're performing.

We have come a long way from really being able to provide a good value proposition to actually do that. I think certainly now our industry's getting a lot more focused on objective measurement. So really looking at technologies that help provide the numbers that really drive decision-making. And we're I guess basically looking at that as the solutions to improving how we do business.

DALENE WRAY: And I'm seeing a move away from them and us mentality. I'm seeing a move towards value chains collaborating with big business. When businesses get very big, they potentially lose the ability to be agile and innovate. And having access to value chains of smart, innovative producers is really valuable for big business.

We're working with Telstra on a project. And it's sort of ludicrous to think that Telstra would be interested in chatting to a little company with 10 staff and a few cattle roaming around the Outback. But they really are interested in what we're doing. And they're interested in making a difference. So.

TICKY FULLERTON: So actually working with them, with a very big company. Obviously, with all that they've got at their disposal.

DALENE WRAY: And I'm seeing that that's just one example. It's happening all over agriculture. And I don't think it's them and us. I think it's how can value chains really leverage the balance sheet of these big companies.

TICKY FULLERTON: Richard, where do you see-- not just incremental disruption-- but a really big jump in disruption, if there is such a thing.

RICHARD HEATH: A jump in disruption. Well, it comes back to what I was talking about before in the potential to change business systems. Through connection to consumers, digital supply chains are going to get producers far more connected to consumers potentially than they ever have been. Traceability platforms. The We've talked about it for a long time. But it is now becoming much more embedded to use the word that Dave talked about before, when consumers start taking photos of bar codes on produce, and that translates to a strawberry farmer being able to know that strawberries from one particular corner of his paddock were better received by the consumer than the rest of the paddock, and then look at what he's done differently there with fertiliser or water, or whatever it is.

That's the step change. It's the capacity of the information to change the way that you're running a business.

TICKY FULLERTON: Anybody got specific examples there they want to throw out?

JANE WEATHERLEY: Well I think one of the key things is the technology enabling that seamless capture of data so that producers don't have to do anything. It just happens. That's one of the great things about the John Deere model is a lot of that machinery is geared to

capture that data as it's doing the planting. And it's then sent straight up to the cloud. It's been sent to their machine. And whoever's back at HQ is tracking how it's all going.

For our traceability systems that I work with, the dream is that producers don't have to fill in an ENVD. It's all captured on farm. We trace it. It goes to a central database. And the integrity system happens without ever knowing it.

TICKY FULLERTON: So the data, obviously, and data mining, is such a huge area in this conversation. But sensors-- sensory systems-- is another very big area. I want to come onto the ability to hack things, change things, and how much innovation is involved at the moment in trying to sort this out.

It was interesting talking to Graham Tuckwell, who is a bit of an ETF guru, which is a financial instrument, for those who don't know. And there's actually thematic ETFs in cyberspace. That's how big this space is.

Now if I put to you that the driverless car becomes universal, and then instead of being under instruction to avoid people, somebody hacks in there and says, no, you've got to take people out. An extreme example, OK.

But I mean, how are we stopping-- or your sensory systems, for example, which presumably involve cattle not moving over a certain space. How do we make sure? Do they? I don't know. They do it with dogs.

How do we make sure that this is used correctly and not hacked into and misused?

DAVID HENRY: It happens. I think it happens. I'm not a cyber expert. Certainly not a hack expert. But there's some really challenges to ensure the system remains secure, and is protected against that sort of attack.

I know there's protocols in place that identify incursions and hacks and all those sort of things. I'm not an expert. I have heard of examples in the US with some of these start-up companies that are collecting data from farmers, and farmers deliberately entering data I think it was-- conversation I've had with Richard before-- deliberately entering erroneous data to throw the system off-kilter. So it's an issue.

TICKY FULLERTON: Mm. Angus, what's government doing about this?

ANGUS TAYLOR: Yeah. It's a good question. I mean, look, the truth is, I think the market is working out how to solve this problem, because it's become such an issue. People are concerned about it. And people won't trust services that are provided to them unless they know their data is protected.

And of course, it's becoming very valuable. I mean, if I have historical data for a piece of land, which is very detailed from Precision Ag. Access to that data is incredibly valuable if I want to sell or lease that land, because I could show the potential vendor what it can do. So this is a big deal.

But I think the market's getting there. I mean we as a government are facing this issue perhaps more than anyone, because we suffer from attacks on our systems all the time.

Moving to cloud-based services I think makes a big difference, because I think you've got real expertise there in those service providers in how to protect data.

TICKY FULLERTON: But there's a balance, isn't there, when it comes to commercial stuff? Because they're the big banks. You know, two of them are up in front the politicians today saying, oh no. We're going to be very careful about the speed at which we open access to our data, which of course, is going to help drive competition. But they're all about-- their argument is about cyber.

ANGUS TAYLOR: Well, yeah. That's right. And it's two separate issues here. One is cyber. And the other is, who has rights to that information, access to that information.

The second one, again, to the extent that we can-- government's a heavy-handed beast. So we don't want to intervene if we don't have to. The Productivity Commission is doing a lot of work on this right now as we speak. And they'll be putting out a final report on this. And it'll affect agriculture as much as many other industries. And we need to get that balance right.

People talk about data ownership. It's less about that then data rights, who has the right to access a particular piece of data. And if we get into a brawl between an agronomist and their client about who has access to many years of data, this is a big deal.

I'd like to think we can solve a lot of this through contractual solutions out in the private sector. But there may need to be some government role in it.

RICHARD HEATH: Can I comment on that, because I think that's a really important. And Angus has got it spot on. The debate needs to move from talking about ownership of data to talking about access to data. While ever we talk about ownership of data like it has some sort of property right, that it's going to be some sort of commodity that's tradable, I think that we're not going to create the right sort of market.

Now there's a company in the United States called Farmobile, which has a platform for acquiring data from all sorts of machinery applications, and then transferring that to the cloud. They've just started. And as far as I'm aware, it's the first widespread transactions where they're just buying that data from their clients.

They're paying $2.00 an acre. Now that's not a lot. If that's the value of data, really, that's not going to be a highly profitable commodity that people are going to trade in. And I think that's missing the point, well and truly, of the value of the data once it's interpreted and had value added to it and all the sorts of things that we've been talking about.

But that requires a different conversation. That requires that access to data conversation, getting away from the I own it and it has value to it only has value once something's done with it, so I'm going to control who has access to it to add the value to it. And we're not really having that debate widely yet.

TICKY FULLERTON: Dalene?

DALENE WRAY: So producers obviously would like to keep ownership of their own data. One opportunity is to consider data cooperatives, so owned by farmers, managed by farmers,

overseen by farmers. They can aggregate their data into their own corp that they own. And then they could monetise it.

TICKY FULLERTON: Jane, what do you think of that?

JANE WEATHERLEY: Yeah. It's probably a similar concept that's being talked about now in terms of data banks. So you basically have a central point where people already put their data. And it's controlled to whatever level they want it to be.

TICKY FULLERTON: Richard, do you like data cooperatives?

RICHARD HEATH: There's certainly quite a few of them emerging in the US. I know there's a fair bit of work being done here in Australia looking at the economic feasibility of how they work. The problem is at the moment is that it's hard to find an economic case for them, because I mean, the infrastructure that you need-- I know that some of the ones in the US are really struggling just to--

TICKY FULLERTON: It's the old coop argument.

RICHARD HEATH: That's exactly what it is. Because, I mean, they're doing it on a not-for-profit basis, because that's the whole message that they want to sell. But once you do that, what's the income model?

So it's difficult. But there's a lot of people looking at it. So.

TICKY FULLERTON: Because you can only sell this data once.

RICHARD HEATH: Exactly.

TICKY FULLERTON: So It's a bit like foreign ownership of land, isn't it? Two people are looking at the same asset, unable to look at it on a level playing field, perhaps.

RICHARD HEATH: Once you sell it, you lose control of it. Absolutely. It can still be interpreted and had value added to it. But I would argue once you sell it the first time, like you say, you've really ceded a lot of that control.

TICKY FULLERTON: So David, are there other spaces aside from-- I mean, we've covered a little bit on data, a bit on sensors. Are there other spaces that CSRO is looking at on the disruption side-- digital disruption?

DAVID HENRY: It's a big organisation. The other bit around where's our next big disruptive innovation gonna come from, I think we all struggle sometimes in remote areas around connectivity. And I don't think we should forget about the implications of connectivity both within a farm, but also connecting a farm and a community, around health and education and community and social benefits as well that connectivity brings.

We tend also to think around connectivity as sort of enabling IoT-- or Internet of Things applications. There's a lot of innovations as well that can happen what we call at the edge. So at the edge is essentially where data is collected.

So you take the John Deere example. And you think, well, what could you do to process and interpret that data on the fly, on the tractor, and then actually have something do something differently at the point of data capture. And it actually eliminates potentially the need to do anything connected to the cloud or the internet or to others.

And I'm certainly not discounting the absolute disruptive nature that that connectivity brings around the internet of things and interpreting and bringing data together. There's a lot as well we can do locally, as well as bringing it all together into sort of big data sets.

TICKY FULLERTON: Which brings me to the amount of on-farm or off-farm investment and take off that this whole area of digital disruption has.

DAVID HENRY: I think traditionally if you think about Precision Ag, you think about your monitors in the cropping industry, you think about automated irrigation systems. You think about auto guidance of tractors. All examples of technology being taken up from the Precision Ag point of view, the benefits largely around productivity on farm-- labour savings, improved nutrient decisions, for example.

And there's probably numerous examples of those on the farm. And I think there's probably less beyond the farm gate at the moment. So I'd welcome the panel's comments on that.

TICKY FULLERTON: Yeah. No. Would you have a think in the audience as to where you'd like to take this in a minute or two. Yes.

RICHARD HEATH: This is one area where I think unfortunately Australian agriculture is falling behind a little bit compared to particularly the US and Europe. We've been very strong adopters of the hardware-- the bits and pieces on the farm that are collecting the information in the first place. We've been well ahead in things like autos, yield monitors, and all the things that Dave just talked about.

The rest of the world is jumping ahead of us in the way that that data is being accumulated, analysed, and provided back in these big data platforms and apps. There's a number of reasons that that's happening. Our lack of connectivity is a really big impediment. That's one of the main ones.

I mean, Angus talked about the 2,900 data sets. They're not as accessible and available to app producers and startups as the public data sets are in the US, for instance. So that's another factor that's limiting that data economy, or whatever you want to call it, the opportunity for startups to see an opportunity, to have the infrastructure that they need to build a product and make it available.

We are lacking in some of that critical infrastructure in Australia that is really unfortunately meaning that the full use or the full opportunity to be gained at the hardware on-farm is really quite limited.

TICKY FULLERTON: You talk about lack of connectivity. When are we going to get it connected enough, do you reckon?

RICHARD HEATH: There's really positive and interesting commercial applications that are emerging because the need is there. The market's starting to take care of it. We're a long way

from that being universal. But it is now thankfully getting beyond just that we need NBN everywhere. It has to get beyond that.

And whole farm networks, radio links, really innovative satellite communications technology. There are a lot of solutions starting to emerge. So I'm quite positive that it's going to be addressed in certainly short to medium-term.

TICKY FULLERTON: So Dalene, you're quite far in Thargomindah from a cappuccino. But how are you--

DALENE WRAY: Yeah.

ANGUS TAYLOR: Birdsville pub

DALENE WRAY: Birdsville got mobile a few years ago. So I think it's not an excuse. OBE's now exporting multimillion dollar company exporting all over the world with basically no mobile phones and no internet for its 25-year history. So it's not an excuse.

I think more could be done to provide some solutions with the connectivity that we've got. For example, really listening with two ears and one mouth to what producers are saying when they're voicing their frustration. So one of the things I hear them say is, MYOB files won't upload. So why aren't we going to the top 10 cloud-based accounting packages that are being delivered in Australia and giving them a solution so that farmers can upload and download files that are smaller?

So when you use the $100 scanners, it produces a 2-megabyte file. And you might be scanning all your invoices in. So why don't we give them a solution that doesn't create a 2-megabyte file. It creates a 1-kilobyte file so that these files can be uploaded and downloaded more easily.

So I think there's a real opportunity for us to provide solutions by going to those types of orgs rather than saying, we need to give this farm more data because then they can upload more 3-megabyte files.

TICKY FULLERTON: Can I flip it on its head? How would your business be different if you did have access-- real access connectivity?

DALENE WRAY: Maybe we would be doing more projects with our value chain sooner. So our projects have been more based from our head office, and more marketing focus to try and create a demand for our product. And we've done that really successively through social media.

We would have had more producers speaking with their own voice sooner. And we still can't really do that yet.

TICKY FULLERTON: Which must add enormous sort of integrity and marketing value for all of the places that you're aiming at.

DALENE WRAY: It certainly does. And more and more I'm hearing from our-- so B2B customers, our retailers and our importers. They don't want to see me, even though I grew up

in Birdsville. They want to see my brother or my sister-in-law or my father or my mum as farmers from Australia.

But if I can't get them to Hong Kong, then I want to see them on social media talking about what they're doing and how they're doing it.

DAVID HENRY: Ticky, one of the interesting things for me just around connectivity is, as Richard suggests, have some low bandwidth wireless type solutions on farm that are commercially available. But sometimes we're tempted when we see these exciting new sensors to sense things well beyond what is required. Oh, let's do it multiple times a second at multiple places simultaneously, and just try to shove water coming through a fire hose through a garden hose. And it just doesn't work.

So there's a lot you can do smarter to actually distill the important information, or analyse it, at the point of data collection, rather than just shove data down a small pipe.

TICKY FULLERTON: Now, let's go to the floor. Who's got a question? Yes. Right in the middle there.

AUDIENCE: My name is Hoy, I come from Vietnam. So I have a question. Most of the database that you've set it just about within-- set up a database for within countries. But also Australia is quite a big exporter. So a lot of piece of information is from other countries.

Like the live cattle, for example. In Vietnam, we import each year 400,000 of cattle. So how can you get the feedback from our consumer? So what is the [INAUDIBLE]. Thank you.

TICKY FULLERTON: Yeah. How much feedback is there internationally for example, in the live ex business? Angus, do you know?

ANGUS TAYLOR: I'll leave it to-- you might have a better idea than I.

[INTERPOSING VOICES]

ANGUS TAYLOR: Could I make one comment, though, which is feedback from processors to farmers, it's an old chestnut, this one. And frankly, the answer is not a lot. There's a really good debate here about whether we could actually increase that level of feedback. So that's true whether it's international or domestic.

TICKY FULLERTON: With the data though?

ANGUS TAYLOR: With the data. That's what I'm talking about.

TICKY FULLERTON: Yes, yes. And how much of a cross border effort is being made with other countries in terms of-- I mean, I suppose with all these free trade agendas going on, presumably there is pressure for that. Well, my point is, I'm not sure we've resolved it at home yet. Let alone internationally. The others might want to comment on that.

JANE WEATHERLEY: Well, I mean, certainly, I think some processes really put a lot of value in providing feedback to their suppliers now, because they are looking for a particular

type of animal now. Then they're looking for generating loyalty farms in particular supplier. So the feedback systems that they're generating are starting to become--

TICKY FULLERTON: But what about the feedback on price-in price-out for the processor? Does that go back to the farmer?

JANE WEATHERLEY: Well, I mean, at the moment, it's all based on individual grid systems.

TICKY FULLERTON: Yeah.

ANGUS TAYLOR :They have their own prices

TICKY FULLERTON: That's harder. OK. All right. Yes, sir.

AUDIENCE: Gordon Collie from Dairy News Australia. I'd like to switch the focus briefly to marketing with the imminent arrival of Amazon. What should agriculture be doing? What is agriculture doing to engage in this fundamental change that's coming very soon?

TICKY FULLERTON: Very good question. Richard?

RICHARD HEATH: I think connecting with the last question a little bit too in terms of how we're gonna get the feedback coming from international markets. I mean, that internet-based marketing extending into food and fresh food. It's happening globally. We've just been hearing recently of fresh milk going on Qantas from Tasmania to China at $20 a litre. That's being bought over the internet.

It's all being enabled by digital systems and digital platforms for more wealthier customers around the world. And it's one of the CSIRO mega chains, wealthier customers, choosier customers, to buy food that they understand where it's come from, that's got the provenance, that's got the credence, and the ability of digital systems to provide that. That is going to provide Australian agriculture the ability to access those markets.

It's how we're going to participate. I think that for a long time we have been able to differentiate in commodity markets around the world with things like grains and beef and everything just on the quality of our product. For grains, it's been dry, hard protein, high quality wheat. The rest of the world is doing that now. And the freight advantage, all the things that we had, they've disappeared as well.

So that our ability to differentiate is going to have to move into something different. And perhaps-- well, not perhaps. Digital is going to be one of those ways that we differentiate and keep those markets.

TICKY FULLERTON: Should we see, though, something like Amazon as a threat to the agricultural sector in the way that say, bricks and mortar retail in Australia might see it as a threat? And is say, an Amazon different from an Alibaba, which promises at the moment anyway, to help businesses export to Asia?

DALENE WRAY: Well, I think it's an opportunity rather than a threat. I'm really happy if I have more customers for our organic beef. One of our challenges is I would love every home

to be able to buy 500 grammes or a kilo of organic beef. But it's not economical for us to move chilled product to a customer in Sydney one 500-gramme pack of organic beef.

So if there's a platform like Amazon where it does become easy to move a tub of cream and 500 grammes of organic beef and something else efficiently, than I think that's a win-win for everyone in agriculture.

TICKY FULLERTON: But that's a big American multinational collecting that data, rather than us.

DALENE WRAY: Well, yeah. I'm happy for Amazon to collate information and give me information back about other organic products that I can feed my kids. So I see it as an opportunity for them to collate information. And I want to be buying products that have less bad things in it. And if Amazon's doing that for me, then I'm happy for it.

RICHARD HEATH: It's gonna equally advantage both ends of the market. So yes, there'll be big multinationals that are collecting data and focusing on the sort of commodity end of production. But it's going to enable just as much the young farmer who crowd funds a pasture-raised organic egg production on the outskirts of Melbourne and sells at farmer's markets. It's going to equally enable both ends.

AUDIENCE: Chris, [INAUDIBLE] Group. Yield monitors are I suppose almost old school technology that have been around 10-plus year. 80% of farmers in the area sort of have them as part of their standard gear. However, there's been obviously a failing, as you talk to the farmers, and the majority aren't seeing any value in the yield monitors.

Where's the industry failed in selling the value proposition to the farmer that it's worthwhile I suppose building their skills and capabilities to get the value. What do you think the failing has been? As farmers just see it as a I suppose a toy, almost, or a pretty picture maker rather than as something that's going to lead to better decisions.

TICKY FULLERTON: Angus?

ANGUS TAYLOR: Yeah. This is one of my bugs I agree with you. And I think it's one of the great challenges of new technology is that it's lovely and shiny. But do you get anything out of it? And when I look at the history of innovation that leads to impact in Australia and agriculture around the world more generally, there's a couple of things for me that are still barriers.

I don't think-- connectivity is obviously an issue. But I think it's not the biggest issue, despite the fact that it's important. And we can talk more about the government side of that. I don't know if it's interesting.

But the two big barriers for me are one culture. And a lot of using data well in agriculture is about exploding myths, about exploding myths. And not everyone wants those myths to be exploded.

So if you look at people like Dave Sackett and Phil Holmes-- many of you in the room will know those guys-- they exploded a lot of myths in livestock agriculture and cropping

agriculture for many years. They taught us things that are great truths, I think, in agriculture. But people didn't always want to hear. And so we have to use data to explode myths.

The other thing that we've lacked, I think, is that entrepreneurial sector of people like those guys who get out there and help to get those insights out into the market. And we're getting quite a strong-- we do have quite a strong sort of consultant and agronomist sector out there. But I think we can continually improve that, improve the entrepreneurial sector who are developing applications that use that data.

TICKY FULLERTON: Is that a new wave? A genuine opportunity?

ANGUS TAYLOR: Oh, I think it is.

TICKY FULLERTON: Because the death of the extension officer was in years gone by. But are they coming back now in this new form? Jane?

JANE WEATHERLEY: As in extension office?

TICKY FULLERTON: Yeah.

JANE WEATHERLEY: Our public sector ones, not in any rapid rate at all. I think there's now a reliance on the private sector to be really picking up the gap that's now been left. And I think that the problem is that technologies are developed that are potentially far more complicated than what people ever imagine in terms of people-- any farmer being able to just pick it up and implement it in their business straight away.

TICKY FULLERTON: They're needed.

JANE WEATHERLEY: Well, the follow-through in terms of what it's going to take to make that really work for businesses.

TICKY FULLERTON: All right. briefly David.

DAVID HENRY: Just very quickly. I want to come back to Chris's question. I'd love to get his views on actually why the technology hasn't been taken up. But we won't invite up yet, Chris.

There is an issue around new monitors. And one is it provides data. So the farmer can get a map. But it doesn't actually interpret it for them. It doesn't tell them why an area's lower in yield than another area. So that step in interpretation is the critical step for them to go, ah. OK. We'll do something different as a result. So it only goes part of the way there.

TICKY FULLERTON: That's the step change you're talking about. Right. Yes.

AUDIENCE: Angus, you mentioned earlier that the government's done some 2,900 reports. I'm actually Darren Liam, a grain grower from Mingenew Western, Australia. But what does it actually mean for me as a grower? I've actually built a network that covers six and half thousand hectares across our farm. Regard to connectivity.

We're rural and we're remote. I don't want to politicise this for one minute. It's a really big issue.

But how do we get less reports and more on the ground as far as co-investment in going forward?

ANGUS TAYLOR: Let be clear. That wasn't reports. That was data sets. And you're all using them. You might not even know.

So for instance, the Bureau of Meteorology datasets, water datasets, soil datasets that agronomists are using. So that is data that is accessible, updated.

I'll give you another extraordinary example is that all your GPS is made possible because of datasets that are issued, put out by the Australian and other governments. Australia moves 5 and 1/2 centimetres a year. And if we're not continually updating what that means for GPS, you'll get the wrong GPS readings when you do Precision Ag.

So they are real datasets having real impact doing real things. So it's very important that people understand that that's a huge engine under the bonnet of Australian agriculture, which many other countries don't have in anything like the form we have. I don't think we're using it as well as we could.

And there is an issue of connectivity. I think there's a flowering of new approaches to connectivity. And Richard, I think, mentioned that earlier. And you're part of that.

And the NBN is just one, I think, one piece of what we're seeing. My house, I now have six options. Five years ago, I had one. And it was expensive and sketchy. NBN satellite is one of those options. But there's a whole range of others that have emerged-- low frequency, fixed wireless, and so on.

And we need to encourage that as a government. Have we been as good as we could have encouraging innovation and connectivity? I think we can do better on that.

TICKY FULLERTON: Ready, yes

AUDIENCE: Yes. David Campbell. Agribusiness freelance. I'll preface by saying I've been involved with technology and innovation for over 40 years now in agriculture, mainly from the commercial sector in introduction into Australia. And some of that's had significant effects in Australian agriculture, as some people in this room would know that I've worked with over years in the commercial world.

A little bit of a disruptive question. It's not about technology. I'm comfortable-- and I've been around the public and private R&D system for over 30 years. I'm comfortable that we'll continue to invest and come up with-- as Chris says-- the things that go ping and excite people. And I can see David Henry shaking his head there, yes.

Part of my question's already been answered by Angus in your comment about myths, and part of it by David in your comment about Precision Ag. It's about 21, 22 years ago we did the first yield maps in Australia. And I was involved in that with some other people.

And what struck us was the knowledge of the old-timers, of the older farmers. When they looked at these yield maps, they told us what the agronomists and the data couldn't. And they found the same thing in the US when they started doing yield mapping quite extensively there.

So my question is, we all know about the data information, knowledge, wisdom, sort of paradigm. We know about that. I just spent 18 months working with developing agriculture in developing countries, and seeing the traditional knowledge that those people use to be innovative.

I think, David, you talked about innovation being a point of difference in differentiation, that that really is the definition of innovation. My question disruptively is how can we take the human capital and knowledge that we have, particularly from our old generations, and also from our traditional landowners-- the indigenous people-- and build that into the knowledge management systems that we're developing around the technological innovations?

Anyone that's been involved in taking technology to the market, you always say, how can we get there faster? How can we get off the curve faster? And one of the ways is to listen to how people use your technology.

When we put Roundup in the hands of Australian farmers in the mid '80s, particularly in WA, they showed us how to use it very differently, well beyond the original design spec for that molecule. And we took that all around the world, as well as in Australia. And that underpinned minimum tillage.

How can we now capture the knowledge that we have, and that wisdom, before we lose it. The demographics of Australian farming are that we might lose some of that pretty soon. How do we build this in now to all the whiz bang stuff that goes ping, and really get up the curve a lot faster, and being more competitive globally, because all of our competitors around the world are asking the same questions I've heard the panel ask this morning.

TICKY FULLERTON: Richard, do you want to start with that one?

RICHARD HEATH: Sure. You ask them, is the simple answer, because you can inform so much of the machine-learning approaches and algorithms that are being developed to look at big datasets. They create much better output if you have an idea of what you're looking for first.

Now there is just straight machine learning, which just looks for patterns. And you don't know what you're looking for. The unknown unknowns. And that to me, is really interesting as well.

But if you start with something, like for instance, there might be some well-established local wisdom about a particular variety that grows better on a southern slope than a northern slope, for instance. Now the ability just to ask that simple question, if you had access to the harvest data all the way across Australia for where those varieties are being grown, you'd answer that question instantly.

Then beyond that, you get into the science of why that might be happening, because all you've got is a correlation rather than a causation at that point. But you can inform the way

that we look at big datasets and develop algorithms and doing machine learning with all this human capital, with all this knowledge, so that we are more quickly directed towards patterns that might be there.

TICKY FULLERTON: Angus, is this part of the question about this is a known unknown. You don't actually know who is out there and how to access this extra layer of what seems to be very important knowledge.

ANGUS TAYLOR: Yeah. I mean, expert systems have been around and crucial to agriculture for millennia, really. The thing is where they're weaker is when you have change. Change of ownership or a change of regime. And you need to learn fast, develop a new expert system.

This whole thing of its it machine or human, I think, is a silly debate, because the truth is-- the example I love is if you look at what can win a chess game now. It's not a machine or a human. It's the culmination of a machine and a human. That's the killer app.

And I think that will be the truth in agriculture-- combining human expert systems with data in a clever way. That's how we explode myths and increase productivity, production, markets, and so on.

TICKY FULLERTON: But is that also a part about getting farmers or people who are very close to the land, older people as you say, on board more trust?

ANGUS TAYLOR: Sure. Sure. And there's a really big role for the service providers to play in that. And they do play-- agronomists and consultants play a huge role in that process. So that is important.

DAVID HENRY: I think too, interesting just been reflecting on the use of robotic dairies in Australia. So robotic dairies, so robots actually milking cows. Relatively common in Europe, for example, in barn-fed situations. Several companies commercially make robots available here in Australia.

But you can't just plunk a robot into a dairy farm system, in a grazing system. It's actually about the system. You'll get the system wrong. You'll get managing the cows and keeping, then retaining their intake, and moving around the paddocks in the most efficient way. You need the robot-- the technology-- to complement the system.

So it's not about the robot. It's about the system and how you manage the system.

AUDIENCE: Greg Harper. Agriculture Victoria.

One of the things that's happened in medical research over the last decade is some very successful commercialisation of Australian innovations overseas. It wouldn't have happened if Australians hadn't kept ownership of that information for some period of time til it could be really well commercialised.

Are we being a little naive in thinking that our datasets don't have huge global value? Should we be a bit more protectionist ourselves?

TICKY FULLERTON: David, one for you. Wouldn't you say?

DAVID HENRY: Should we be more-- I-- I-- don't for one minute think that our data is not valuable overseas. Particularly when it comes to this discussion about traceability and provenance and what consumers want, and the information they want, along with products. So there is, I think, an opportunity to utilise the data that we collect on farm and through the supply chain to influence what purchasing decisions are made overseas.

TICKY FULLERTON: Sorry. I jumped to you because I think of all the great innovations and ideas and IP that comes out of commercialising out of CSIRO. But yeah--

DANELE WRAY: Thinking more altruistically, I'm really excited that some of the innovations in Australia may be taken up in other parts of the world. For example, it makes me feel really good at night to know that we can potentially influence the health of cattle around the world. And I can do that not by giving them our data. I can do it by giving them the project, the solution. This is how you do it.

So you don't have to give away data to have profound impacts on your own value chains and value chains around the world.

RICHARD HEATH: Ticky, also, open data does not mean free data. There's this misconception when you start talking about open data platforms that it's completely free. Anyone can get it, giving it away.

Open data platforms just mean that there are rules that are published and understood about how to access the data. You still control the access. If it's data we value, you can build that into the access.

But the important thing is that it is accessible, and people understand how to get hold of it.

TICKY FULLERTON: But presumably, to the question's point, it's how you build in the access that delivers long-term value.

JANE WEATHERLEY: I think just following in terms of going back to the MSA example. That was a world-leading model on measuring eating quality for meat. And originally way back when it first started, industry basically said, we're gonna hang onto this. And we're not going to share it with any other country. It's our competitive advantage.

And in doing that, what's happened is because we held onto it probably for a little bit too long and didn't share it early enough that other countries have now developed their own systems. So I think there is very much a timing issue of how long you hang onto it. And then you actually--

DANELE WRAY: And I think if you don't share, you can't benchmark. And there's something very risky in thinking that you're at the top of the tree and that you're the best. When actually when you start benchmarking, you find out that you really may be closer to the bottom.

ANGUS TAYLOR: Ticky, if I may, it's been one of my huge frustrations over the years to watch our failure to create an export sector in our knowledge.

ANGUS TAYLOR: In our knowledge. An export sector based on what we know. We are, I think, the most competitive agricultural producer in the world. So why are we only good at exporting our agricultural products. We should be good at exporting our knowledge.

Now my own view on this is that closing off data won't help that. We actually need-- open data is a critical pathway to creating applications that interpret that data, which is the bit that's really missing in all this, in my view. And applications have been assailable around the world in different ways.

TICKY FULLERTON: So do you think, for example, water markets should be regulated?

ANGUS TAYLOR: But that's a different-- that's a very different thing. I mean, one of the reasons why I think Australian agriculture is so competitive is we have had an open data approach to it. The Bureau of Meteorology has great weather data relative to many other countries in the world, and has done for a long while. I could go on and I can find terrific benchmarking data from ABARES over many years for its farm surveys and so on.

So we've had this open data philosophy. I think it's worked well for us. What we haven't done, and I think this is a different thing, is created a sector that creates applications that can interpret that data and use it in a commercially valuable way. And that's where I think the opportunity is.

DANELE WRAY: The NRN special hub uses information from satellites that aren't all owned by Australia.

TICKY FULLERTON: Indeed, Yes.

AUDIENCE: Hello. My name is David Gunner I work for the Department of Agriculture. I've got the following question. It's been alluded to throughout the proceedings. Question is, what changes the relationship with the private and public sectors, their funding and support, could and should be done in the future for innovation?

TICKY FULLERTON: Angus, do you want to try that one?

ANGUS TAYLOR: Ah, look. This is one of the really tough questions we battle with and Prime Minister is passionate about. How do you encourage innovation?

And of course one of the least innovative organisations in every country in the world is the government. So people look to us. And I say, well, hang on.

I'm not sure government is going to be the source of innovation. I think the critical point to start from is that the innovations will come from the private sector-- the big innovations-- not us. And we need to respond to them. One of the things we can do as a government is try to become more innovative ourselves. And I think that will help in many ways. If we can get data out to the private sector that they need to create a commercially valuable application, then we should respond to it.

And I think that responsiveness to what the private sector needs to innovate is absolutely crucial for government. I know the CSIRO does a lot of this. But that is the key for us.

So if someone comes to us and says, look, we can create an application, which is a world better. But we need this data to be released. That's where we can get in and respond.

RICHARD HEATH: It's probably a good opportunity to talk about really major new initiative that was announced yesterday, which is the food agility CRC. $160 million funding over the next 10 years, including $50 million from the federal government as part of the CRC programme. It's got 54 partners, which are a mix of--

TICKY FULLERTON: So will it go anywhere?

RICHARD HEATH: It's going to do all sorts of things. But it is agribusiness. It's RDCs. It's public agencies. It is a truly collaborative model about how to get these interactions happening that will actually deliver innovation at a partnerships between the public and private sector. And the whole basis of this CRC is about the way that data will move throughout the value chain, connecting producers with consumers, systems to do that, and so on. So I think it's a really exciting new initiative that's going to cover so many of the things that we've been talking about today.

DANELE WRAY: CRCs do work. the CRC for spacial innovation for example which NRM spatial hub, I think is going to be a game-changer for agriculture in Australia. Idea Chris Sounness and myself are on a industry advisory group for the federal government's $14 million Farming Together programme, which is-- it's aim is to drive more collaboration and cooperation in agriculture.

So we've seen some great results from that programme. And I'm sure there's many others. We're co-investing with the MLA on this animal well-being project. So we see co-investment does work.

AUDIENCE: Yes. Jim Pratley from Charles Stuart University. Bit of a segue into my question, actually, from the Minister. We've heard today about the important data in decision-making. We've heard about the importance of automating that so that it's real time data.

My question is to the Minister as to why the government can't take a lead in this space in terms of it's own data collection. Because it seems to me that universities ought to be able to automate their data processes. RDCs ought to be able to automate their data processes. So you can actually get a real time picture of what's actually happening between form policy decisions.

And yet, we've got 15 RDCs, all the different software that aren't harmonised, et cetera, et cetera. We've got ABARES doing farm surveys. You don't know the outcome of those for a year or two or three. And we've got farmers who have got survey for fatigue.

And so if a lot of their data collection could be automated into the system, then you would actually have your answers in real time. So can we have a government that actually takes the lead in this space?

ANGUS TAYLOR: Well, look. You know, since we've been in government, we've released a phenomenal number of data sets relative to what had happened before. So again, this is a very personal issue for the Prime Minister, who has this view that we should be pushing data out that we've got sitting in the vaults, get going nowhere. And as much as we can, we should be

doing it through APAs, which means it can be real time. So my job is to accelerate that process.

We're coming from a starting point where that just wasn't the cultural-- the philosophy, because the truth is that bureaucrats had a incentive to avoid doing that because of the risks involved. And there are risks, particularly when you get down to personal data. But we've made an imperative. We're doing an enormous amount of it.

Go and look at national map. I mean, the way we're actually getting data out there. Now we've still got a long, long way to go. Every government in the world has got a long, long way to go.

The country that's leading it probably is Estonia. But they had an advantage of being a former Soviet-- part of the Soviet Union. So releasing data never worried them too much.

TICKY FULLERTON: And is part of the problem different departments and different groups have different systems?

ANGUS TAYLOR: Absolutely. Correct. And different data formats. And so, there's an enormous amount of work going on in this front. We completely agree with what you're saying. What I would say is, it is an enormous amount of time, effort, and money to get that to happen. We're finding cheaper ways to do it.

And someone reminded me before this that national map-- which you should all go and have a look, by the way, if you want to. National Map cost us $80,000 dollars. We got a quote for about $10 million. And a couple of smart people-- one of whom is in the room- worked out how to do it for $80,000.

Now it's that kind of innovative sort of approach to government and digital garment that we need more of, and that I'm pushing every day.

TICKY FULLERTON: Excellent.

DAVID HENRY: Angus, you mentioned we all have information in the vault, and data in the vault. As one of the interesting things I think that RDCs-- research organisations-- all struggle with. We've got lots of reports that sit on shelves and in data systems and hard copies all over the place. And we talked about what's truly disruptive into the future.

I think one of those is artificial intelligence. Now don't think of the Terminator when I say that. It's actually more the ability to interrogate even voice recordings and paperwork and scanned copies of fax sheets and research reports, and interrogate and pull that using natural languages are questions. And we've actually just done one with GIDC, a data set.

We can actually ask a question. What's the impact of an increased unit of nitrogen application on a particular crop? And it actually drills through that vault that's all been put into the system, and actually pulls out the relevant information. So artificial intelligence.

TICKY FULLERTON: Did you want to add something, Jane?

JANE WEATHERLEY: Well, not. I've just got an example for our industry around that connectivity between datasets is going to be a massive thing. So for MSA, we graded 3.1 million animals last year. We can only link the genetics to 1,000 of those animals through the database that we have. But the future is that all those animals, we should have all the genetic data seeing with it, so that we can really hone in on a performance measures.

TICKY FULLERTON: Yes.

AUDIENCE: Mark Foley from Fairfax. We've seen digital disruption move beyond the farm gate. And in other areas of life, digital disruption is being associated with companies subverting regulations, getting around costs, and that sort of pushed it to increase their profits. Is there a need to regulate that for agriculture? Is that a concern? Is the share economy good for farming?

TICKY FULLERTON: Richard?

RICHARD HEATH: It's another one of these big trust issues. So data actually has an enormous capability in agriculture to help with regulatory compliance and benchmarking and all those sorts of issues, if farmers accept, again, that whoever they're supplying the data to isn't going to use that data against them.

I don't know how far away we are as a farming community from accepting that. I would argue that we're a fair way away from that happening yet. There is some examples overseas where it's starting to happen. The Canadian Field Print Initiative, which is a fertiliser benchmarking programme, is working with farm recording packages and developing ABIs so that the information that you put into your farm programme as paddock records just goes straight into your compliance for demonstrating that you're applying fertiliser appropriately.

So I think that the opportunity is there. How much it will be embraced, I'm not entirely sure.

TICKY FULLERTON: All right. I think on that note-- and I'm glad we ended up with data and data access, cause that seems to be the pointy end of the panel's discussion today. But I'd like to thank you all. To do a very good lunch.

I think I'd like to thank very much our panel. I think it as terrific. David Henry, Richard Heath, Jane Weatherley, Angus Taylor, and Dalene Wray. Thank you very much.

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