Agricultural sector & supply chain commit to Blueprint action

Some 100 key industry leaders from across the agricultural sector and its supply chain committed to work together on Friday to drive forward the sector’s Blueprint for Australian Agriculture.
Gathering in Canberra for the first time since the Blueprint was launched in February, industry leaders agreed to join forces to turn the agreed Blueprint priority goals into actions.
Of the goals identified by the Blueprint, the industry leaders selected four key goals that they wish to see action on today, to ensure the success of the Australian agriculture sector tomorrow:
* Innovation, research, development, extension: Securing investment in, and developing a model to underpin, research, development and extension in Australian agriculture.
* Competitiveness: Building the sector’s competitiveness and profitability through understanding our market opportunities and value chains to create growth, market access and future opportunities.
* Agriculture within society: Telling the story of agriculture by building a common narrative about the sector, in order to better position agriculture in the minds of urban Australians, prospective employees and international markets.
* Natural resources: Embedding sustainability as core business across agriculture and its supply chain.
In order to achieve these four Blueprint goals, participants committed to the following actions:
* Innovation, research, development, extension: Determine the appropriate funding requirements and models to underpin contributions from both the private and public sector via an industry roundtable.
* Competitiveness: Collectively develop a costs and needs analysis to understand market opportunities, competitors and value chains.
* Agriculture within society: Develop and implement a communications plan to better tell the story of agriculture.
* Natural resources: Develop a shared understanding of sustainability via a roundtable, as the first step in embedding this in core business.
The industry leaders acknowledged that the Blueprint is an ambitious plan with many goals for agriculture and the wider sector. They agreed that implementing the Blueprint is a long-term process, and will require the involvement of all within agriculture sector and its supply chain.
Importantly, the four goals and actions identified as key priorities from this forum are not the only goals that will be addresses as the Blueprint actions progress: they are simply the starting point for action.
Other goals, including the need to support the development of the National Workforce Development Plan, boost agricultural education and track emerging issues for agriculture, all ranked as high priorities for the industry leaders, and are on the agenda for discussion at the next Blueprint forum, which will be held in Canberra in October/November 2013.
The Blueprint is an initiative of the National Farmers’ Federation, along with partners Westpac, Woolworths, Bayer and Syngenta Australia.