Showcasing innovative practices – Australian Pastoral Property Innovation Manual
Showcasing innovative practices – Australian Pastoral Property Innovation Manual Conference Paper
16th Australian Rangeland Society Biennial Conference
- Author(s): Squires, J., Sherriff, C.
- Published: 2010
- Publisher: Australian Rangeland Society
Abstract: Innovations have been an important part of agriculture in Australia, being developed by necessity to provide unique ways of simplifying tasks, saving time or improving effectiveness. Innovators often don’t realise the potential value of their ideas to other producers. Hence innovations often get “trapped” and only used by the innovator business. It was this observation that lead to the development of the Australian Pastoral Property Innovation Manual. The purpose of the manual was to profile the innovative practices of rangeland producers. For this to happen, producers had to be invited to contribute ideas. This was achieved during 2009 by contacting producers involved in the network of Bestprac groups and pastoral producer networks around Australia. The Australian Pastoral Property Innovation Manual is a compilation of 120 innovations from pastoral businesses in SA, Qld, NSW and WA. The process of gathering, documenting and sharing innovations has had a significant effect on the producers involved in the project. One of the significant learnings came when producers realised that many of the practices that they took for granted were actually very innovative. They were also surprised to learn that many others were not undertaking these ideas that they accepted as commonplace. The sharing of these innovations has lead to increased adoption of innovation from within the pastoral industry and even implementation of innovations from other industries. This paper will explore the concept of pastoral innovation and highlight how the development of the Australian Pastoral Property Innovation Manual has assisted with the ongoing improvement of pastoral businesses connected to the Bestprac network.