Our Plans

The development of the SRA Strategic Plan 2021-2026 was a collaborative effort with key stakeholders, including growers and millers, to create a roadmap for the industry’s future.

The plan emphasizes a stronger focus on industry needs, particularly bioeconomic opportunities and innovation, while remaining aligned with SRA’s mission of sustainability and profitability. The strategic update is intended to ensure that SRA remains a trusted partner in driving the Australian sugarcane industry forward, working closely with stakeholders to address emerging challenges and leverage research for high-impact solutions.

Our Strategic Plan

In 2021, SRA launched a new Strategic Plan (2021-2026), after significant engagement with key industry stakeholders to ensure we continued to evolve to meet the needs and priorities of growers and millers and the sugarcane industry more broadly. The plan had a transformational focus, providing a vision for progressing and evolving SRA to stay relevant, innovative, commercial, and sustainable. In February 2023, the SRA Board reviewed the first year of the plan’s implementation to ensure it continues to guide those responsible for planning, delivering, and translating research and services to benefit our levy payers and the communities that the sugarcane industry supports. The Strategic Plan 2021-2026 Update completed in 2023, narrowed our focus to provide a strategic roadmap, that comprehensively addresses the opportunities and challenges that lie ahead for our industry and regional communities. Using the updated SRA Strategic Plan 2021-2026, we will continue to progress forward through constant improvement and a visionary mindset, to ensure we continue to meet the needs and priorities of growers and millers, and the sugarcane industry more broadly, now and into the future. Please read the Sugar Research Australia Strategic Plan Update 2021 – 2026 in conjunction with the Sugar Research Australia Strategic Plan 2021 – 2026.

Please read the Sugar Research Australia Strategic Plan Update 2021 – 2026 in conjunction with the Sugar Research Australia Strategic Plan 2021 – 2026.

Ten-Year R&D Plan

In June 2024, SRA released its Ten-Year Research and Development (R&D) Plan 2024-2034 to chart our course for investment in research, aimed at addressing key issues and critical challenges faced by Australian sugarcane growers and millers. The purpose of the R&D Plan is clear: to bolster the industry’s competitiveness, productiveness and sustainability through innovative R&D while benefiting the regional communities within which the industry is located. The Plan aims to steer investment in research on behalf of the Australian sugarcane growers and millers and the Australian government to improve the profitability and sustainability of the industry using an integrated approach across five R&D programs including: Varieties, Agronomy & Farming Systems, Crop Protection, Milling & Processing and Adoption.

SRA Annual Operating Plan 2024/25

The Annual Operating Plan (AOP) 2024-25 details investment in Research, Development and Adoption (RD&A) activities and outputs, aligning with SRA’s Strategic and Ten-Year R&D Plans, to be managed by SRA over the coming year. It includes all core and contestable funded activities such as grant projects, programs and services, and district productivity plan activities, specifying the delivery provider and aggregate expenditure. SRA has a balanced and collaborative research portfolio of investments that deliver tangible solutions and options to advance the productivity, sustainability, profitability, and long-term growth prospects for the Australian sugarcane industry. By aligning research investment with the five R&D Programs described opposite – as opposed to Research Missions as in previous AOPs – SRA will embark on a new method of reporting by R&D program, offering consistency with the Ten-Year Plan.

Sugar Plus

The Australian sugarcane industry has released its first whole-of-industry vision and roadmap.

Sugar Plus – Fuelling the Future of Food, Energy and Fabrication, outlines a clear path for the Australian industry to secure and grow its value for future generations.

The roadmap sets out a series of actions in the near, medium, and longer term, to strengthen and build the industry while charting a path to a bigger, bolder future.

District Productivity Plans

Sugar Research Australia’s District Productivity Plans have been developed through consultation and engagement undertaken through SRA’s Industry Services team. Development of the plans has involved participants across the sugar industry supply chain to identify constraints impacting productivity and profitability at the local level. The plans highlight specific local issues with proposed solutions and actions to address them and will be updated and reviewed annually to drive investment at a local level. Reporting on progress will occur six monthly. The key to success will be implementation which will require leadership, change and focus. Copies of the district plans are available for download below:

Burdekin District Productivity Plan Central District Productivity Plan

Far North District Productivity Plan Herbert District Productivity Plan

Southern District Productivity Plan Tully District Productivity Plan

South Johnstone District Productivity Plan

The SRA Strategic Plan 2021-2026 outlines five key research missions, each targeting specific challenges and opportunities within the sugarcane industry:

1. Profitable and Productive:

Focuses on improving yield efficiency to overcome rising input costs. Expands breeding research, international partnerships, and smart farming technologies.