Welcome

The Agronomy and Agricultural Engineering sections of the International Society of Sugar Cane Technologists (ISSCT) will meet for workshop sessions on Sustainable Sugarcane Production in Townsville from 9-14 September 2012.

These workshops are held every 3 years to allow more informal and in depth discussion between technologists than is possible at the major ISSCT Congress. This will be the 9th Agronomy Workshop. A previous workshop held in Australia in 1997 featured irrigation as the main topic. A combination of agronomy and agricultural engineering topics was proposed because of the interdependence of these skills in a sustainable production system.

The 2012 workshop will be hosted by the Australian Society of Sugar Cane Technologists and BSES Limited. We expect that 60-70 agronomists and agricultural engineers from international sugar industries will attend the workshop. Sessions will also be open to the Australian industry’s technologists, farmers, students and Agri-business representatives. The draft program includes two and a half days of oral and poster presentations and discussions which will feature sessions on:

•   Techniques for increasing profitability
•   Techniques for sustaining production resources
•   Minimising environmental impacts

Full day field trips will be organised to the Burdekin and Herbert River districts to feature Australian sugarcane production technology, farm management and approaches to environmental issues. Australian sugarcane production technology leads the world in the areas of field mechanisation, adaptation of production systems for mechanisation, options for and management of nutrients and chemicals and minimising any environmental foot-print.

Workshop information: