Did you know?
Good plant moisture status is critical in the first 20 days after flowering to allow potential fibre elongation rates.
While most of rural Australia is bemoaning the lack of interest by our youth in rural vocations, the cotton industry is bracing itself for a rebound in employment. The Cotton Catchment Communities CRC’s cotton production course has experienced steady but relatively low enrolments over the past five years as the industry steadily declined to only 15% of usual production levels. Yet on the back of recent and substantial rain, acreages will easily bounce back to normal for the coming season. But that will require personnel….cotton educated personnel.
The University of New England (UNE) and the University of Sydney (USyd) joined forces this week to bring twenty five, final year agriculture students to Narrabri. Both groups are enrolled in cotton production courses through the Cotton CRC’s education program. The excursion provides students with first hand experience on how cotton is produced in Australia. It also allows students to gain insight into the numerous opportunities the cotton industry and rural Australia has to offer. Faces amongst these groups from past years have gone on to take up positions and perused excellent careers within well known cotton organisations.
The excursion supervisors, Dr. John Stanley (UNE) and Dr. Carina Moeller (USyd) have devised a program which takes the students to local corporate and family cotton farms, as well as the full range of cotton service industries, including gins, classing facilities, marketing and research operations. They will move along the full production cycle. In particular the students will visit Cotton Seed Distributors, Namoi Cotton, Australian Classing Services, the Australian Cotton Research Institute, Auscott (Narrabri), Phil Norrie’s property “Mollee”, Aircair and the Australian Cotton Centre. Industry staff will be on hand to teach the students and pass on their enthusiasm for the roles they perform as producers or researchers.
Amongst the group of local agriculture students were international students from Botswana and Bangladesh experience the ‘real’ rural Australia.
Mr. Habibullah Bahar, who, only arrived with his family from Bangladesh a week ago has signed up for a PhD at UNE on cotton pest control. Mr. Habibullah Bahar has already visited researchers at the Australian Cotton Research Institute to determine the finer points of his study program on non-chemical means of cotton pest control.
The Cotton Production course is not just for undergraduates, it is also of great benefit to those currently working in or new to the cotton industry. The course provides four units of study for those interested in cotton related employment. i) Cotton Production, ii) Cotton Protection, iii) Cotton and the Environment and iv) Cotton Farming Systems. The units are recognised by universities and go towards postgraduate certificates and undergraduate diploma qualifications. Topics include the practical science of cotton growth and crop management, the crop protection from weeds, diseases and pests, how farming practises meet the natural environment and what happens beyond the farm gate.
