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University of Sydney heading $16m dairy recovery in New South Wales

As part of a multimillion-dollar bushfire resilience initiative, the University of Sydney will lead research into the recovery and resilience of NSW’s dairy industry.

This comes as part of a collaboration between the NSW government, the private sector and the University of Sydney, aimed to address concern for the dairy industry, which has faced years of drought and bushfires in 2020.

David Littleproud, Australia’s Minister for Emergency Management and Adam Marshall, NSW’s Minister for Agriculture announced that the $16 million would be invested over a five-year program. The announcement also marked the initiatives first meeting at the Dairy Research Foundations (DRF) headquarters.

“Agriculture is the cornerstone of the economic recovery and the dairy industry is embracing innovations to keep the sector growing,” said Littleproud.

Stephen Garton, vice-chancellor of the University of Sydney highlighted this initiative as an example of the role the university sector could play in addressing complex social issues.

“This innovative, collaborative project draws on the University’s deep expertise and industry partnerships to ‘future-proof’ the dairy industry in the face of drought and bushfires while increasing productivity – helping safeguard our food security,” said Garton.

The University of Sydney will focus the program on what they’ve termed the ‘4Hs’: healthy milk, cows, systems and people.

“The program looks to unlock the potential of milk, cow and water to increase farm business profit, de-risk the dairy industry and develop new markets. We hope to accelerate the sector’s recovery and contribute to its future successes and profitability,” said Sergio (Yani) Garcia, project lead and the University of Sydneys DRF director highlights.

“This collaborative program will invigorate dairy RD&E in NSW, marking the beginning of a new and vibrant future for the NSW dairy industry, with true integration of all industry sectors,” Garcia said.

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