Available Scholarships

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Note: This list applies to 2024 scholars. Available scholarships for 2025 scholars will be available in March 2024. 

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Five Drought Resilience Scholarships

This program receives funding from the Australian Government’s Future Drought Fund.

The $5 billion Future Drought Fund is an investment by the Australian Government to build drought resilience in Australia’s agriculture sector, landscapes and communities. Each year, $100 million is made available to help Australian farms and communities prepare for the impacts of drought. These scholarships focus on building drought resilience. We encourage applicants to consider study topic ideas relating to this theme. More details here

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Two Grain Industry Scholarships 

Research ideas:

• The next agricultural revolution

• Limiting the impacts of price and market volatility

• Managing seasonal variability and production risk

• Crops for energy, feed or fuel

• Acting on climate e.g. where and how farmers can have an impact

• Sustainable and ethical production

• Impact of larger farms e.g. on adopting R&D, increasing working capital and risk, labour and the social fabric of farming communities

Please refer to the GRDC RD&E plan here

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Wool Industry Scholarship

Research ideas:

• The benefits of wild dog exclusion fencing

• Can engineering save shearers bodies and increase efficiency?

• How can woolgrowers get carbon out of the air and into their landscape?

• How can woolgrowers be recognised for their biodiversity?

• Governance and participation structures for production livestock genetic benchmarking services

• What’s possible with genomic reference populations?

• Global view of EID in sheep: methods, technology (RFID and databases), individual management opportunities and challenges

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Fisheries and Aquaculture Scholarship 

Research ideas: 

• Alternative technologies for fisheries and aquaculture (catching, production, harvest etc) in an Australian context

• Global scan of leaders in environment, social and governance (ESG) to understand opportunities to position fishing and aquaculture well into the future

• Global investigation of inter-sectoral resource re-allocation to recognise Indigenous interests, identify outcomes and critical decisions that led to achieving outcomes

• Global scan to consider how might fishing and aquaculture re-position to take advantage of natural capital including blue carbon in an Australian context

• Global review of successful, sector supported approaches for gathering and using recreational sector catch and effort information to identify insights able to be applied in Australia

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Red Meat Industry Scholarship

​Research ideas:

• Increased efficiency of animal production, higher profits for producers and an overall increase in on-farm animal welfare and consumer perceptions of welfare

• Increased productivity of the feed base – better plants, better management and utilisation of forage

• Improvement in reproductive efficiencies for breeder herds / flocks through delivering higher survival rates between conception and weaning

• Improved connectivity options for use of digital technologies and developing digital information products and dashboard decision tools/guidelines to provide informed and predictive management systems

• New products, packaging and business model innovations to transform commodity red meat (and its components) into higher valued solutions

• Improvement in technologies that measure key traits to describe carcase value, such as lean meat yield and eating quality, and health attributes

• GHG emissions avoidance (feed additives, forages and genetics) and carbon storage (pastures and trees, grazing management)

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Industry Scholarship from any of the following sectors: 

• Chicken meat 

• Export fodder 

• Thoroughbred horses 

• Honeybee and pollination 

• Rice 

• Pasture seeds 

• Ginger

• Tea Tree Oil

• Kangaroo

• Buffalo

• Goat Fibre

• Deer

Please refer to the AgriFutures website for more details here

 

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Five Horticulture Scholarships

Please refer to the five-year Strategic Investment Plan (SIP) for each industry:

 

Avocado hort-innovation-sip-2022-26-avocado.pdf

 

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Apple/Pear hort-innovation-sip-2022-26-apple-pear-r.pdf

 

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Onion hort-innovation-sip-2022-26-onion.pdf

 

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Raspberry/Blackberry hort-innovation-sip-2022-26-berry-r2.pdf 

 

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Vegetable hort-innovation-sip-2022-26-vegetable-r3.pdf

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Cotton Industry Scholarship 

Research ideas:

Please refer to the CRDC Strategic RD&R plan here

 

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Graincorp scholarship 

Research ideas:

• AgTech

• Agri Energy / biofuels and feedstocks

• Animal nutrition

• Automation on farm

• Biotechnology and genomics (broadacre)

• Carbon and regenerative farming

• Data management and capture solutions

• Grain Testing, Inspection and Certification (TIC)

• International market access for grains

• On-farm storage

• Plant based protein / alternative protein

• Precision farming and agronomy

• Sustainability and circular economy

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PSP Investments Scholarship 

Research ideas:

• regenerative agriculture, carbon sequestration, carbon neutrality, soil health

• technology and data driven innovations: including biotechnology, biologicals and digital tools

• risk mitigation: including climate risk, yield sustainability and input reduction

• natural capital identification, measuration and valuation

• public policy in agriculture

• diversity and inclusion in agriculture

• impacts of institutional investment in agriculture

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CBH Group Scholarship (WA-applicants only)

Research ideas:

Please refer to their website, and in particular, their Sustainability Plan here

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CSBP Fertilisers Scholarship (WA-applicants only)

​Research ideas:

• Improving nutrient use efficiency

• Improving nutrient use efficiency to reduce the emissions intensity of production

• Novel sources of crop nutrition

• Managing risk in broadacre cropping

• Micronutrients for crop and human nutrition

• Biofertilisers and biostimulants – their role in plant nutrition and potential to reduce emissions from production.

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Two Grain Industry Association of WA Scholarships (WA-applicants only)

Research ideas:

Topics that benefit the Western Australian oats industry, such as innovative solutions and opportunities in production, processing, breeding, marketing, agronomy, food and beverage products or more.  Out of scope is oaten hay and oat grain used as unprocessed animal feed.

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William Buckland Foundation Scholarship (Vic-applicants only)

Advancing agriculture by strengthening resilience in agricultural communities

Please refer to their website for more information here

 

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Royal Agricultural Society Foundation Scholarship (NSW-applicants only)

Created in 2007, the Royal Agricultural Society (RAS) Foundation is helping to build strong, vibrant rural and regional communities by providing a range of grants and scholarships for education and community development.

Please refer to their website for more information here

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University of Tasmania/JM Roberts Charitable Trust Scholarship (Tas-applicants only)

Research ideas:

• Soil health and regenerative agriculture

• Resilience to climate change in farming systems

• Low emissions feed technologies

• Projects that are of particular interest to the North Midlands area of Tasmania

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Northern Pastoral Scholarship (Northern pastoral producers only)

The Northern Pastoral Scholarship was launched in 2018 by the Australian Agricultural Company (AACo), Consolidated Pastoral Company (CPC), Elders and S. Kidman & Co. Recognising the need to foster the Northern Australian pastoral sector, these four iconic agricultural companies joined forces to create the scholarship with the aim of enabling recipients to become leaders in their field.

 

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Nell and David Brook in partnership with Southern Queensland Landscapes Scholarship (Qld-applicants only)

​A focus on ensuring a profitable, sustainable and ethical food and fibre industry whilst taking care of waterways, biodiversity and soil. Please refer to their website for more information here 

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Gardiner Dairy Foundation Scholarship (Vic-applicants only)

Gardiner Foundation invests in research and development, people and community development and industry engagement and strategic support to maximise benefit to all sectors of the Victorian dairy industry and dairy communities. Gardiner has contributed over $85m toward Victorian dairy industry projects.

Please refer to their website for more information here 

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Fonterra Australia Suppliers Council Scholarship (Vic and Tas-applicants only)

This scholarship is open to all applicants and is not dependent onyour milk processor. Fonterra Australia Suppliers’ Council (FASC) has an overarching goal to ensure, through representation and open and honest communication, that Fonterra continues to strengthen its partnership its farmers and that we drive the best outcomes for both farmers and Fonterra. Whilst FASC does have a Fonterra farmer focus, they support the wider dairy industry, most notably through our ‘Proud To Be A Dairy Farmer Program’ and a Nuffield Scholarship. Please refer to the website here

Research ideas;

• Dairy antibiotics, sustainable use

• Traceability and new dairy safety innovations

• Lifting dairy farmer engagement in the industry

• Carbon farming and dairy – how can it work on a dairy farm?

• Value streams for non-replacement calves – pros and cons of the changes in approach to non-replacement calves

• Is there a future for the family dairy farm?

• What is the future for pasture based dairy farming?

• Anti-microbials in a dairy cow’s diet (eg in ruminative feeds)

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ANZ Bank Scholarship 

ANZ provides banking and financial products and services to over 8.5 million retail and business customers and has 200 agribusiness managers across Australia. They support numerous grants and programs to support regional Australia, 

Please refer to their website for more information here 

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Woolworths Scholarship 

Since 1924, Woolworths Group has worked hard to offer the best possible convenience, value, range and quality to the 24 million customers they serve each week across their growing network of businesses. More details here