In the latest edition of eChook, Professor Mingan Choct, CEO of Poultry CRC, writes:

The 28th Biennial Conference for the Australian Society of Animal Production (ASAP) was held at the University of New England in Armidale from 11 to 15 of July. The theme of the conference was 'Livestock production in a changing environment'. This theme fits well with the main objective of the Poultry CRC, i.e., producing more from less, sustainably, and helping to ensure Australia's food security for the future.

The Poultry CRC, together with the Beef and Sheep CRCs and the CRC for Remote Economic Participation, featured strongly at the conference's Innovation Session where the importance and challenges of driving adoption in the livestock industries were discussed.

Lloyd Thomson, our Commercial Manager, presented on the Poultry CRC's approaches to transferring technology outcomes to industry, and I gave an overview of the CRC and its activities. The Poultry CRC also sponsored the inaugural J.L.Barnett Lecture, which was given by Professor Paul Hemsworth, who worked with the late John Barnett in the field of animal welfare.

Traditionally, the ASAP conferences focussed almost exclusively on sheep and cattle production but the 28th conference included considerable content on non-ruminant production. When asked why this was the case, I explained that in the face of climate change and marginalisation of agricultural science in our society, all agricultural industries had a need to unite in their minds our approaches to education, adoption and commercialisation in the future.