Rural Industries Research & Development Corporation

|| Home || Search || Contact ||  Publications Eshop  || Privacy Statement ||

 

Freedom of Information The Corporation publishes or holds the following categories of documents: those provided free to the public, while stocks are available, or displayed on the Corporation’s website; those sold to the public on a partial cost-recovery basis; and general administrative documents, including project and personnel files. A listing of projects funded by the Corporation in 2000/2001 is set out in Research-in-Progress, June 2001 which is on the Corporation’s website. Funding information on individual projects is available, on request, from the Corporation. The Corporation received two requests under the Freedom of Information Act in 2000/2001. General inquiries about access to documents or other matters relating to FOI should be directed to: Mr Claudio Ciuffetelli Manager, Business & Finance Rural Industries Research and Development Corporation PO Box 4776 KINGSTON ACT 2604 Phone: (02) 6272 4656 Fax:  (02) 6272 5877 Email: claudioc@rirdc.gov.au

Operational Reporting How our Staff are Employed Staff Numbers and Remuneration Staff Training Accountability to Industry Corporate Publications Public Relations The Web Project Listings Royalties RIRDC’s Commercialisation Policy Framework Scholarships

 

Key Objective To attract and retain an innovative, productive, creative and committed group of staff. Key Results More staff now doing a greater mix of tasks.   Cost effective and reliable corporate IT systems.   Corporate systems that continue to meet accreditation standards with ISO 9002 Quality Assurance from SGS International Certification Services Pty. Ltd.   No claims lodged with Comcare in 2000/2001.   Absenteeism of 24 hours per employee in 2000/2001, up from 15 hours per employee in 1999/2000. $2,466 per person training investment.   The Year Ahead Continued priority on staff undertaking work related continuing education programs to ensure their preferences continue to grow and they stay with the Corporation.   Have a workplace which results in zero Comcare claims.   Ensure the Corporation is in the lowest 25 per cent quartile on absenteeism when compared to industry benchmarks.

How our staff are employed RIRDC staff are employed under Section 87 of the PIERD Act 1989. This legislation requires the Corporation to determine the appropriate established terms and conditions of employment for its staff.  During 2000/2001 all staff other than those on individual contracts were covered by the RIRDC General Terms and Conditions of Employment. These terms were reviewed in September 2000 and a new two year agreement endorsed by the Board and the staff. It took effect from 1 October 2000. Under these arrangements the Corporation reserves the right to employ new staff on either individual contracts or on the general terms and conditions. Staff numbers and remunerations At the end June 2001 the Corporation had 16 staff members engaged on a full-time basis. Nine of these were on individual contracts. RIRDC also had a number of part-time staff. The staff structure at the end June 2001 is shown in Figure 1. Details on the salaries of full-time staff are summarised in the table below. Consistent with its legislative obligations, the Corporation is an equal opportunity employer. Remuneration of full-time RIRDC staff   Salary Range  $  Staff at  30 June 2001  Staff at 30 June 2000 190 001–200 000 1 - 160 001–170 000 1* 1 120 001–130 000 2 1 110 001–120 000 - 1 100 001–110 000 2 1 70 001–80 000 0 1 60 001–70 000 2 3 50 001–60 000 3 1 40 001–50 000 5 3 30 001–40 000 - 4 Remuneration includes salaries, superannuation, accrued leave and other benefits. * Includes a provision for redundancy payment Staff training The Corporation's training investment in 2000/2001 was $39,453. This compares with $20,485 in 1999/2000. On a per capita basis for full-time equivalent staff, this represents an investment of nearly $2,110 in 2000/2001. This investment focused primarily on on-going tertiary education and computer application courses.

 

(a) William M. Mercer Cullen Egan Dell, Corporate Benchmark Monitor: Benchmarking in Practice, July 2001.		Human Resources Benchmarking(a) RIRDC in Context
			Q1	Median		Q3		Average
(b) “By Size”: The RIRDC benchmark group is < 200		By Size(b)
		Training expenditure Per employee ($)
		–Benchmark	815	1,390		1,657		1,643
		– RIRDC			2,110
		Training Expenditure as % of Base Salary Costs
		– Benchmark	1.5	2.3		2.9		2.7
		– RIRDC			3.1
		Total Staff Turnover (%)
		– Benchmark	14.3	19.4		24.9		19.8
		– RIRDC			21.4
		Sick Leave Days per Employee
		– Benchmark	4.76	5.56		6.2		5.3
		– RIRDC			3.24
(c) “By Industry”: The RIRDC benchmark group is public service		By Industry (c)
		Training expenditure Per employee ($)
		– Benchmark	588	1,124		1,524		1,202
		– RIRDC			2,110
		Training Expenditure as % of Base Salary Costs
		– Benchmark	1.4	2.3		2.5		2.2
		– RIRDC			3.1
		Total Staff Turnover (%)
		– Benchmark	16.2	20.4		24.3		21.0
		– RIRDC			21.4
		Sick Leave Days per Employee
		– Benchmark	5.0	6.0		6.7		5.9
		– RIRDC			3.24

 

Our People

Our Staff Values:

• To nurture a climate of mutual trust and respect

• To understand, accept and value individual differences and capabilities

• To recognise and respect the role of a cohesive and co-operative team, built on shared goals, successes and setbacks

• To communicate, question and consult openly and honestly throughout the whole organisation

• To clearly define roles, delegations, responsibilities and accountabilities

• To support and commit to personal and professional development.

Accountability to Industry

For the purposes of reporting on operations in 2000/2001, RIRDC had three organisations prescribed by Section 7 of its legislation. This requires RIRDC to report annually on its activities each financial period. This accountability runs parallel to RIRDC’s Annual Report to the Minister and the Parliament. Separately, it is relevant to note that the Deer, Honeybee and Rice Industries are nominated as representative bodies for the Primary Industry (Excise) Levies Act 1999. Formal reporting during 2000/2001 occurred as follows:

• National Farmers’ Federation (NFF)

15 November 2000.

• The Australian Egg Industry Association (AEIA)

6 November 2000.
 
• Australian Chicken Meat Association (ACMA)

6 March 2001

RIRDC’s reporting to these three prescribed bodies was done when industry meetings were being held for their own purposes. The Corporation made no payments towards the costs of these meetings.

On 24 March 2001 the Corporation reported to the Deer Industry Association of Australia on the operations of sub-program 2.4 Deer. The cost of this consultation to the Corporation was around $4,000.

The reporting of these consultation arrangements is in accord with guidelines issued by the then Minister on 6 July 1998 on the ‘Funding of Consultation Costs by Primary Industry and Energy Portfolio Statutory Authorities’.

In relation to these guidelines, it should be noted that two of our representative organisations held operative research contracts with the Corporation in 2000/2001.
 
 

Org	Project No.	Project Title
NFF	NFF-1A	Workshop to improve the operation of the Exceptional Circumstances (EC) program
AIEA	AEI-10A	Trialing emergency animal disease arrangements in the Australian egg industry (EIDF)
AIEA	AEI-11A	Options for enhancing industry competitiveness and R&D and marketing efficiency (EIDF)
AIEA	AEI-8A	National industry databases (EIDF)
AIEA	AEI-9A	National Industry Databases (EIDF)
AIEA	MS001-63	Membership of International Egg Commission (EIDF)
AIEA	TA001-23	International Egg Commission Annual Production and Marketing Conference, USA, September 2000 - Mr Hugh McMaster (EIDF)
AIEA	TA001-59	6th European Symposium on Poultry Welfare, Switzerland, Sept 2001 - Mr Peter Bell
AIEA	TA001-60	Visit to Australia, August 2001 - Mr Andrew Joret

Corporate Publications

The Corporation continues to have a very active publications program. The Corporation now has more than 700 publications in its series. Sales in 2000/2001 amounted to $127,147. This compares with $187,969 in the previous year. This decline in revenue is due to two main reasons. Firstly, we sold nearly as many reports in 2000/2001 but they were lower in unit price. Actual sales numbers in 2000/2001 were 9,284 compared with 11,259 in 1999/2000. Secondly, there has been a very significant increase in downloading of reports from our website. Details on new publications issued in 2000/2001 for each sub-program are set out under each respective sub-program.

The Corporation’s pricing policy is based on recouping only the costs of printing and distribution for sub-program specific publications. Corporate publications are free and, for 2000/2001, included:

Corporate documents

• 1999/2000 Annual Report
• 2000/2001 Annual Operational Plan
• 2000/2001 Program Prospectus
• 2001/2002 RIRDC Research in Progress (issued as individual sub-program chapters)
• Publications Catalogue

Newsletters

Corporate Newsletter (four issues)

Newsletters for 10 of the sub-programs:

Agroforestry and Farm Forestry

Organic Produce

Tea Tree Oil

Essential Oils

Wildflowers and Native Plants

Asian Foods

Deer

New Plant Products

Human Capital, Communications and Information Systems – Rural Australia Online

Honeybee – R&D Updates

Five Year Plans

• Five Year R&D Plan for Deer
• Five Year R&D Plan for Wildflowers

Public Relations

The Corporation’s Public Relations program focuses on the promotion of report results to encourage the practical adoption of this knowledge.

During the past year, there has been ongoing development of promotion in agricultural, urban and regional media.

Traditional communications channels are employed, with targeted advertising and media releases.

The successful use of two monthly email newsletters, which have more than 1700 subscribers, shows there are opportunities for low-cost communications through non-traditional channels.

One newsletter contains short articles on RIRDC reports and other news, while the second is a full list of all news reports posted the website each month.

The Corporation also continued to market its products both directly and indirectly through:

Direct mail campaigns to libraries and known RIRDC publication clients; and

Various Corporation newsletters.

RIRDC’s Target Audiences

1 Producers	Current	Potential/new entrants
2. Grower organisations	Industry Associations	NFF	State-based affiliates
3. Government and policy makers	Federal Minister	Parliamentary Secretary	AFFA	State Ministers
4. Research partners & technical providers	State departments for agriculture and resources	CSIRO	Universities	Private companies	Austrade & Supermarket to Asia	Others
5. Media	Rural specialists	Metropolitan	Regional	Trade incl. food industry	R&D journalists	Others
6. Community	Libraries	Educators	Interested others
7. End users	Consumers	Marketers
8. Internal	Canberra-based staff	Externally based staff	Directors	Advisory Committee Members	Contractors

The Web
www.rirdc.gov.au

An important evaluation through a survey of stakeholders and customers in February 2001, showed that the web site was a relevant and very useful tool. Hits to the site have consistently increased, reaching over 180,000 a month, representing more than 120,000 actual pages served.

The site has continued to grow in line with the Government's online content, security privacy and access requirements. All corporate publications are posted quickly to the site. In addition, the site now contains more than 700 free downloadable full research reports (including a separate, brief summary for each) and short reports. The full reports received hits at the rate of nearly 20,000 a month. A similar number of reports are available for online, secure purchase for those customers who want a hard copy. Online sales have averaged over $700 a month.

In an effort to increase interactivity with stakeholders and customers we began emailing, at the end of each month, a list of links and descriptions of new research reports to 1700 people and organisations. This was enthusiastically received and adds to the strategically important free electronic newsletter of major research findings and developments emailed early each month to the same list of subscribers in the agribusiness, agricultural, government and educational fields.

Close liaison and cooperation was maintained with the Internet section of the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry (AFFA) in the development of the Government's Agriculture Portal. Assistance and cooperation also was given to the producers of the Government Science and Industry Portal. In further efforts to bring together appropriate, related research results from around Australia to the attention of stakeholders and customers, hundreds of fact sheets produced by State agricultural departments and agencies and the the New Zealand AgResearch agency, were collected. With each agency's approval and agreement, the titles of the fact sheets with links to each actual publication, were sorted according to RIRDC sub-program subject areas and made available on the site as a complete list and on each sub-program page. The service has attracted much favourable comment.

Other additions to the site included:

Over 100 full research reports, each with a separate brief summary.

An average of three new media releases a month.

The complete text of four quarterly corporate newsletters.

Five-year plan for the Deer Program; a draft plan for the Native Foods Industry and a draft plan for Culinary Herbs.

An updated Annual Operational Plan;

An updated online strategy.

Monthly egg newsletters, a regular deer newsletter and occasional newsletters on agroforestry, tea tree oil, Rural Australia Online and organic produce.

The full text of compendium of Projects completed in 1999/2000 and Research in Progress.

Prospectus of information for researchers preliminary funding proposals and full proposal information and application form.

Other Sites

RIRDC Rural Women’s Award 2001
www.ruralwomensaward.gov.au

This site was established in November 1999 when the Corporation first launched the RIRDC Rural Women’s Award 2000 and has been maintained in line with the recent launch of the Award’s year 2002 program. Access to the site can also be gained through RIRDC’s home page.

RIRDC Extranet

The Corporation has also established an Extranet which enables its Directors and external research managers access to corporate information, previously only available as a local area networked Intranet.

This site works both locally and online and is constantly updated and monitored. It is password protected so that only authorised users can gain access.

Project Listings

This Annual Report does not contain a listing of projects under contract. There were 612 at the end of June 2001.

As an aid to getting the details on each of these individual projects, the Corporation has finalised its Research-in-Progress report, which shows ‘current status’ of projects at the end of May 2001.

In addition, all projects completed in 2000/2001 have summaries showing their key outcomes. As already noted, this report Research-in-Progress, June 2001 has been published on our website (www.rirdc.gov.au) under each respective program area.

Royalties

During 2000/2001 the Corporation received $88,088 (exclusive of GST) in royalty income from the following activities:

Royalties of $83,044 were received from the development and licensing of varieties of certain species of fodder legumes for sowing seed and seed export. This research and commercialisation was undertaken by RIRDC in association with Seedco Australia Cooperative Limited.

Royalties of $2,695 were received from sales of the Australian Rainman computer software developed under the Corporation’s Resilient Agricultural Systems sub-program. The software analysis information for approximately 4000 locations throughout Australia and incorporates the likely effects of the Southern Oscillation Index and of the Sea Surface Temperatures in the Indian Ocean on rainfall in the coming season.

Royalties of $2,349 were generated from sales of the ILT 20A vaccine that was developed by CSIRO with funding from the RIRDC’s Chicken Meat and Egg sub-programs to control infectious laryngotracheitis, a viral respiratory tract disease in poultry.

Scholarships

A key aim of the R&D program is to ensure that portfolio-related industries are supported by people with high-quality scientific, technical and leadership skills. In 2000/2001 the programs also continued to support conferences and field days aimed at providing the platform for transferring information and commercialising R&D outcomes.

The formal postgraduate education programof the Corporation seeks to ensure the industries have a continuous supply of well-trained people. In 2000/2001 the Corporation spent $224,848 (GST exclusive) on this area, $171,348 for continuing scholarships and $53,500 for new scholarships.
 
 

Scholarships awarded in 2000/2001

In 2000/01 the Corporation funded 5 new scholarships as detailed below.
 

Name	Sub-program	Research topic	Organisation
Amelia Martyn	Wildflowers and Native Plants	Physiology and control of bract burn in waratahs	University of Sydney
Wendy Coppin	Wildflowers and Native Plants	The genetics and disease resistance in kangaroo paw	University of Sydney
Robert Doupe	Resilient Agricultural Systems	Selection for faster growing black bean	Murdoch University
Nerida McGilchrist	Horses	The development of safe and efficient grain feeding practices for the Australian Horse Industry	The University of New England
Jacqueline Kattenbelt	Chicken Meat; Eggs	The reverse genetics of Newcastle disease	CSIRO Animal Health (in association with Deakin University)

Ongoing scholarsips

Since 1985, 61 scholarships have been awarded by RIRDC (and its predecessor ASRRC). The Corporation sponsored 13 ongoing post graduate scholarships in 2000/01.
 

Name	Sub-program	Research topic		Organisation
Tyron Venn	Agroforestry	Socio-economic evaluation of management options for native forests on Aurakun community land, Cape York		University of Queensland
Andrew Beaton	New Animal Products	Factors that influence meat quality from kangaroos		University of Sydney
Jenifer Ticehurst	Agroforestry	Hydrological analysis of the spatially explicit integration of agroforestry into Australia's farming systems		Australian National University
Louise Hilton	Chicken Meat; Eggs	The overall objective of this research is to enhance disease resistance and vaccine efficacy in poultry through the administration of cytokine therapy		CSIRO Animal Health (in association with Melbourne University)
Michelle Peters	Eggs	To develop an attenuated strain of Chicken Anaemia Virus suitable for vaccination of chickens		University of Melbourne
Lisa Jane Daniel	Resilient Agricultural Systems	Development of Biotechnology: Rural Industry Integration Processes		University of Queensland
Xuanli Ma	Wildflowers and Native Plants	Development of Molecular Markers to Support Wildflower Breeding		University of Western Australia
Louise Silvers	Resilient Agricultural Systems	To examine the biological basis of host specificity of myxomia virus strains from North and South America and from Australia in different leporid species at both the cellular and molecular level		Australian National University
Matthew Rudd	Chicken Meat & Eggs		Identification of virulence determinants of infectious bursal disease virus (IBDV)	CSIRO Animal Health (in association with Deakin University)
Wei Leng (Belinda) Chung	Eggs		Defined probiotic preparations for competitive exclusion of enteropathogens from poultry	University of New South Wales
David Pearson	Resilient Agricultural Systems		Brokering a new reality in sustainable food production – the necessity for marketer mandated information in the organic food industry	University of New England
Gemma Graham	New Animal Products		The role of leptin in seasonal weight loss and puberty in the emu	University of Western Australia
David Witcombe	Chicken Meat; Eggs		Production and characterisation of recombinant antigens of Eimeria and their potential use in a maternally-delivered vaccine against poultry coccidiosis	University of Technology, Sydney

Site map Contact us Feedback Links Disclaimer Privacy Statement

Last updated: 18 October 2001
Copyright © RIRDC
http://www.rirdc.gov.au/pub/anrep01/operationalreporting.html