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AGRICULTURAL AND FOOD SCIENCES
This scientific community was launch on the 30th of April 2025 during the Agri-Food Seminar. It was born after a series of event organised with INRAe and The Embassy of France to Australia. This community aims to gather stakeholders and organisations from agricultural, fisheries and forestry sciences.
NEWS AND OPPORTUNITIES
COMMUNITY ACTIVITIES
FOCUS ON INRAE'S PARTNERSHIPS IN AUSTRALIA
PARTNERS IN AUSTRALIA
Sustainable Farms is a unique multi-disciplinary research and education program led by the Australian National University. Our work focuses on the integration of biodiversity conservation with agricultural production on farms across 8.3 million hectares in south-eastern Australia. This landscape is characterised by the critically endangered Box-Gum Grassy Woodland ecological community, of which less than 5% remains, predominantly on private land. Our team have been undertaking ecological monitoring at more than 850 farm study sites for over 25 years.
The Sustainable Farms team works with landholders, as well as government, industry and community organisations, to share our research and empower landholders to make more informed, science-based management decisions about the management of natural assets on their properties. Our research demonstrates that well-managed natural assets, such as remnant woodland, shelterbelts, farm dams and riparian areas, can have multiple benefits for biodiversity, agricultural production, climate change mitigation and farmer well-being. We also work with the government to inform policy development for the Nature Repair Market.
COMMUNITY LEADERS
JEAN-FRANÇOIS HOCQUETTE
Jean-François is Research Director and Scientific Officer in charge of International Relationships for Australia and New-Zealand of INRAE (the French National Research Institute for Agriculture, Food and Environment). His research interests concern muscle biology, genomics and consumer studies as relevant to muscle growth or beef eating quality. He was leader of the research team “Muscle Growth and Metabolism” (1999-2006), and Director of the Herbivore Research Unit (172 staff, 2006-2010). He has been working for the French High Council for Evaluation of Research and Higher Education (HCERES) from 2012 to 2021. He is now president of the French Association for Animal Production. He was awarded twice by the American Society of Animal Sciences (2014 and 2021). He has organized the World Congress of Animal Science in Lyon in 2023.
ANDY SHEPPARD
Dr Sheppard is a Chief Research Scientist in CSIRO, and the Co-Executive Director of Department of Agriculture Fisheries and Forestry-CSIRO Catalysing Australia's Biosecurity Initiative after instigating this partnership across both agencies. He is also the Director of CSIRO’s European Laboratory in Montpellier France. He serves on a number of boards/advisory committees including the OECD Cooperative Research Programme Governing Board and the Scientific Advisory Body and the Federal Government Threatened Species Scientific Committee. He is an elected fellow of the Australian Academy of Technology & Engineering and International Fellow of the Académie d'Agriculture de France
