Parliamentary procedure
Delegates and mentors of the Youth Ag-Summit gather for a photo in front of Australia's parliament in Canberra, before heading out to a research station.
Photo: Lisa Guenther
Special guest
Belinda Cay of the Grains Research and Development Corporation fills delegates in on farming and ag research. Cay and her family farm in the Adelaide Plains in South Australia.
Photo: Lisa Guenther
Winter Down Under
A late winter day at the CSIRO Ginninderra research station. Youth Ag-Summit delegates learned about a range of topics, including sheep production, wheat phenomics, precision ag and integrated weed management during the day trip.
Photo: Lisa Guenther
Wheat research
Dr. Jose Jimenez-Berni, research scientist at CSIRO, tells delegates how their specialized equipment is used to measure canopy temperature in wheat. Canopy temperature is a measure of water use efficiency, and researchers may select warm or cool canopied plants, depending on rainfall patterns.
Photo: Lisa Guenther
Sheep production
Delegates had a chance to learn all about sheep production, including traceability and flystrike control, during a visit to the shearing shed.
Photo: Lisa Guenther
Meet the gun shearer
Ian Elkins demonstrates the craft of sheep shearing and invites visitors to give the shears a whirl. Elkins is a "gun shearer," slang for a professional shearer who removes fleece quickly without nicking the sheep.
Photo: Lisa Guenther
Just shorn
A freshly sheared wether mingles with his wooly mates outside CSIRO's shearing shed.
Photo: Lisa Guenther
Research on the range
The view from the shearing shed yard at CSIRO's Ginninderra Research Station. The Ginninderra Plain is hemmed in by mountain ranges.
Photo: Lisa Guenther
En masse
Youth Ag-Summit delegates and mentors pose for one last group picture outside CSIRO's shearing shed. The summit included 100 invited delegates from 33 countries, plus mentors to help facilitate discussions.
Photo: Lisa Guenther
Feeding the nine billion-plus people expected to be living on our planet by 2050, from a land base that’s not expected to get any bigger, is the question posed to young “thought leaders” at this year’s Youth Ag-Summit.
Grainews and Country Guide field editor Lisa Guenther is in Canberra this week for the event, hosted by Bayer CropScience and Future Farmers Network (FFN), which follows up on the inaugural Youth Ag-Summit held in Calgary in 2013.
During the event, delegates are to connect with each other, listen to inspirational speakers, exchange ideas in breakout sessions, take part in farm field trips and pledge to help develop local solutions for local conditions in their home countries.
In this photo gallery, delegates visit the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) station at Ginninderra, on the north side of Canberra in Australia. CSIRO is Australia’s national science agency and has been in existence since 1926.
During the visit, Youth Ag-Summit delegates learned about wheat breeding, precision agriculture, integrated weed management, broad acre cropping, and livestock/sheep production and welfare.
