University of Southern Queensland

What's Queensland doing that we're not?

So they've done really well at particularly the University of Southern Queensland, who we work with as we develop our learning resources.

They've done really well to develop offline approaches that work and to expand those to as many places as possible.

They have had significant government support which obviously makes these things easier.

Now, if you've not heard of it, it's a disease that can hit yields pretty hard into the next crop.

Brandon Long asked University of Southern Queensland's lead researcher, Dr Noel Knight, what their findings around this particular disease could mean for Queensland growers.

So we've been targeting net blotch of barley, which is a really important disease, causing around $125 million in losses every year.

And it can even, in susceptible varieties, cause yield losses exceeding 40%.

So good to monitor the crops where the seed was produced.

So where practical, avoid retaining seed from crops with severe net blotch infection.

That is Dr Noel Knight, a research fellow at the University of Southern Queensland Centre for Crop Health, speaking to Brandon Long.

You're listening to the Queensland Country Hour.

But I felt that if I stopped, that was failure and so I wasn't going to let that happen.

But then the University of Southern Queensland were changing their course structure and from sort of contracts and torts, that traditional subject structure, to civil obligations A, B and C.

And so part of that was an introductory to torts.

and an introductory to contract law.

Give it a sleep and wake up and make a decision but also understand that not every day is a good day.

So following your time at the uni, why did you decide to leave the uni and what did you do after that?

So I was working at both the University of Southern Queensland and QUT doing sessional work across both unis and I thought to myself, okay, this is a segue into becoming an academic and I thought I'll start with my Masters and knock that over and And that would give me a higher hourly rate as well within the universities.

And then I'll do my PhD and I'll become an academic.

these issues can be better managed.

Dr Noel Knight is a research fellow at the University of Southern Queensland's Centre for Crop Health.

He tells Brandon Long more about what growers need to keep an eye on this season.

We're in the season of cotton planting now through the beginning of October and there's quite a few regions are getting seed into the ground and getting emergence.

And understanding what's in your field will be important as you think about this as a long-term disease management decision, not necessarily just for this season.

If crops are going in now, the management decisions have probably been made already for this crop, but thinking about those over multiple seasons can be very important.

University of Southern Queensland's Dr Noel Knight speaking to Brandon Long.

It's 22 to 1.

The program is funded by the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade in conjunction with Australian and Indonesian universities.

Katherine Putnam from the University of Southern Queensland is the project lead.

The idea is that they make horror short films together to build cultural understanding and creative partnerships between both countries.

We are living, you know, in a period that people feel quite anxious about the future, so horror has this opportunity, uh, to breed- to bridge those cultures.

Thank you for sharing that as well, and tell us more about, uh, your role, uh, at the university.

I work at the University of Southern Queensland.

I'm, uh, full-time, uh, you know, full-time research.

Um, I've got a, a title as chair of cancer survivorship, which is allows me to, to focus on those things that are, that are important to me.

My...

Got wonderful work opportunities.

I, I really enjoy the people I work with at the UICC, uh, the Prostate Cancer Foundation of Australia, at the University of Southern Queensland.

I mean, I'm blessed in that regard.