R&D update: What 120 years in business can teach us about incremental change
13 March 2026
16 March 2026
For more than a century the historic Yarralumla Nursery has helped shape the iconic and enduring greenspaces of the nation’s capital. To keep pace with environmental conditions, increased biosecurity risks, and evolving best-practice standards, Yarralumla turned to the levy-funded GrowConnex program in 2015.
Yarralumla’s engagement with GrowConnex didn’t turn the processes they’d held for more than a century on its head. Instead, their engagement with the levy-funded program opened avenues for testing ideas, managing risk, and adapting practices incrementally – lifting their standards one step at a time.
Core lessons
Engagement with GrowConnex supported the multi-generational nursery in assessing learned and current ways of working by identifying areas where they can improve and future-proof the business.
Led by best management principles and supported by GrowConnex, some changes came in the form of:
- water treatment design, ensuring clean, consistent water for plant health and disease reduction, reducing the time needed for plant maintenance.
- propagation facility overhaul for better climate management and seedling care
- automated systems to reduce labour pressure and improve operational consistency
- changes to growing substrate to maintain optimal plant health, improve nutrient availability and address material degradation
- data capture and storage to inform decision making
Attributing R&D investment to their growing capacity as a nursery, Yarralumla is continually lifting standards with the intention of having their progress recognised with their Nursery Industry Accreditation Scheme Australia (NIASA) accreditation.
Confidence and knowledge transfer
Yarralumla shows that rather than adopting one single practice, using R&D as a decision-support tool allows businesses to evolve confidently rather than react under pressure.
The confidence gained from the support of the GrowConnex program has supported the balance of legacy systems with emerging pressures. With climate change, biosecurity threats and workforce pressures evolving, transferring skills and knowledge through R&D is vital for continued business resilience.
Yarralumla Product Supervisor Shane Campion said the insights available through GrowConnex inform their everyday practice.
“Accessing levy resources via Colin gives us a greater sense of assurance and the confidence to continually improve and challenge our processes,” Shane said.
Industry insight
The research and insights that become available through levy-funded projects empower nurseries like Yarralumla to stay connected to emerging challenges and industry developments
Aided by a ‘softly-softly’ approach, the allowance of adoption over the span of years has supported a gradual shift toward best management principles to lift their nursery standard.
For businesses with legacies comparable to Yarralumla, or practices that have not been reviewed within the last decade, engagement with GrowConnex for slow, guided support for industry- and future-informed decision making may be of benefit.
If you’re concerned about the impact of climate, biosecurity incursions, or changing workforce on your business practices, support through the levy R&D and GrowConnex program is available. Your levy is working for solutions to your challenges today. To ensure you’re utilising the resources and benefits available to you connect with your local GrowConnex expert.
ENDS
The ‘National Biosecurity and Sustainable Plant Production Program’ (NY20001), funded by Hort Innovation using the nursery levy and matched by the Australian Government, is a horticulture initiative designed to support nurseries in strengthening biosecurity and sustainable production practices.
