APPN’s new annual progress report video

APPN is pleased to release its video report of progress and achievements for the 2024-25 year.

Presented by APPN CEO Richard Dickmann and hosted on APPN’s new Vimeo channel, this Annual Report reviews the changes, expansion, equipment and ongoing research projects supported by the national APPN team. 

The video covers an exciting and extremely productive year at APPN. We have made enormous progress in our scale, organisation and capabilities to position ourselves as Australia’s national plant phenotyping infrastructure and a globally respected phenomics network.

APPN now comprises nine Nodes hosted by renowned plant research institutions across Australia, along with our Head Office and Central Data teams, both based in Adelaide. 

Across this Node network, we have undertaken a wide range of impactful projects, often in collaboration with multiple Nodes, other NCRIS-funded organisations, and the Grains Research and Development Corporation (GRDC). These include the Multi-Scalar Crop Characterisation Network national field trials data project, the multi-partner OzBarley project to support ongoing Australian barley breeding, plus research into frost and heat tolerance in wheat, productivity in oaten hay, and more.

As the video report shows, the year’s developments also included a significant expansion of our phenotyping capabilities with major investments in new mobile and field phenotyping systems through co-investment by GRDC. These include some of the most sophisticated drones and sensor packages ever used for crop phenotyping in Australia. 

Last, and by no means least, Mr Dickmann outlines the remarkable growth of our team, which has since exceeded 100 staff across all our Nodes. 

It is important to acknowledge that our people and their talent are our most important assets and APPN welcomed and farewelled many great people during 2024-25, from changes in our Board and executive team, to the ongoing support of several promising individual research projects through our expanded Postgraduate Internship Awards program. 

The video is a great record of APPN’s many changes and achievements in a single 12-month period. We encourage you to watch it to catch up on our progress – and to anticipate how much more we will accomplish in the months and years ahead.

Watch now

31 October 2025