This describes a major research initiative—the Sustainable Grazing Systems (SGS) Program’s "National Experiment"—that has set the standard for how large-scale rural research is planned, conducted and reported. Hence it is a significant "methods" paper. This paper serves as the basic methods description for all other papers that arise from the SGS National Experiment, including many that were published along with our paper in the special SGS edition of the journal. The authors represent a large group of researchers (ca. 40) who comprised the National Experiment team, and who commented on the manuscript.

This paper describes a new framework for organizing and delivering large-scale rural research programs. It comprised 13 innovative R&D integrating processes to combine six diverse research Sites across Australia’s temperate high rainfall zone (>600 mm annual rainfall—a span of some 7,000 km) into a single, integrated experiment. Sites collected a common data set about the productivity and sustainability of grazing systems, so that issues beyond the Site level could be explored. Essential to this approach were database and modelling tools that enabled across-Site issues to be examined by a mix of conventional data analyses and modelling scenarios. This had not been previously attempted at this scale for the Australian grazing industries—or perhaps anywhere. Some of these innovations worked better than others, and we learned from our mistakes how to implement them better next time—refer to the companion SGS National Experiment paper (Andrew et al, Aust. J Exper. Agric. 43: 993-1013, 2003)—in many ways a more significant paper.

Innovations such the themes to link productivity and sustainability issues across the research sites and provide a focus for data analysis, and an additional funded "harvest year" devoted to developing the products from the Program (including the special SGS journal edition papers) have already been adopted by subsequent national research programs.

Analysis of the underlying reasons for the declining productivity and sustainability of the grazing industry in the high rainfall zone of Australia (as indicated by a decline in perennial grass content, in turn linked to increasing soil salinity, soil acidity, and weed invasions, and reduced livestock performance) highlighted the need for improved management of the whole grazing system, not piecemeal approaches. The major funding body, Meat & Livestock Australia, commissioned a small group of leading farmers to plan a new Program of research and on-farm training, which became SGS. This built on a previous national research program (Temperate Pastures Sustainability, the subject of another special edition, Aust J Exper. Agric. 40[2]: 121-356).

The challenge is for research to be effective, to target real needs and be used to develop products that assist farmers to farm more profitably and sustainably. This is especially so in Australia where farmers are significant investors in the research via levies on product sales. The SGS Program as a whole achieved that. It touched about half of all relevant farmers across Australia, and almost all of those participants made beneficial changes to their grazing management to enhance their profitability and sustainability. The SGS National Experiment was part of this effectiveness. Its design and the innovative processes greatly enhanced the effectiveness of the research effort and importantly built ownership with the farmers and other stakeholders. These processes are available to be adapted by any group which wants to improve the effectiveness of their Programs.