Led at a national level by CSIRO, the RiskWi$e project is helping grain growers understand the trade-off between potential reward and downside risk across a range of farm management decisions.

RiskWi$e's aim is for growers to be able to get decisions ‘more right more often’. It is working to support grower on-farm decision making across four key themes.

1. Nitrogen and input management: Making fertiliser and other input decisions that optimse long-term rewards vs risks
2. Enterprise financial decisions: Making farm machinery, technology, infrastucture and asset investment decisions
3. Agronomic decisions: What crop to grow, when to sow and how to maximise returns in a range of seasonal conditions
4. Natural resource capital management: Balancing short-term profit while maintaining long-term soil function and productivity

RiskWi$e in NSW

Southern NSW Innovation Hub leads the RiskWi$e NSW Action Research Group working on a range of projects in collaboration with grower group and research partners, including:

• AgGrow Agronomy
• AMPS Research
• Central West Farming Systems (CWFS)
• FarmLink Research
• Grain Orana Alliance (GOA)
• Holbrook Landcare Network
• Irrigation Farmers Network (IFN)
• Riverine Plains

Research themes and projects in NSW:

Nitrogen decisions

• Testing nitrogen (N) sequence targets vs traditional budgets
• Measuring yield projections, biological/economic optimums, and local practice
• Exploring grower attitudes and behaviours around N management
• (AgGrow, AMPS Research, CWFS, FarmLink, GOA, and IFN)

Enterprise agronomic decisions

• Managing Phosphorus (P) in the farming system: Testing strategies to reduce P input costs on high‑P soils (AgGrow)
• Lime and learn: Assessing risks/rewards in acid soils of low‑rainfall systems (GOA)
• Rotational decisions in northern cropping systems: Improving cropping system choices through simulations and participatory research (AMPS)

Enterprise financial decisions

• Major capital acquisitions: Tools and information for farm expansion, machinery, and storage investments (AMPS)
• Slow thinking frameworks: Helping growers adopt slower, more deliberate decision‑making under uncertainty (Riverine Plains and Holbrook Landcare Network)

Natural resource management

• Soil carbon risks in cropping systems: Workshops, surveys, and case studies to understand carbon storage, cycling, and offsetting risks (CWFS)

RiskWi$e news

• October 2026 Update
• April 2026 Update

Resources

• Webinar: Making fast harvest decisions, wisely (2026)
• GRDC Groundcover: Trials aim to simplify nitrogen decisions (2026)
• Fast Graphs for Slow Thinking N Calculator (2026)
• GRDC Update Paper: Comparing nitrogen management strategies to inform risk–reward (February 2026)
• GRDC Update Paper: Nitrogen decisions - how to get them more right more often (January 2026)
• GRDC Update Paper: Benchmarking 'good' farm decision-making (January 2026)
• GRDC Groundcover: Behavioural science helps clarify the risks and rewards of decision-making (July 2025)
• GRDC Update Paper: Improving grower confidence in late sown canola (July 2025)
• Podcast series: Navigating on-farm risk and reward (June 2025)

Reports

• RiskWi$e Behavioural Science Progress Update (November 2025, by Dr Brendan Brown, RiskWi$e National Project Lead - Behavioural Science, CSIRO)

National project lead

CSIRO

Project funding

RiskWi$e is a five-year, $30 million national investment by the Grains Research and Development Corporation (GRDC).