The Australian sugar industry enters the new millennium facing both old and new
challenges for survival and growth. Globalisation is pushing countries like Australia to
world class competitiveness in order to survive while others have and will probably
continue to enjoy concessions and protection. Technology must provide the platform for
survival and growth in this environment. It will not be good enough to nibble at the
edges with increment improvements. This coming decade will demand material
technological breakthroughs capable of delivering substantial (at least 35%) reduction in
the capital cost of production capacity, sustainable by-product opportunities, minimum
energy consumption and minimum waste. Lesser opportunities also exist for reducing
the unit cost of production and, while they are important, they are not as critical as the
focus on capital cost. Structural change to the industry and a total industry approach to
technology development will be necessary to achieve viability benchmarks.