Premier congratulates Asahi Holdings and QUT on agreement

Published Thursday, 01 October, 2015 at 05:13 PM

Premier and Minister for the Arts
The Honourable Annastacia Palaszczuk

In Tokyo today as part of a trade mission, Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk witnessed the signing of an agreement between one of the world’s largest beverage and food conglomerates, Asahi Holdings, and Queensland’s QUT.

While visiting Asahi’s Research Centre, the Premier congratulated QUT and Asahi on the agreement, which will take their joint sugar industry-based research to the next important phase.

“This project is a prime example of the potential success of collaborative research and development that my Government supports and encourages through our Advance Queensland initiative,” she said.

“Many Australians are familiar with Asahi beer. What they may not realise is Asahi is also synonymous with not just a quality product but quality research and development.

“I understand that through its independent research, Asahi discovered a low maintenance sugarcane process that would increase the yield of both sugar and ethanol without needing to greatly increase the input of sugarcane.

“I also understand, that Trade and Investment Queensland’s Japan office facilitated the introduction that led to QUT’s Centre for Tropical Crops and Bio-commodities undertaking testing of Asahi’s development process.

“I am pleased to be here with a business delegation from all over Queensland, but particularly regional Queensland, to support the drive to build partnerships between Queensland universities and corporate partners seeking commercialisation opportunities.”

The Memorandum of Understanding signed today will see Asahi and QUT advancing their collaboration on research that, if proven successful at a commercial level, could have significant benefits for Queensland’s sugar industry.

It will build on work already undertaken at QUT’s Pilot Plant in Mackay, and is part of the QUT Centre for Tropical Crops and Bio-commodities research program.

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