Opening of the Plant Futures Facility

Speech delivered by Professor Deborah Terry at the opening of the Plant Futures Facility at St Lucia.

Date: 6 June 2025

 

Thank you, Sue – and good morning, everyone. 

Before we begin, I would like to acknowledge the Traditional Owners of the lands on which we meet today and pay my respects to Elders past, present and emerging.

I’d also like to acknowledge some special guests who have joined us here today:

  • Mr Michael Berkman MP, the Member for Maiwar
  • Mr James Martin MP, the Member for Stretton
  • Professor Kerrie Wilson, Queensland Chief Scientist
  • Councillor Tanya Milligan, Mayor of the Lockyer Valley Regional Council
  • Mr Peter Varghese AO, Chancellor – and members of the University Senate
  • Representatives of our building design and construction partners
  • Representatives from our government and industry partners
  • UQ colleagues and distinguished guests

I’d like to warmly welcome you all to our St Lucia campus for the official opening of Queensland’s landmark new research building – the Plant Futures Facility.

The actual facility is located just a short, 5-minute stroll down the hill from here – behind the Hartley Teakle Building.

But, as you will have picked up from that video, the Plant Futures Facility is a secure building that’s been carefully designed to enable rigorous experimental research into how precise changes in the environment affect plant growth.

And given the highly-controlled nature of the facility, unfortunately, it’s just not feasible to host an event with lots of people – such as this – inside the new building.

However, we didn’t want to miss the opportunity to celebrate the opening of this globally significant plant research facility.

And so, we decided to take the unconventional step of officially opening the facility from a short distance away – here, at the UQ Art Museum.

The facility that we’re officially opening today is one-of-a-kind.

In terms of its scale and precision, there is certainly no comparable plant research infrastructure anywhere in the Southern Hemisphere.

During construction, it was described to me as a “high security, luxury hotel for plants”.

And that’s a very useful, shorthand way of thinking about the high-tech laboratory facilities that our plant researchers now have access to, here, on our St Lucia campus.

With the laboratory spaces and plant growth rooms in this facility, our researchers can now study how plants respond to different conditions – and even tiny changes in their atmosphere or environment.

Most importantly though, this facility will enable our researchers – working alongside our partners from industry and government – to advance knowledge in a range of areas that will have a real-world impact.

For instance, the scientific evidence that will be produced in this new facility will help us to better understand ecology, and safeguard aspects of biodiversity.

It will help to improve crop productivity, so we can secure a more sustainable food supply, an outcome that will underpin our future economic prosperity.

In addition, the research that is conducted here has the potential to advance the production of new types of fibres, drugs and biofuels.

And it will most certainly help us to better predict – and prepare for – how plants will respond to our changing climate.

The University of Queensland is already recognised as a global leader in many of the scientific fields that we will be advanced in this new facility.

In the most recent National Taiwan Rankings, for instance, we are ranked number 6 in the world for ‘Environment & Ecology’, and number 13 for ‘Agricultural Sciences’. And in the QS Rankings, we’re ranked 15th globally for ‘Agriculture & Forestry’.

In each of these categories, I’m proud to say we lead the nation, with significant research strength that has been built over many decades.

That strength is particularly evident at our Gatton campus, which boasts over 1,000 hectares dedicated to teaching and research in the agricultural, environmental and veterinary sciences.

It’s also evident in the work of the UQ-based Queensland Alliance for Agriculture and Food Innovation, or QAAFI – which is one of the world’s leading research institutes for the study of sub-tropical and tropical agriculture and food production.

UQ has made a $65 million investment in this new facility with the clear and explicit ambition to build the scale, focus and impact of our plant science research.

The design, construction and technical sophistication to deliver on this ambition was not insignificant. 

So, I do want to take this opportunity to acknowledge the ‘dream-team’ of design and construction partners who joined forces to bring our vision for this building to life.

Thank you to the building’s architect Michael Christensen and Michael Lavery, and the team from m3architecture.

You’ve both done a wonderful job of blending form and function in the Plant Futures Facility – while, at the same time, creating a building that pays homage to the surrounding architecture.

I would also like to acknowledge the brilliant contributions of our other design and construction partners from Hansen Yuncken, Conviron, Croudace, NDY, Savills, and Wood PLC.

And, of course, thank you also to Andrew Brodie, Morgan Hook and our Property and Facilities Delivery and Engineering team.

Thank you for the huge effort that went into ensuring that the new infrastructure was designed and built to very exacting standards and thank you to Sarah Armstrong for her ongoing work as the Facility’s Senior Manager.

You’ve all done a wonderful job.

On that note, it’s now my great pleasure to invite Queensland’s Chief Scientist to say a few words on behalf of the Queensland Government – and to officially open the Plant Futures Facility.

Prior to her appointment as our State’s Chief Scientist in 2023, Professor Kerrie Wilson was the Pro Vice-Chancellor, Sustainability and Research Integrity, at QUT, where she also served as Executive Director of the Institute for Future Environments.

We are very proud to say that she is a UQ alum, a former professor of this university and a globally respected environmental scientist.

So, in many ways, she is perfectly positioned to understand the kind of impact that this new facility will have in terms of pushing the boundaries of our globally significant plant science capability. 

Please join me in welcoming Professor Kerrie Wilson.