Miles Ellery wins Curtin University’s award for Most Outstanding Full-Time Honours Student in Agriculture

A budding agricultural science scholar based in WA’s Wheatbelt has scooped a prestigious award for his research into new alternatives to the chemical fertiliser superphosphate. Miles Ellery was this month crowned Most Outstanding Full-Time Honours Student in Agriculture by Curtin University’s School of Molecular and Life Sciences. The award recognised his extensive research examining the potential of struvite — a wastewater treatment by-product of magnesium, ammonium and phosphate — as a potential new option for phosphorous fertiliser. “We need phosphorous for productive pastures in high-rainfall zones, and my research has assessed whether there are alternatives to superphosphate,” Mr Ellery said. “This can still be effective on-farm but there can be environmental impacts depending on rainfall events.” Mr Ellery — who works as CSBP Fertilisers’ Brookton area senior account manager when he is not studying — also investigated if recycled phosphorous can be an option for future sustainable resource management. He said the combination of research and on-the-job experience enabled him to give better nutritional advice to WA growers. “This experience has given me confidence to use field research results as the basis for recommendations, and given all results feed back into CSBP’s NUlogic model it makes me confident of using that for recommendations based on soil analysis,” he said. “Showing nutrition trends in the field is important for providing confidence in sustainable, profitable fertiliser strategies.” The struvite trial included multiple field days, as well as university networking events where Mr Ellery discussed his results with other researchers and industry players. “This helped me build a network with diverse opinions and insights on farming and fertiliser strategies, and these ideas can also be passed on to growers for discussion and potential implementation on farm,” he said. CSBP has a long-standing relationship with Curtin University and has committed to supporting the School of Molecular and Life Sciences’ annual students awards for the next five years. CSBP general manager Ryan Lamp congratulated Mr Ellery — who joined CSBP in 2021 as an agricultural officer on the field research team — for his “outstanding academic efforts”. “As a business we are always searching for innovative fertiliser sources and application strategies that can responsibly enhance farm productivity and ultimately boost profitability for WA growers,” Mr Lamp said. “Miles’ research over recent years has strongly supported this aim, and we are pleased to see the benefits of CSBP’s trial work in Miles’ research outcomes.” Mr Ellery said he was honoured to receive the latest accolade, which comes after he was earlier this year the runner-up for the Young Professionals in Agriculture Forum’s annual Noel Fitzpatrick Medal for the same research.