Small laboratory gins are a vital piece of equipment in cotton research at the plant breeding and other subjects where small plots are used. CSIRO’s plant breeding program has more than 30,000 small plots for ginning. Since the instance of Fusarium wilt, sites with that disease have not been sampled for ginning and fibre quality. This reduces the available information on fibre quality. One solution is to have a gin located at Goondiwindi or Moree for ginning samples from breeding or other plots, so fibre can be tested at a contract testing line in the same valley.

The gin has been successfully purchased, delivered and modified to appropriate operating safety standards. The gin ensures better and more comprehensive data from all sites and thus assists with better decisions on breeding line selection.