What is innovation management and how does it relate to Australia's food industry?

The food industry is the largest of Australia's manufacturing sectors. It is facing increased challenges from globalisation of the industry. Recent years have seen increased mergers and acquisitions and entry into our national market of powerful new multinational retailers. The National Food Industry Strategy launched in June 2002, has identified stimulation of innovation as critical to maintaining the competitive position of the food industry in the face of rapid globalisation.

Innovation in the food industry is manifested in many ways, via new products, processes, packaging, transport and supply chain relationships. Industry and the academics who study it have increasingly recognised that innovation is also manifested in management practices and organisational structures that help companies identify opportunities and develop and commercialise new or improved technologies, products or processes.

Research and training to enhance our understanding of many facets of innovation management good practice has increased in the past decade. As a result, there is a rich set of resources and suppliers, both nationally and internationally, that may contribute to improving our innovation capabilities. Some of these resources may assist Australia's food industry in creating more innovative cultures in their companies. These resources may be intellectual or practical, tangible or intangible, technological, financial, and human.

The Innovation Management Toolkit project will develop and offer a web-based innovation management consulting service for the food industry.

The website will include:

• A 'taxonomy' that aims to help classify the many service suppliers, tools and methodologies available to the food industry;
• A partial inventory of innovation management tools and methodologies that may be useful to the food industry;
• A partial inventory of the many organisations that may contribute some of the resources that may help improve corporate innovation in the food industry;
• An annotated bibliography of useful readings from the literature on innovation management;
• Selected reports from project partners that may be downloaded (e.g. Marcure, 1999, "Report of CSIRO's Project Cassandra Food Foresighting Initiative");
• Keyword-searchable abstracts of some particularly useful articles;
• An annotated bibliography of useful websites on innovation management with hotlinks to sites described;
• A calendar of events, including executive briefings on international food industry innovation initiatives; and
• 'Interest profile' survey to ensure you received electronic access to resources and invitations to events that may contribute to the ability of your organisation to manage its innovation challenges.