2011/737 Seafood Industry Partners’ Project (SIPP) 2011 retreat: Connecting early career researchers with the Australian seafood industry through meaningful coaching partnerships: Year 3

By Mark Oliver and Emily Mantilla

The Seafood CRC's Education and Training Program has a strong end-user focus and needs to ensure "industry ready" graduates enter the Australian seafood industry at the completion of their candidature. The desire to develop the capabilities of both young researchers and industry participants is a strong and major driving force in the Seafood CRC. As such, research students and Post Doctoral Research Scientists (early career scientists) will be part of a program that enhances their pathway into further seafood research or industry careers. This program is called the Seafood Industry Partners Project (or SIPP) and usually takes the form of a yearly training "retreat".

The central theme for SIPP 2011 was post-harvest orientated with a sizeable focus on seafood meal development, preparation, cooking and presentation. This theme allowed for a group of world class chefs to assist with a 'seafood innovation challenge' with our early career scientists, mentors and Seafood CRC staff. The Seafood CRC secured the Sydney Seafood School located at Sydney Fish Markets (SFM) as the venue for the seafood challenge. SIPP 2011 consisted of a welcome lunch; workshops on product development, seafood quality, intellectual property; a presentation by chef Cole Thomas on the use of seafood in a restaurant; the actual 'seafood innovation challenge' involving world-class chefs; a working dinner and a tour of the SFM auction floor.

A total of 16 PhD students, three Masters by Research and one Post-Doctoral Research Scientist participated in SIPP 2011. Furthermore, a total of eight industry mentors and five internationally acclaimed chefs actively participated in SIPP 2011.