The Narara Section of Gosford Primary Industries Institute opened in 1914 and produced Phylloxera-resistant rootstocks to combat a major outbreak of the Phylloxera aphid in the grape growing areas in New South Wales and Victoria.

With the movement of the citrus and vegetable production areas from the coastal lowlands to the plateau, a field station site was purchased at Somersby in 1953 with soils more characteristic of the main production areas on the Central Coast.

Among many achievements, the release of new rootstocks for the citrus industry has been a major ongoing achievement for the Institute. Gosford Primary Industries Institute has historically produced almost all of the citrus rootstock seed for the Australian citrus propagation industry.

New cultivars have been released to industry from breeding programs associated with strawberries, tomatoes and Australian native ornamental crops. Such crops include geraldton wax, kangaroo paw and lechanultia. Wastage control in citrus fruit and establishment of disinfestation schedules has been developed to enable export of citrus and pome fruit to Asia and the United States.