The agency must transfer historical weather records to an online database in coming years, including daily and hourly data from weather stations across the country.

Close to 30,000 station years of data must be uploaded and the bureau is desperate for alternatives to endless taxpayer-funded labour.

Management have decided to test the market for providers who can facilitate the crowdsourcing of digital data for the Australian Historical Climate Record online.

While no price has been set, the bureau is eager to gauge the cost of the project with digitisation now a competitive industry.

The scheme would allow unpaid volunteers to upload data themselves, including hard-copy records from the late-1800s held by the National Archives of Australia.

The successful bidder would manage the volunteer program, including public engagement, on a two-year contract.

"Crowdsourcing has the potential to advance this work much more quickly at lower cost," the spokeswoman said.

She insisted the bureau would not commit to outsourcing work until a proper assessment was made.

"That decision will be dependent on whether funding can be secured, in addition to the market demonstrating capacity to deliver benefit and value for money," she said.

Digitisation is resource intensive and expensive but informs crucial research and forecasting.

Daily climate records go back to 1910, although the data set is incomplete with more work to be done.

"Paper records also exist in various forms that are not currently within the bureau's holdings, such as documentary records from various sources that have not been managed by the bureau," the spokeswoman said.

The National Film and Sound Archive has also called for private companies to assist the digitisation of records,

Late last year, the NFSA says thousands of hours of magnetic tape footage and audio is at risk of being lost by 2025 if not digitised more quickly.

NFSA suggests it can do 2500-3000 hours of digitisation per year, although some private companies claim they can do the same work in two-three weeks.

The National Archives has been making digital copies of selected records available on its website since 2001. Close to 24 million images of archival records are now available online