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r o a i t l Celebrating a I r n o d p u r s t 10 years o r C ie t s en Re m sea lop r ch & Deve

Australia’s Rural Women Revealed, recognised and respected © 2009 Rural Industries Research and Development RIRDC Contact Details Corporation. Rural Industries Research and Development Corporation Level 2, 15 National Circuit All rights reserved. BARTON ACT 2600

ISBN 1 74151 871 7 PO Box 4776 ISSN 1440-6845 KINGSTON ACT 2604

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r o a i t l Celebrating a I r n o d p u r s t 10 years o r C ie t s en Re m sea lop r ch & Deve Australia’s Rural Women Revealed, recognised and respected 4 Foreword

A message from the Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry— The Hon. Tony Burke, MP

The Hon. Tony Burke, MP Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry

Since coming to the agriculture, fi sheries and forestry Th e RIRDC Rural Women’s Award has recognised and portfolio over eighteen months ago, I have been deeply rewarded these exceptional women for the last ten years. encouraged by the resilience and optimism of the women who work on our land. Travelling throughout rural and In increasing women’s capacity to contribute to primary regional Australia, I have had the opportunity to meet industries and rural Australia, the RIRDC Rural Women’s many women whose hard work, both on and off the farm, Award is increasing the pool of women ready and able to signifi cantly contributes to the development and success of embrace leadership opportunities. their communities. I warmly congratulate all participants for the excellent Th e innovation and resourcefulness of women in rural and contributions they have made to their industries and to the regional Australia will be crucial to a vibrant future for our well-being of their communities. Representing a broad range agricultural, fi sheries, forestry and food industries. Together of industries the state and territory winners demonstrate we will help our primary industries meet the global economic outstanding personal skills and abilities and a commitment challenges and benefi t from new international opportunities. to the long-term viability of rural Australia. Th ey are to be Th e Government also wants women in rural and regional commended for taking up the challenge to stretch themselves Australia to play a central role in helping their communities and their capacity to make a diff erence to their respective prepare for climate change. Rural women are hard-working primary industries and rural communities. and innovative, yet they are seriously underrepresented on the boards and industry groups that help to infl uence government By participating in the award, these accomplished women policy and in other leadership and management roles. have helped increase the profi le of their industries, engendered community pride and boosted the self-belief I am personally committed to ensuring that we do better in and confi dence of women throughout rural Australia. this area. Appointments by this government have seen the Th e RIRDC Rural Women’s Award is a truly valuable representation of women on rural Research and Development Corporation boards increase to more than 40 per cent since achievement. I am confi dent that this year’s winners will November 2007, but there is still more work to be done. Th e build upon the distinguished record of the last ten years and Government’s Recognising Women Farmers initiative will continue to take a lead role in strengthening their industry support leadership and capacity building activities for rural and the social fabric of their community. I look forward to women. working with you in the years to come.

5 Preface

Rural Australia must make optimum Th e award’s primary stakeholders—the related service industries—in each state use of its assets if it is to capture the Australian Government Departments and territory are selected against three opportunities that lie ahead and manage of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry criteria: the changes that confront us. Until we and Infrastructure, Transport, Regional • a demonstrated personal see many more women taking their Development and Local Government— commitment to sustainable primary place in leadership and decision-making provide crucial strategic and fi nancial industries and to the role of rural roles, we will not be making the best support. women in their state or territory use of our assets. Th e RIRDC Rural • potential to achieve and deliver Women’s Award has a vital part to play Th e award’s national sponsors—the benefi ts to primary industries in recognising women and preparing Australian Women’s Weekly, ABC Radio • providing leadership and sharing them for these roles. (the original instigator of the ABC Radio skills and knowledge. Australian Rural Woman of the Year) Th is publication celebrates 10 years of and Rural Press Ltd—provide crucial Th e award has evolved over the decade the RIRDC Rural Women’s Award. It media exposure and endorsement. to refl ect the changing needs of its captures the professional and personal recipients, but the leadership and journeys of award recipients since 2000, Since the award’s inception in 2000 business skills and the fi nancial support when the award began. For many close to 150 women, representing have remained constants and central to recipients, the path has led to great every facet of primary industries, have the award’s ability to increase women’s success in business and leadership in been recognised for their vision, their capacity to contribute to primary their industries and communities and leadership and their capacity to make industries and rural Australia. beyond. For others, the vagaries of the a diff erence to primary industries and economy and the climate have thwarted rural Australia. Th e 2009 RIRDC Rural Women’s some of their ambitions. But through all Award provides a bursary of $10 000 Past recipients have used the award and the recipients’ journeys some enduring for each of the seven state and territory the associated bursary to develop new traits shine through—tenacity and a ‘give winners and the opportunity for all markets and value-adding opportunities it a go’ attitude, a passion for primary winners and runners-up to attend for an array of produce, from salmon industries and rural communities, the Australian Institute of Company and yabbies to cheese, horticulture, ingenuity, and a fearlessness about Directors course. Th e bursary provides wildfl owers and wine, to crocodile skins, embracing change to ensure a more the fi nancial support to allow recipients alpaca and wool. Th ey have increased the prosperous future for rural Australia to pursue their vision for their industry collective bargaining power of producers, and the coming generations. Th e Rural and in so doing advance their skills and and in turn producers’ returns; opened Industries Research and Development their capacity to contribute to primary up new conversations and thinking on Corporation applauds these women and industries and rural Australia. the viability of peri-urban agriculture; is proud to recognise them as recipients communicated the importance of Th e 2009 award also provides, for the of the Rural Women’s Award. primary producers to our cities; and fourth consecutive year, the opportunity Th e 10th anniversary of the award challenged paradigms and conventional for one of the seven state and territory is a milestone that refl ects RIRDC’s thinking about climate change. winners to be named the Australian commitment to leadership and capacity winner and another the Australian Recipients contributions to their building for rural industries and runner-up, to represent the award and industries and communities have been communities. RIRDC instigated the rural women at the national level. recognised through appointments to award in order to recognise women’s positions of infl uence, on ministerial contribution to primary industries and, and premiers’ advisory committees importantly, to further develop their and reviews, company and corporation capacity to contribute by providing boards, and as chairs and presidents of the support and resources needed to their industry organisations. Dr Peter O’Brien augment their skills and abilities. Managing Director Although the Rural Women’s Award Rural Industries Research and Th e award is an initiative of RIRDC in acknowledges past achievement, Development Corporation partnership with the state and territory it is fi rmly focused on the future, agencies responsible for agriculture, encouraging women to discover and primary industries and natural resource exploit their strengths and supporting management, which manage the award their leadership and capacity to at the state and territory level. contribute to primary industries and RIRDC is a statutory authority of the rural Australia. Women from all kinds of Australian Government. Our mission primary industries—including broadacre is to maximise knowledge outcomes farming, intensive livestock operations, for industry and government from our cropping, horticulture, fi sheries, forestry, investments in research and development. natural resource management and

6 Contents

Foreword ...... 5

Preface ...... 6

Contents ...... 7

Acknowledgments ...... 10

2000 ...... 11 New South Wales winner: Diana Gibbs ...... 12 New South Wales fi nalist: Sue McGinn OAM ...... 13 New South Wales fi nalist: Margaret Taylor ...... 14 Victorian winner: Rowena Doyle ...... 15 Victorian fi nalist: Jo Gardner ...... 16 Victorian fi nalist: Alison Brinson ...... 17 Queensland winner: Annie Pfeff er ...... 18 Queensland fi nalist: Kerrie Pain (Richards) ...... 19 Queensland fi nalist: Janet Campbell ...... 20 South Australian winner: Carol Schofi eld AM ...... 21 South Australian fi nalist: Jaylene Fuge (Gurr) ...... 22 Western Australian winner: Mary Nenke ...... 23 Western Australian fi nalist: Anne Jennings ...... 24 Western Australian winner: Shelley Birch ...... 25 Tasmanian winner: Anne Taylor ...... 26 Tasmanian fi nalist: Jane Allwright ...... 27 Tasmanian fi nalist: Anne Heazlewood ...... 28 Northern Territory winner: Sue Wainwright ...... 29 Northern Territory fi nalist: Terry Underwood OAM ...... 30

2001 ...... 31 New South Wales winner: Jon Maree Baker ...... 32 New South Wales fi nalist: Barbara Nuthall ...... 33 New South Wales fi nalist: Linda Duff y ...... 34 Victorian winner: Sharyn Munnerley ...... 35 Victorian fi nalist: Lisa Jarvis ...... 36 Queensland winner: Diane Gresham ...... 37 Queensland fi nalist: Lillian Lever ...... 38 South Australian winner: Jeanette Gellard ...... 39 South Australian fi nalist: Tracy Warland ...... 40 Western Australian winner: Rhonda Tonkin ...... 41 Western Australian fi nalist: Janette O’Keefe ...... 42 Tasmanian winner: Frances Bender...... 43 Tasmanian fi nalist: Jodie Epper ...... 44 Northern Territory winner: Carmel Wagstaff ...... 45 Northern Territory fi nalist: Miriam Golding ...... 46 Northern Territory fi nalist: Katrina Wright ...... 47

7 2002 ...... 49 New South Wales winner: Robbie Sefton ...... 50 New South Wales fi nalist: Sandra Doyle ...... 51 New South Wales fi nalist: Ruth Quigley ...... 52 Victorian winner: Carol Mathew ...... 53 Victorian fi nalist: Joanne Butterworth-Gray ...... 54 Queensland winner: Mary Lankester ...... 55 Queensland fi nalist: Suzanne Nation ...... 56 South Australian winner: June Gill ...... 57 South Australian fi nalist: Susan Berlin ...... 58 South Australian fi nalist: Carol Johnson ...... 59 Western Australian winner: Angela Whittington ...... 60 Western Australian fi nalist: Tracey Ebert ...... 61 Western Australian fi nalist: Pamela Williamson ...... 62 Tasmanian winner: Jeanette Reader ...... 63 Tasmanian fi nalist: Christine Mann ...... 64 Northern Territory winner: Kate Hadden ...... 65

2003 ...... 67 New South Wales winner: Milada Safarik ...... 68 New South Wales runner up: Megan Mosely ...... 69 Victorian winner: Anna Aldridge ...... 70 Victorian runner up: Kaye Scholﬁ eld ...... 71 Queensland winner: Desley Vella ...... 72 Queensland runner up : Teena Mammino ...... 73 South Australian winner: Sharon Starick ...... 74 South Australian runner up: Heather Burdon ...... 75 Western Australian winner: Erica Starling ...... 76 Western Australian runner up: Suzanne Woods ...... 77 Tasmanian winner: Lee Adamson Ringk ...... 78 Northern Territory winner: Beverley Wilson ...... 79

2004 ...... 81 New South Wales winner: Rebecca Arnott ...... 82 New South Wales runner up: Lorroi Kirkby ...... 83 Victorian winner: Marilyn Lanyon ...... 84 Victorian runner up: Beverley Fisher ...... 85 Queensland winner: Claudine Ward ...... 86 Queensland runner up: Dee Dunham ...... 87 South Australian winner: Jeanette Long ...... 88 South Australian runner up: Laura Fell ...... 89 Western Australian winner: Diana Morrison...... 90 Western Australian runner up: Wendy Newman ...... 91 Tasmanian winner: Diane Rae ...... 92 Tasmanian runner up: Sandra Gillanders ...... 93 Northern Territory winner: Lee Berryman ...... 94 Northern Territory runner up: Megan Hoskins ...... 95

2005 ...... 97 New South Wales winner: Jennifer Bradley ...... 98 New South Wales runner up: Kate James (Woodward) ...... 99 Victorian winner: Sue Markwell ...... 100 Victorian runner up: Elaine Paton ...... 101 Queensland winner: Anne Osborne ...... 102 Queensland runner up: Delphine Puxty (Bentley) ...... 103 South Australian winner: Lisa Rowntree ...... 104 South Australian runner up: Lyn Dohle ...... 105 Western Australian winner: Maureen Dobra ...... 106 Western Australian runner up: Deborah Oberon ...... 107 Tasmanian winner: Amanda Way ...... 108 Tasmanian runner up: Laura Richardson ...... 109 Northern Territory winner: Ann Palmer ...... 110 Northern Territory runner up: Sarah Fea ...... 111

8 2006 ...... 113 New South Wales winner: Kate Schwager ...... 114 New South Wales runner up: Mary Howard ...... 115 Victorian winner: Yvonne Jennings ...... 116 Victorian runner up: Cate Bell ...... 117 Queensland and Australian winner: Martha Shepherd ...... 118 Queensland runner up: Ann Radke ...... 119 South Australia winner : Heather Baldock ...... 120 South Australia runner up: Roxanne Prime ...... 121 Western Australian winner and Australian runner up: Bev Logue ...... 122 Western Australian runner up: Diana Holly ...... 123 Tasmanian winner: Heather Chong ...... 124 Tasmanian runner up: Cheryl McCartie ...... 125 Northern Territory winner: Janette Hinze ...... 126 Northern Territory runner up: Pippa Kraﬀ t (Clarke) ...... 127

2007 ...... 129 New South Wales winner: Eleanor Cook ...... 130 New South Wales runner up: Fiona Kliendeinst ...... 131 Victorian and Australian winner: Deborah Bain ...... 132 Victorian runner up: Vera Fleming ...... 133 Queensland winner: Sonia Maley ...... 134 Queensland runner up : Linda Jaques ...... 135 South Australian winner and Australian runner up: Abi Spehr ...... 136 South Australian runner up: Natasha Mooney ...... 137 Western Australian winner: Pam Lincoln ...... 138 Western Australian runner up: Pia Boschetti ...... 139 Tasmanian winner: Rachael Treasure ...... 140 Tasmanian runner up: Gail Menegon ...... 141 Northern Territory winner: Tracey Leo ...... 142 Northern Territory runner up: Tina MacFarlane ...... 143

2008 ...... 145 New South Wales winner: Tracey Knowland ...... 146 New South Wales runner up: Louisa Kiely ...... 147 Victorian winner: Lisa Mahon ...... 148 Victorian runner up: Lucy Mayes ...... 149 Queensland and Australian winner: Ros Smerdon ...... 150 Queensland runner up: Georgie Somerset ...... 151 South Australian winner: Domenica Latorre ...... 152 South Australian runner up: Yvonne Smith ...... 153 Western Australian winner and Australian runner up: Maggie Edmonds ...... 154 Western Australian runner up: Audrey Bird ...... 155 Tasmanian winner: Jeanette Fisher ...... 156 Tasmanian runner up: Amabel Fulton ...... 157 Northern Territory winner: Norma Higgins ...... 158

2009 ...... 159 New South Wales winner: Kim Currie...... 160 New South Wales runner up: Gillian Hogendyk ...... 161 Victorian winner: Roma Britnell ...... 162 Victorian runner up: Kate Wilson ...... 163 Queensland winner: Barb Madden ...... 164 Queensland runner up: Wendy Agar ...... 165 South Australian winner: Susi Tegen ...... 166 South Australian runner up: Ulli Spranz ...... 167 Western Australian winner: Kirsten Skraha ...... 168 Western Australian runner up: Doris Parker ...... 169 Tasmanian winner: Jane Lovell ...... 170 Tasmanian runner up: Jane Huntington ...... 171 Northern Territory winner: Mischelle Hill ...... 172 Northern Territory runner up: Moira Lanzarin ...... 173

9 Acknowledgments

Many people have contributed to the success of the RIRDC Rural Women’s Award since its inception in 2000:

• the award recipients themselves

• the state and territory agencies responsible for agriculture, primary industries and natural resource management—for administering the award at the state and territory level

• the Australian Government Departments of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry and Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government—for their valuable strategic and ﬁ nancial support

• the award’s national sponsors—ABC Radio, Rural Press Ltd and the Australian Women’s Weekly

• members of the national, state and territory selection committees

• past and present senators and members of parliament

• employees of the Rural Industries Research and Development Corporation.

10 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award 2000 Participating in the award ...

Diana Gibbs Sue McGinn OAM Margaret Taylor Rowena Doyle Jo Gardner Alison Brinson Annie Pfeffer Kerrie Pain (Richards) Janet Campbell Carol Schofield AM Jaylene Fuge (Gurr) Mary Nenke Anne Jennings Shelley Birch Anne Taylor Jane Allwright Anne Heazlewood Sue Wainwright Terry Underwood OAM

11 2000 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Diana Gibbs New South Wales2000 winner

After much planning and researching, After the launch of the label, we we ﬁ nally launched the Diana Gibbs— developed outlets around Australia, Australian Collection label at Mercedes starting in Sydney and regional New Australian Fashion Week in May 2003. South Wales and gradually extending further. We also sold to a boutique Th is project started with a commitment in the United Kingdom and to a made in 1998 by some wool-growing department store in Copenhagen—the families from the South West Slopes of latter on the strength of having New South Wales to stop selling wool presented two of our wraps to Crown as a commodity and start marketing Princess Mary on the occasion of her it as a product. Th e Rural Women’s visit to Australia. Other items from Award allowed us to develop a business our range have found their way as gifts plan for the project—to manufacture to Dame Graca Machel, Her Majesty high-quality woollen scarves and wraps the Queen of Spain, former Japanese incorporating unique designs that tell Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi, and stories of our land, using Indigenous all recipients of the New South Wales culture as the theme. We engaged RIRDC Rural Women’s Award. Via the specialist factories in Italy to spin and website, we have also sold our products weave Australian merino wool to our to Canada, Germany, Th ailand and the exacting standards. United Kingdom—and, of course, all around Australia.

August 2006 saw us attend our fi rst trade fair, Life in Style, in Melbourne. Th is decision has allowed our business We’re only here for a short visit, so be sure to to grow rapidly: having up-market stop and smell the flowers. tourism, giftware and specialist boutique owners coming to our stand at the fair was much more eff ective than trying to visit potential outlets individually. Th e business expanded so much that in February 2008 we • Community representative on the committee that established launched a second collection, the Diana Cootamundra HealthOne, a community health centre in Gibbs—Natural Collection. Th e focus Cootamundra, 2007 and 2008 of this second collection is still wool, • Director, Forest and Wood Products Research and Development but we have also developed trans- Corporation, 2000 to 2006 seasonal and summer scarves, using • Chair, New South Wales Regional Communities Consultative cotton, linen, silk, cashmere—in fact, Council, 2000 to 2007 any fi bre that is natural. Th e plain styles • Independent member of Governance Committee, New South Wales appeal to a diff erent market and allow Water Loss Management Program, since 2006 us to off er a diff erent price point. We • Member, New South Wales Climate Change Council, since 2006 continue to expand both collections. • Panel member for Wilkinson Inquiry into Recruitment and Retention of Medical Practitioners in Rural and Regional Australia, 2000 and I love showing everyone how beautiful 2001 Australian wool can be—soft and • Panel member for Allan Inquiry into Financial Viability of Local luxurious and used to deliver a very Government in New South Wales, 2005 and 2006 special item. We are proud to be a • Advisor on the economics of the hydrocarbons industry to the Office showcase for this traditional Australian of the Presidency of the Republic of South Africa, 2007 and 2008, industry, and we continue to take our to SasolChevron Qatar, 2006 and 2007, and to Chevron South Asia, wool into new domains. 2006 and 2007

12 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Sue McGinn OAM New South Wales2000 finalist

I entered the world of full-time dairy Th e award gave me the proﬁ le to farming when in 1994 I married my successfully stand for election to the husband, Brett, a fourth-generation board of Dairy Farmers (Australian dairy farmer. Having grown up in Cooperative Foods) in 2000. I sat on Brisbane, I had no farming experience the board for eight years, until Dairy and hadn’t even set foot on a dairy Farmers was sold to National Foods. I farm until we began dating. I naively remain the only woman to have sat on ventured into a new and exciting the cooperative’s board during its 108 industry, having no expectations of years of existence. what I could, or could not, achieve.

It’s better to burn out than rust out.

• Nuffield Scholar, 1998 Fifteen years on, we run a proﬁ table • First International and growing dairy business. We Forum for Women in produce top-quality milk from a Dairy, 2000 high-production purebred Holstein • Elected to Dairy herd. Our focus is marketing elite Farmers board, 2000 Holstein genetics through artiﬁ cial • Elected to Holiday insemination, using the world’s best Coast Credit Union sires. We accelerate our breeding goals board, 2003 by using embryo transfer techniques to • Member of the Order build the female families of our most of Australia, 2005 valuable animals and have sold cattle to • Masters degree enthusiasts in Queensland, New South in Business Wales, Victoria, South Australia and Administration, 2007 Tasmania. Of note is our niche focus on breeding red-and-white Holsteins (they are usually black-and-white), which often attract a premium in the marketplace because they are so rare.

I entered the RIRDC Rural Women’s Award in the hope of winning the bursary and so helping to fund the First International Forum for Women in Dairying, which was held in Sydney in 2000. I had a dream to run a forum that would inspire women to become more involved in our industry, particularly in leadership roles. As a ﬁ nalist, I did not receive the bursary, but the forum still went ahead. It now has a permanent home as part of World Dairy Expo in the United States and is held each four years. Th e fourth forum will be held in 2012, and I certainly hope to attend.

13 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Margaret Taylor New South Wales2000 finalist

• Prime Minister’s In 2000 my Rural Women’s Award So in 2009 I fi nd myself confronting Centenary Medal ambition was based on change change and change management in for Services to Rural management in rural communities. communities on diff erent soil. Th is year Tourism and Economic Th is was largely a response to the I will project manage the establishment Development potential impact of dairy deregulation and development of a School of English • Head of School and on rural communities, including my in Dili, East Timor. In 2007 and 2008 Project Manager, Mary own community in the Bega Valley. I worked for brief periods with the MacKillop East Timor Mary MacKillop East Timor Institute, Institute School of I value the strength and tenacity that based in Dili, in literacy and teaching English lies within individuals in communities. education and English as a second • Bega Outstanding Th is often unknown resource has language. Business Awards— the capacity to change lives and Excellence in Service communities for the better. My work I returned to permanent part-time to the Bega Business since the 2000 Award has been based teaching in 2008, focusing on learning Community, 2005 on this belief. I instigated the South diffi culties and classroom teaching in Coast Rural Tourism Network which country New South Wales. I still live in went on to win the South Coast Award the beautiful Bega Valley, where Bega for Excellence in Tourism. Cheese goes from strength to strength, providing employment for about 600 local people. Never see a need without doing something about it I will be taking leave from school this ——Mary MacKillop year, so that I can continue the work begun in East Timor in 2007 and 2008. Coming face to face with people in one I have represented my community on of the poorest countries in the world a number of regional boards, including only an hour-and-a-half by plane from SERTEC (the South East Regional Darwin has strengthened my belief that Training and Education Centre) the one should ‘never see a need without Bega District Nursing Board, the doing something about it’ and that each Sapphire Coast Producers Association, of us has the capacity to manage change the South Coast Tourism Board and that will take us and those around us the philanthropic group the Mumbulla forward. Th e choice is ours. Foundation, which disbursed a total of $200 000 to local on-the-ground Communities supporting communities initiatives over three years. I served on can happen in so many ways, despite the Bega Chamber of Commerce and cultural, social, economic, political, Industry Executive for several years geographic and spiritual diff erences. and chaired the Bega Business Council to successfully lobby for a Diploma of Education at the University of Wollongong Access Centre in Bega, a new Hospital for the Bega Valley Shire and a By-Pass for Bega. I also project managed International Women’s Day in the Bega Valley Shire and have been a member of the Loom Growers: a group of local women supporting women in Burma and China and Mahbob Rawi- Mahboba’s Promise.

14 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Rowena Doyle Victorian winner2000

• Secretary, Victorian University of Melbourne’s Longerenong (which we make and sell), together with Division of Mohair and Dookie campuses, and the module mohair blankets, socks, scarves and rugs, Australia, 2006 to 2008 was later sent to other states for use in helped us maintain our herd numbers in • Vice-president, Mohair regional seminars. 2002 while we waited for rain. Australia, 2007 • Recipient, consecutive Th e training package can be a stand- Th e tourism industry has also helped Powercor business alone accreditation package or can us weather what has now been 11 years awards be completed as part of a Diploma of drought. We have two self-contained in Agriculture. After completing the homesteads that allow people to enjoy bursary project, I went on to do the country life, collect fresh eggs in the remaining components of the Diploma morning, and walk among friendly of Agriculture, graduating in April 2005. animals. Coming for short or long stays, our guests leave the property with In 2002 the fi rst Australian mohair a greater knowledge of life on the land sire evaluation project was run on our and, of course, the mohair industry. property, using our breeding does. Coaches also bring people to spend an Th is project required an even group of hour or two watching animals being does that were artifi cially inseminated shorn and the orphaned kids being using semen from 11 diff erent sires bottle fed and to visit our on-farm from mohair studs across the country. shop. Th e resultant progeny were evaluated over the fi rst three shearings. It was a In 2007 I was encouraged to apply privilege to work with mohair-specifi c to the Federal Government for an researchers, and I learnt a great deal Australian Tourism Development during the two years of the project. Program grant. Th is funding was for Recording and evaluating progeny ‘exceptional circumstances’ drought- from sires is important for genetic declared areas, encouraging tourism improvement and, after being involved businesses to diversify from mainstream My Rural Women’s Award ambition with this project, I developed practical tourism markets. I applied for the was to write a nationally accredited ways of achieving this on the farm. funding to complete a partially built mohair-classing training module, function centre, which we had delayed to teach mohair producers about Unfortunately, 2002 was our worst year fi nishing because of the drought. Th e preparing their fi bre for sale. Before that of the drought, and our water source for application was successful, and the time there was a lack for formal training stock, the Wimmera River, became too function centre is almost completed; whereby mohair producers could learn saline for use. So began the fi rst of what it will be used for weddings and about their fi bre and preparing it for is now six years of water carting. With conferences and to cater for the many sale. Producers would have to wait failed crops and large bills for buying coaches that visit. I have encouraged for comments on a classing sheet in and transporting water and hay, we were surrounding farms to open their relation to fi bre that had been classed fortunate to be able to focus on a non– properties to visitors, since I believe months beforehand. agriculture related craft industry. Th e they all have a story to tell. Agri- angora goat is an excellent dual-income tourism is an undervalued resource I enjoyed the writing project, which I animal, there being much demand that can provide additional income and completed with the help of a registered for both the fi bre and the meat. Our promote our country areas. training provider and is based on animals are heavily selected for superior national competency standards. Th e fi bre production, and those not meeting It would be remiss of me not to package was released for industry the standard set are moved into the meat mention my proudest achievements evaluation, including by mohair brokers trade and provide a further income in during the past 10 years—two beautiful and buyers, and a fi nal module was mohair hides. Mohair-hide soft toys, sons, John and Th omas. I am grateful completed. Th e program was run at the dolls’ wigging and Christmas stockings to a supportive family in my husband, Glenn, and parents, Bob and June Liddy, and attribute the success of the The only limit to our realization of tomorrow property to the family as a whole and will be our doubts of today. our unwavering belief in the direction ——Franklin D Roosevelt we have taken.

15 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Jo Gardner Victorian finalist2000

At present I am working as the Much as I have enjoyed and relished community development oﬃ cer for the challenge of my various roles in the Horsham Rural City Council. Th e public arena, I am more committed position continues on from my work than ever to my vision of encouraging as manager for regional sustainable young people into rural and regional development with the Wimmera areas and into sustainable agriculture. Catchment Management Authority. Th e sustainability of agriculture is very much dependent on the resilience of At the time I participated in the Rural our rural communities. But, with full- Women’s Award my involvement in time work, a consultancy and a number primary industries was as a grower of enterprises on the side, a 20-month- and exporter of herbs. Gardner old baby and another baby due any day, Herbs still operates as a sideline, but life is busy and I can’t squeeze much I found greener pastures. In addition more in. to my work with Horsham Rural City Council, I am establishing a carbon-trading consultancy, focusing on options for on-farm sequestration through agro-forestry, and I have established a nursery that has now diversiﬁ ed into natives and currently produces about 10 000 seedlings a year. We also operate a guesthouse on the property. Additionally, I enjoyed two years as manager of a trust fund–owned mixed farm of 800-odd hectares that supports cropping, wool and prime lambs.

My involvement with the award encouraged me to take up new pursuits, although my connection with the vision I had back then has changed slightly. After the award I became involved in the Victorian Government’s Entrepreneurship Panel, the board of the Rural Finance Corporation’s Young Farmers Loan Scheme, the board of the Wimmera Catchment Management Authority, and the Wimmera Development Association.

16 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Alison Brinson Victorian finalist2000

• Helping the raspberry In 2000 my award ambition was It was time to use my new-found industry introduce to learn more about integrated capacity-building skills professionally. a statutory levy pest management, or IPM—using In 2003 I began off -farm work, one day for research and good bugs to control pest bugs—in a week, as the industry development development greenhouse horticultural crops. I aimed offi cer for the national raspberry to initially use my new knowledge on industry. Th is is now a three-days-a- our own fl ower farm, and then I would week position, focusing on facilitating help other farmers reduce their reliance the uptake of best management on chemical controls in managing pest practices (including IPM), improving problems. communication in a geographically diverse industry, and assessing the genetic material from the raspberry breeding program. My role is both Every day is a new opportunity. fulfi lling and challenging. I enjoy being part of a small but rapidly expanding industry, acquiring skills as varied as website development, evaluating plant Ten years on, did I achieve this goal? and fruit quality (new cultivars must Yes and no. Defi nitely not in the way have good fl avour), running training I dreamed about when I penned my activities and being a tour guide. application for the inaugural Rural Women’s Award. We continued to Our son is now an important part practise IPM on our farm. I started a of our fl ower growing business. In group for local greenhouse growers, recent years he has also become active so that they could meet regularly on on industry committees. I can share farms to learn and share experiences with him some of the insights I have of pest and disease management. My gained. It is exciting to see young interests broadened to include a focus people participating in decision making on safe and eff ective use of chemicals. in their industry and ensuring that I also represented the Victorian agriculture and horticulture have a Farmers Federation on the state strong future in Australia. and national ChemCert boards and represented ChemCert Australia on the community consultative committee of the Australian Pesticide and Veterinary Medicines Authority.

During the next few years I participated in a number of leadership and group- facilitation courses and sat on several rural industry committees. My interests were changing—from being a farmer to being a networker, a committee junkie and a facilitator. Along the way, I supported and facilitated the development of skills in other rural women. WinHort Yarra Ranges began in 2002. Th is group of local women, of which I am the coordinator, has successfully raised the proﬁ le of local women in horticultural businesses, and many of the women are now on industry and government committees.

17 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Annie Pfeffer Queensland winner2000

• Scholarship winner, Th ere have been many changes since that will assist in the accreditation Australian Rural I won the Rural Women’s Award with of the facility as well as the overall Leadership Program, the ambition of promoting mono- organisation. 2008 unsaturated sunfl ower oil. Th e industry • Chair, Pittsworth is moving forward positively, and I have In August 2007 I joined the and District Hospital been involved in a variety of industry Condamine Alliance (a natural resource Friendly Society Ltd and community projects. management body), and in late 2008 I • Director, Condamine became acting chairman of the alliance Alliance In the past eight years my involvement after the retirement of the chairman. • Director, Queensland within the industry has been varied. In 2007 I also received a Queensland Rural Adjustment I was president of the Australian Department of Primary Industries and Authority and Regional Sunfl ower Association and assisted Fisheries scholarship to participate Development Program in merging the association with the in the Australian Rural Leadership Canola Association and a number of Program. Th is was an outstanding other oilseed associations to form the program, and I feel privileged to have Australian Oilseeds Federation. I was participated. also involved in developing the Better Oilseeds project, which has assisted I continue to work with industry and the entire industry in dealing with a my community, using the skills that I number of diffi culties that have limited have been blessed with for the benefi t the production of sunfl owers. of all.

This is why I am involved in my community and industry, rather than what I live by: Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country. ——John Fitzgerald Kennedy

At present I am one of two representatives of the sunﬂ ower industry tasked with promoting the development of the inaugural Australian Summer Grains Conference in 2010. Th e aim is to bring together ﬁ ve individual summer crop conferences.

Five years ago I was invited to join the board of the Pittsworth and District Hospital Friendly Society Ltd, and in November 2006 I was elected chairman of the board. We are undertaking a $4 million development and upgrade to the facility to facilitate dementia- speciﬁ c care. My role has been to introduce governance procedures

18 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Kerrie Pain (Richards) Queensland finalist2000

In recent years we have developed It has also highlighted the need for a fully integrated processing and greater integration between industry manufacturing system, setting the and education facilities. specifi cations on the raw wool and taking the yarn through to fabric Th e future for Merino Country is and fi nally garments. Instead of bright. We are working with suppliers manufacturing off shore, we made in the defence and emergency services the decision to do all production in sectors to further develop markets for Australia, and we now have full control our products in the workplace and over all cutting and manufacturing are investigating overseas markets (in of garments, having bought our own particular, Canada and the United machines and employing our own States) with a view to setting up sewers, thus supporting local industry. franchise systems for selling our products. Th is will help us increase our turnover and achieve greater economies of scale in processing the raw product; it will also enable woolgrowers to work The world is full of many colours, but you with us directly and become involved have the mind to choose what the colour shall in having their wool processed right through to garments. Further, they be. will also receive direct feedback from consumers.

Originally from a wool- and beef- Not only have we been producing My involvement with the Rural producing property outside Richmond merino wool garments for everyday Women’s Award has been a positive in western Queensland, I saw the use in work, travel and play: we have experience: I have developed some opportunity to value-add and develop also been instrumental in educating great relationships with other my own fabric—a soft, easy-care merino the general public and promoting user- participants, who are forward-thinking wool jersey for everyday wear. My friendly, easy-care Merino wool gear to and inspirational. Th is exposure to a company, Merino Country, processes Australia through ‘wool parades’ at the network of amazing women living in its own fabrics and manufactures a wide major royal shows and many regional rural and regional Australia has helped variety of garments, selling them under ﬁ eld days, local shows and trade fairs. me keep in contact with primary the brand names Merino Country, Our Wundies (woollen undies) have industries in general and maintain Bare Belly Joe and Wundies through helped change the image of wool enduring friendships and business mail order, direct sales, wholesale and meaning thick, heavy, itchy jumpers relationships. government contracts. to being a great product to keep the wearer comfortable in all climates, My original Rural Women’s Award especially the hot, steamy tropics. ambition was to further develop markets for merino wool fabrics and I have also been involved in the garments and to have better integration Australian Wool Fashion Awards, of the supply chain. I have achieved both as a judge and as a sponsor, to this with the opening of a specialty encourage up-and-coming designers retail outlet in Paddington, Brisbane, to use Australian merino wool in their and by increasing our database of direct work. Th is has involved mentoring sales customers around Australia and students from all areas of Australia, overseas to about 12 000. We were helping them gain insights into taking awarded the contract to supply merino a design concept from idea to reality. wool thermals to Victoria Police in Th is has been a steep learning curve not 2003 and won the contract again only for the students but also for me in 2008, to supply garments until and my staﬀ , and has given me a better 2013—a great achievement for a small understanding of what is not being Queensland company. taught in our fashion design colleges.

19 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Janet Campbell Queensland finalist2000

In 1995 I was a participant in the With macadamia prices at an all-time RIRDC-funded Farmwide project, low, the macadamia farm is very much which was designed to introduce a secondary income stream. internet communications, software and hardware to primary producers I have taken on a full-time position as throughout rural, regional and copyright coordinator at the University remote Australia. Following on from of the Sunshine Coast. Th e position is Farmwide, I developed a web-based very demanding but also very rewarding pilot training project dealing with the because it brings me into contact with software and communication tools such a variety of students and teachers. available for business activity statements for the Australian Taxation Oﬃ ce. Th e aim for the tools was to help rural and remote Australians when the Goods and Services Tax was introduced.

My Rural Women’s Award project involved developing a web-based training program on direct export marketing for primary producers. At about the same time my husband and I bought and set about transforming an overstocked and seriously drought- aﬀ ected property on the Darling Downs. We wanted to turn it into a sustainable cropping operation that consistently produced good yields of high-quality grains, cereal and lucerne through zero tillage and good water management practices.

We have since switched from grains on the Darling Downs to macadamias on the Sunshine Coast, and we are now into our seventh harvest. In my opinion, the skills and experience required for primary production are easily transferable between industries because the important attributes essentially remain the same; that is, attention to detail in production management, crop hygiene, sustainable practices, harvesting methods and quality control always pays oﬀ .

20 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Carol Schofield AM South Australian2000 winner

• Member of the Order Current climatic conditions threw I hope to combine my passion for and of Australia new challenges at me, and in 2006 experience in the rural sector by moving • Centenary Medal I was forced to walk away from our into local government, where I aim • First female chair, yabby and marron farm, which was to encourage a better understanding Advisory Board of once an award-winning business. I between urban and rural communities. Agriculture believed I still had much to off er my • First female president, community, and as a lifelong learner I Th e award has continued to off er me Agricultural Bureau of took on the challenge of further study, wonderful opportunities, and as my South Australia culminating in two diplomas—in event confi dence and skills grow so does my • Premiers Food and management and marketing and in contribution to rural industries and Fibre Award, Seafood product development. community groups. Section • SA Great Award In 2005 I was approached to become for outstanding Chair the Water Allocation Committee achievement and for the Western Mount Lofty contribution to state Ranges. Th is committee is vital to the pride preparation and consultation process in • National Pioneer South Australia’s Water Allocation Plan Women’s Hall of as we strive to strike a balance between Fame signature quilt our communities’ environmental, —‘Women first in their industry and the social needs for water field’ sustainability. I have been privileged to sit on the interview panel for the Rural Women’s Award several times and have found this experience most rewarding.

After returning from the 4th World Congress of Rural Women in Durban, South Africa, I was instrumental in establishing the World Rural Women’s Congress. Th e objectives of the organisation are to encourage the participation of Indigenous Australians in attending the congress, assist rural Australian women with ﬁ nancial assistance to attend the congress and support a women’s project from the host country on returning from the congress.

Don’t run through life so fast that you forget not only where you are going but where you have been, for life is a journey to be savoured each step of the way. (—Anon)

21 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Jaylene Fuge (Gurr) South Australian2000 finalist

My life has changed dramatically since One of the challenges I set myself a few I participated in the Rural Women’s years ago was to run in a half marathon. Award: I have moved from being I found this an amazing experience, single and child-free to having the physically and mentally. It helped responsibilities of being a partner and me with personal growth and goal- parent and working full time. setting, and it gave me that wonderful sense of achievement that comes from In 2001 I resigned from my position completing something so demanding as development oﬃ cer for the South physically. I have continued with a daily Australian Dairy Farmers Association to exercise routine because I have a strong begin my journey into philanthropy. I belief in the importance of work–life took up a position as events coordinator balance. for the Multiple Sclerosis Society, managing and planning the annual fund-raising events. Two highlights were organising a black-tie ball for 300 guests, which raised about $20 000, and a musical that generated a further $87 000 for the society. Th e job was a wonderful challenge and experience. Two years later I moved to the Royal Society for the Blind to work as special events coordinator. At the end of 2005 I decided to take a break from charity and philanthropic work.

In recent years I have worked predominantly as an employment consultant and job-seeker service consultant. In 2007 I took up the position of case manager with Employers Mutual Ltd. Th is position involves managing the case load of Workcover recipients; liaising daily with employers, doctors, lawyers and health professionals; assessing workers’ liability to Workcover; and providing to team members advice on relevant legislation.

22 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Mary Nenke Western Australian2000 winner

• Member, Regional Winning the inaugural Rural Women’s Over 130 people camped overnight in Women’s Advisory Award for Western Australia was a a nearby paddock, enjoying a cooked Council, 2006 major punctuation mark in my life. It breakfast next morning. • Governor’s Award aff orded me the opportunity to visit for Regional Western the Boston Seafood Show and spend Th e award has led to many exciting Australia, Western time with our US importer, with whom opportunities, including being on Australian Citizens we are currently working to introduce state and national committees and Awards, 2007 value-added aquaculture products. boards. It has been fabulous to be able • Australian Export Hero, Th e award also helped highlight to infl uence outcomes for regional 2007 the important role we, as women, Australia, gathering opinions and • Participant, 2020 are playing in diversifying rural and information from my networks across Summit and the regional Australia and our ability to regional Australia. Highlights have National Rural embrace change. Winning made me been being appointed to the Regional Women’s Summit, more visible and helped open many Women’s Advisory Council in 2006, 2008 new and exciting doors. being a participant in the Rural Stream at the 2020 Summit, and participating Since 2000 our business, Cambinata in the National Rural Women’s Yabbies, has faced the normal challenges Summit. It was amazing being made of rural industries dependent on an ‘Australian Export Hero in 2007’, the weather. To improve market receiving the 2007 Governor’s Award access, we have added gourmet for Regional Western Australia at the pickled yabbies and abalone to our 2007 Western Australian Citizens’ product range, further diversifying Awards, and being chosen in 2008 our broad-acre farming business. In to feature on Qantas as one of four 2006 we obtained a grant from the ‘Australian Woman Entrepreneurs’. Commonwealth Food Processing in Regional Australia Program to help with Finally, without my wonderful construction of a state-of-the-art export husband, Michael, and our large kitchen complex for value-adding to family, their spouses and children, aquaculture products. In late 2008 we all this would be meaningless and fi nally received accreditation from the unachievable. Maintaining balance in Australian Quarantine and Inspection my life and valuing others and their Service, and we have just despatched part in the team has been imperative. our fi rst shipment to India. A new On 15 February 2009 Michael and product range of gourmet foods, Family I celebrated 40 years of marriage, Inspirations, is currently being labelled. and a friend wrote, ‘We just loved your family, and it makes me wish I In 2003 we launched our annual had been brave enough to have six Cambinata Extravaganza, aimed at children. We were so impressed with linking the city to the country and your reception area and the whole profi ling the region. Th e event, held in commercial organisation’. our unique ‘shearing shed’ complete with baby grand piano, begins with a mini-expo, where producers and artists showcase their products; this is followed by a multi-course feast created by a top chef using regional foods such as yabbies, abalone, saltwater trout, lamb and beef accompanied by local wines. Th e guests include local food lovers, plus a large contingent of city folk and a sprinkling of overseas visitors. In 2008 Postcards WA fi lmed the event.

23 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Anne Jennings Western Australian2000 finalist

• Awarded a full-time In 2000 when I participated in the My involvement in rural women’s aff airs scholarship, funded Rural Women’s Award my husband, continues. I spent three years on the by Worsley Alumina Les, and I were farming—initially State Planning Group for WA FarmBis through Edith Cowan dairying and then growing hay and and two years on the State Advisory University, to undertake prime lambs—in the south-west of Committee for the Rural Financial PhD studies, 2006 Western Australia. While our children Counselling Service. Th ese were • Presented papers were in primary school I enrolled in a wonderful experiences and expanded at conferences in Human Services degree at Edith Cowan my networks throughout Western Dunedin, New Zealand, University, at its Bunbury campus. I Australia, as well as my knowledge of and Darwin, Northern have been working in rural community things rural. Until December 2008 I Territory, 2008 development ever since, both for was on the Faculty Board of our local • Invited speaker at government and for community groups campus of Edith Cowan University, the Riverland, South and as a self-employed consultant. as well as being on the Research and Australia, Zonta Higher Degrees Committee. I was Business Women’s Working in my own consultancy also on the Advisory Board of Sophia Awards, 2008 was great, giving me the freedom to College of Counselling, a registered • Rural Representative- operate from the farm. On any day I’d training organisation. My ambition WA FarmBis Planning be working at the computer, then I’d is to sit on other advisory groups Group 2005 – 2008 receive a phone call from Les—who and boards in the future as I fi nd • Industry gave men mobiles?—and next thing these positions very interesting and Representative- I’d be running after sheep. One time, rewarding. It will be interesting to fi nd WA Rural Financial I looked up and there was our border out what opportunities there are for Counselling Service collie sitting on the back of the ute women on boards when you are based Advisory Committee laughing at me … I’m sure. in the remote North-West.

My greatest achievement has been seeing my daughters continue the type Washing one’s hands of the conflict between of work I have always been interested the powerful and the powerless means to side in. Beccy works in social work and with the powerful, not to be neutral. community development and Debra ——Freire in natural resource management. My granddaughters and grandsons also have this holistic feeling for the land and their community. As I remarked at My award ambition was based on our last Rural Women’s Award reunion, expanding my skills in rural community a friend once told me, ‘Our daughters development. I have continued along leap from their mother’s shoulders’. this path, being involved in many Watch out, world, as they do! community development projects in both voluntary and paid capacities. Whilst doing this I have also completed a master’s degree, and I am now working on my PhD in Community Development and Education.

We are no longer farming now, but we are still involved in the sector as agricultural contractors. Les has found a niche doing this in Broome and has been living between there and home in the south-west of the state. We moved to Broome permanently in 2009 and I am employed by the Shire of Broome as Social Planner-Community Developer.

24 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Shelley Birch Western Australian2000 winner

In 2000 I represented Th e Leibe Group Currently I have an active role in our Women’s Committee as a ﬁ nalist in the farm business administration, am RIRDC Rural Women’s Award. President of our Coorow Townscape Committee and am contracted by the Th e Liebe Group is a Western Co-operative Bulk Handling Group Australian Northern Wheatbelt to facilitate on-farming training in Research and Development group the practicalities of Quality Assurance that was founded in 1997. Th e Liebe accreditation in the Western Australian Women’s Committee was established in Grains Industry. 1998 and I was a founding member of this committee for ﬁ ve years. Our adoption and enthusiasm of Quality Assurance enabled ‘Catalina Farms’ to win the 2005 Co-operative Bulk Handling Groups Better Farm Integrated Quality Excellence Award Just go out there and do what you have to do. for Western Australian grain growers. ——Martina Navratilova

Th e Liebe Group is now a leading and well respected Agricultural Research & Development Group which boasts 200 farm businesses as its members and currently has a team of 5 full time staﬀ working for the group and approximately 20 volunteer positions.

Th e Women’s Committee continues to hold annual ﬁ eld days with consistent attendances in excess of 100 people.

Th e award was a wonderful opportunity for me to network and up skill to enhance the contribution I could make to the industry and the community groups I was involved with.

I am a partner with my husband in a farming enterprise, ‘Catalina Farms’ 300 kilometres north of Perth. I have lived in our small town of Coorow for 28 years and I enjoy my life in small rural communities and have a positive outlook for the agricultural industry.

25 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Anne Taylor Tasmanian winner2000

• Goddard Sapin – Contact between irrigation pipes and skills needed to successfully and safely Jaloustre scholarship to overhead power lines is a ‘shocking’ operate a viable farming business. study in France, 2004 thing, one that has touched me several • Tasmanian chair, times in the past 37 years. Th e double In 1997 my husband commented Occupational Health fatality of two vibrant 21-year-old farm that he was worried about the Physiotherapy Australia workers in January 2007 was the last manual handling techniques of a new Group of the Australian straw. Th e rate of seven deaths in seven employee, who had previously worked Physiotherapy years within a 20-kilometre radius of as a shearer. He asked if I would teach Association, 2003 to a northern Tasmanian town could not this young man the correct techniques. 2007 continue. It was obvious something I was concerned that the young man • National chair, needed to be done to ensure that no would not ‘take it from the boss’s wife’, Australian Association more lives were lost. so we invited several neighbouring of Manutention farmers and their wives to a workshop Practitioners, 2005 to Th e skills, knowledge and networks I focusing on preventing back injuries. 2007 have gained since winning the 2000 I was astounded how little they knew, • Inaugural chair, Rural Women’s Award empowered me especially those who had recently Proactive Agricultural to call a meeting with the intention graduated from agricultural college. Safety & Support. of forming a ‘grass-roots’ not-for- profi t group. Th e group was launched Th us was born the concept of on- at Agfest 2007 and is now known farm safety training. Together with as Proactive Agricultural Safety & my neighbour, who is a qualifi ed Support, or PASS. I am the inaugural nurse, and a Workplace Standards chair of the management committee. Tasmania inspector, we delivered a number of workshops to farmers and PASS off ers to Tasmanian farmers their employees at various farms in the information about farm safety district, providing information and awareness, skills and knowledge practical skills to meet their obligations through on-farm practical workshops, under the new occupational health and seminars and forums and regular safety legislation, as well as fi rst aid and • Prevention is communication through our newsletter safe manual handling practices. and website, www.pass.org.au. Electrical better than cure safety was our fi rst project. Winning the award enabled me to • Do it now, and then establish my business, Wise Work, and it is done. My interest in farm safety and injury to extend my farm safety eff orts and prevention was sparked by two strong deliver workshops statewide, including images from my fi rst year of working as to industries such as aquaculture, health a physiotherapist in a regional hospital: care and mining. the fi rst was a farmer’s desperation to get back to work even when he had I have since augmented my skills as a debilitating back problems; the second ‘manual handling trainer’ by attending concerned the disastrous and life- courses with a view to becoming an altering injuries sustained by young accredited manutention trainer, in both men, in particular from motorbike industrial loads and health care, as well accidents. I thought that, if farmers had as participating in further training in some knowledge of and skills in safe France. I have also begun a Diploma in manual handling techniques and some Occupational Health and Safety, which I basic ergonomic information, many hope to convert to a master’s degree when injuries could be prevented. I complete a research project entitled ‘Farmers acquiring injury prevention and Later I married a farmer and began sustainable manual task skills’. working with him in our mixed enterprise. Although I defi nitely did not want any of my family to acquire an injury, I did want them to gain the

26 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Jane Allwright Tasmanian finalist2000

I continued to work the farm with At present I am working in my husband, Chris, for the fi ve years administration at a local private school, following my involvement in the Rural which I am enjoying—especially the Women’s Award. Like so many others, contact with many diff erent people we lived through drought and fl oods. and, of course, the children. We live We expanded our property, developing on a hectare of ground on the Derwent more cropping ground and putting in River, 20 minutes’ drive from the centre new water storage dams to drought- of Hobart. Oh, how diff erent! Son proof the land. Jotham has just turned 17, started an apprenticeship as a diesel mechanic, I was fortunate to work for the and gained his driving licence and a car Department of Primary Industries and all within a week. Daughters Hannah Water as a negotiator for the Private and Evie are in high school and can Forest Reserve Program; this allowed catch a bus a short walk from our me to gain training in negotiation and home. Th e girls and I are leaving for a facilitation. I also spent fi ve years on six-week trip to America and Europe in the board of Australian Women in May 2009—long service leave, I call it. Agriculture, the fi fth year as president; this was a steep learning curve, but it Tasmania continues to struggle with was one of the best times for my own drought, and I feel for all my fellow personal development. farmers as they do what they can to survive. I will always consider myself a In addition to Australian Women farmer, and the skills farming has given in Agriculture I continued with my me and my children will hold us all in support of Tasmanian Women in good stead for whatever else we may do Agriculture, to help others make in our lives. the most of their opportunities. We re-assessed the needs of the organisation and the support received from the Department of Primary Industries and Water to further develop the network in the state and through our connections with other organisations overseas. Th is included a visit to Nebraska and Oregon in 2001: an exchange program has since been organised. Th ere is also an exchange program with Agricultural Women in Ireland.

In January 2006 my husband was diagnosed with cancer. Th is was a devastating time for us as a family. He had various treatments during the following eight months, but he lost his battle in September of that year. Th at left me with three children, aged 10, 12 and 14, and a 1200-hectare property to run. During the second year of drought after Chris’s death, after much debate and consideration, I made the decision to put the property on the market.

27 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Anne Heazlewood Tasmanian finalist2000

With my husband and my son I am a I take the lead in promoting and partner in a family farm business based marketing our businesses. at Whitemore in northern Tasmania. Th e business consists of a diverse I am still a member of Tasmanian cropping program—poppies, peas, Women in Agriculture but am no cereals and small-seed production, longer involved in National Partners including ryegrass and clovers—and a in Grain. Th ese days I take a little time livestock enterprise involving Border off for myself, and I am enjoying being Leicester and English Leicester sheep involved in a book club. studs along with prime lambs and trade cattle. We are members of the Super Borders program, which is the brand name for high-performing Border Leicesters that have been bred in registered fl ocks to a specifi c quality standard; the English Leicester stud is one of the oldest continually maintained British-breed fl ocks in Australia.

About 30 years ago we diversiﬁ ed into Are we going OK? a small-seed cleaning and processing business. Heazlewood Seeds now processes a wide range of seeds, such as pasture seeds, cereal, canola, peas and other vegetable seeds, as well as specialised and high-value crop seeds.

Th e output of our businesses has doubled in the past ﬁ ve years, largely as a result of networking and word of mouth. We have increased farm production by buying more land and adding an irrigation scheme along with making use of a whole-farm plan. We now employ nine casuals during the summer. Th e contract seed cleaning and processing operation has also grown: we now have 90 silos for storing seed on the farm and, among other things, send buckwheat to restaurants in Singapore and canola to Paraguay and Uruguay.

One of my big commitments is informing the broader community about primary industries and its continued importance to Australia. Th e 1870s barn we transformed into a reception and function centre has been expanded, and we now cater for domestic and international tours, farmers’ seminars and even weddings.

28 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Sue Wainwright Northern Territory2000 winner

• Winston Churchill Fellowship Th e cropping enterprise grew rapidly, little or no access to services for special 1985 and I continued to breed my cattle and needs—such as children with physical • Playgroup Australia Board develop a computer-aided recording and and developmental disabilities, mothers Member 2002 - present analysis system for tracking the genetics suff ering stress or post-natal depression, • Chair, Bazadais Cattle Breed and performance of the various lines and farmers with depression as a result of Society, 2004 - 2008 crosses that were most suitable for the drought and economic pressures, and • Speaker, International Play climate, pasture and markets. For this families simply needing assistance for Association Conference, 2005 program I was fortunate to win the Rural general health, education or social reasons. Diploma Community Women’s Award, and the bursary allowed • With the support of the wonderful Development 2007 me to travel to China to explore the genetic requirements for breeding cattle women I have met as a consequence of • Awarded Fellow of Australian that were most suitable for an export participating in the award, my confi dence Institute of Management 2007 market from Australia to central and gradually returned and I became more • Graduate Australian Institute of northern China. active in identifying the needs of rural Company Directors 2007 families and Indigenous communities. I • Delegate Minister Plibersek’s Th e very night the award was to be was elected chair of the Bazadais Cattle National Rural Women’s presented, my husband called to say Breed Society for four years and travelled Summit 2008 the station had to be divided and sold to France in 2007 to speak at the because of his partner’s immediate International Cattle Breeders Conference Pursue every withdrawal of fi nance. Devastated, I in Bordeaux. I also attended the opportunity as it may struggled through the presentation and International Rural Women’s Conference returned home to the news that even my in Spain in 2004 and was invited to speak never come again. beloved cow herd of 25 years would have at the International Play Association ——My father to be sold. We moved to 8 hectares in Conference in East Berlin. I was to speak Darwin’s hinterland to ‘lick our wounds’ at the Mountain Agriculture Conference and regroup. in Nepal in 2006 but withdrew from this when fi ghting broke out in the area. Relying on my business training and Mothers and children, cows and calves background, I took a short-term position continue to attract my interest and be the that involved restructuring a small not- focus of my endeavours. for-profi t organisation that had come upon hard times. Playgroup Northern In January 2009 I travelled to Alaska for Territory was for families with children the third time to continue my eff orts under school age; it off ered structured in support of the introduction of some In 1995, after I had spent 10 years as play programs and social interaction for Northern Territory resource programs a single parent battling to put three children and the opportunity for their developed for isolated families in children through boarding school and parents to meet and form mutually Australia, whose needs are remarkably university, using proceeds from my stud supportive outlets and share parenting similar to those of people isolated by and commercial cattle operation in activities. During this period I used my distance and climate in the icy regions Queensland, a dear family friend returned award bursary to travel to China, and of the Arctic. One of our programs is to Australia and suggested we join forces in this helped to re-establish some of my working very well for the Inuit people a new enterprise growing peanuts and corn lost confi dence and alleviate my sense of of the native village of Barrow, just under irrigation. Th is integrated well with failure. 240 kilometres from the North Pole; it my established breeding and fattening was –60°C when I visited. operation, but in a short time the ‘writing As I continued to develop new programs was on the wall’ when problems with at work—concentrating more and more Although my life changed dramatically available water for irrigation in southern on rural and remote families with no around the time I received my award, Queensland and northern New South services at all—I was invited back into in essence it was the award and the Wales emerged. After much discussion, the political side of cattle breeding and support and opportunities it presented research, investigation and soul-searching, was able to satisfy my love of cattle and of that enabled me to fi nd new depths, new we decided to marry, sell everything and the bush, where many of the families we insights and a new direction and to use move to a station we had bought outside assisted lived and worked. Understanding my experience and expertise positively Katherine in the Northern Territory, the isolation remote families experience, and constructively. For that I will be where we had discovered a huge, reliable I was encouraged to stay with Playgroup forever grateful. underground water source suitable for and to help develop opportunities through irrigation and grazing. new technologies for families with

29 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Terry Underwood OAM Northern Territory2000 finalist

• Winner, Northern Territory In the past decade my challenges, welcome the associated responsibility Telstra Business Women’s and those for rural Australia, have and opportunity to contribute to this Business Owner Award, 1998 multiplied. My family and I recently important work. • Territorian of the Year— bought an adjoining property, Katherine Region, 1999 Inverway, considerably increasing our My roles as ambassador and advocate • Recipient, Northern Territory acreage, cattle numbers and dependence for the bush and its people remain at Chief Minister’s Women’s on the live export trade. Most of my the forefront of my writing and public Achievement Award time is now divided between our three speaking projects. My autobiography, • Ambassador for Australia’s Northern Territory properties—Riveren In Th e Middle of Nowhere, is currently Year of the Outback, 2001 and Inverway in the Victoria River in its 18th reprint. • Northern Territory finalist, district and Midway in the Douglas– Th e Rural Women’s Award has cast Australian of the Year Awards, Daly region—where I work as required light on many courageous women 2004 beside my husband, our children, who are hard-working, innovative and, • Medal of the Order of Australia their spouses and their young families. above all, survivors. I am honoured in the General Division for Th e challenge of survival given the to stand beside them to celebrate this ‘service to the community, escalating costs of production has never prestigious anniversary. particularly through business been greater. and in promotional and cattle industry roles’, 2005 We face age-old concerns of seasonal • Member, National Advisory variability, market instability and Council Australia Outback problems with food safety while all Development Consortium Ltd around the broad debates on climate (Outback Calling Ltd), 2007 change and carbon emissions trading • Delegate, Australia 2020 gain momentum. Summit, 2008

How fortunate we are in this magnificent country to have the land as our livelihood, family and friends as companions, and faith and love as our tools.

Th ere is no avoiding the two huge concerns that confront us—the global ﬁ nancial crisis and the world food and water shortage. Participation in the Australia 2020 Summit in April 2008 conﬁ rmed for me that this is an era when cooperation between producers, policy makers and consumers is crucial. As a member of the Federal Government’s Northern Australia Land and Water Taskforce, I

30 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award 2001 Participating in the award ...

Jon-Maree Baker Barbara Nuthall Linda Duffy Sharyn Munnerley-Jose Lisa Jarvis Diane Gresham Lillian Lever Jeanette Gellard Tracy Warland Rhonda Tonkin Janette O’Keefe Frances Bender Jodie Epper Carmel Wagstaff Miriam Golding Katrina Wright

31 2001 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Jon Maree Baker New South Wales2001 winner

• Creator, three WinCott My involvement with the Australian I continue to work in agriculture, in programs cotton industry from 1995 to 2007 led our own farming enterprise, which now • Board member, New me to develop greatly as an individual, consists of irrigated pasture, Australian England North West there being tremendous support and stockhorses, Santa Gertrudis cattle and Area Consultative networks for learning and mentors. Border Collies. Th ese days my primary Committee During that time of growth in irrigated focus is my children and the farm. • Winner, Australian agricultural industries, the roles ﬁ lled Institute of Company by women opened up and changed Directors scholarship, markedly, and I and others saw a need 2004 for recognition of women’s roles and • Accredited Myers- value by making personal development Briggs Type Indicator and leadership opportunities formally (MBTI) facilitator, 2003 available.

At a meeting of interested people the idea of a women’s network to help disseminate practical and broad- based information was canvassed. It crystallised into WinCott—Women’s Industry Network Cotton. Th e proﬁ le of the network allowed for publicity and recognition of the diverse roles played by women in the industry and facilitated sharing of information on a level that aﬀ orded understanding and learning opportunities.

Persistence paves the way to success.

Th e Rural Women’s Award bursary allowed me to develop my project to run three separate learning programs. After this, the industry’s direction moved towards young people, with a full leadership program encompassing a wide range of industry participants. Winning the award meant I had many opportunities to be a guest speaker, and I achieved much more than I ever thought possible. In fact, the award experience has changed my life and given me a sense of purpose in seeking greater opportunities for women in the cotton industry. Although I do not have a hands-on role in the industry now, I can see the changes made through WinCott, and I feel that my winning the award had an impact on many women besides me.

32 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Barbara Nuthall New South Wales2001 finalist

My family owns and operates a 1200- We recently returned from a fact- hectare farm outside Young, in the ﬁ nding tour of Norway, Scotland, south-west of New South Wales. Our England and Ireland, visiting turkey main activities are sheep and oilseed and chicken farms. We covered a lot of and cereal production. But my passion ground and learnt a great deal about and our latest venture is duck farming, diﬀ erent management and production and we now have 15 000 breeders. techniques.

One of the highlights for me in the past few years was visiting St Jude’s School in Tanzania, which was set up by A day without laughing is a wasted day. Gemma Sisia, from Guyra in northern New South Wales. Visiting the school and working with the children was a humbling and rewarding experience.

My original enterprise was producing geese, but fertility problems exacerbated by drought made continuation of the venture virtually impossible. We sought expert advice overseas, the latest advances in research occurring in Denmark, but the company we were dealing with went into liquidation. A veterinary surgeon colleague took an interest in the project and decided to artiﬁ cially inseminate our breeding geese, with no success. So, after four years of drought and much frustration, and with a failing sense of humour, we decided to quit geese and change to ducks.

We now produce 5000 ducks weekly for Pepe’s, one of Australia’s largest duck processors. Although the move into ducks was a steep learning curve, the eﬀ ort seems to have paid oﬀ . Pepe’s would like us to triple our production, but we are operating at maximum capacity with the facilities we currently have.

33 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Linda Duffy New South Wales2001 finalist

• Prime Minister’s My journey so far has led me from My Rural Women’s Award ambition Centenary Medal my family’s farm on the banks of the involved mentoring between for Services to Rural Edward River at Deniliquin in south- generations of older and younger Communities west New South Wales to a variety of rural people. It led to me receiving • Rotary Vocational places across this vast country-from a Churchill Fellowship in 2003, to Excellence Award Melbourne to Fitzroy Crossing in the travel to the United States and the • Churchill Fellowship to Kimberley, to Hay in the far west of United Kingdom in the following UK & USA 2004-2005 New South Wales, to Orange and year to investigate mechanisms for • Masters in then Mudgee in the central west of sustainability in rural communities. Sustainability 2006 New South Wales as a rural fi nancial • Past member NSW counsellor, and gaining along the My focus remains human resources: Rural Women’s way a Degree in Accountancy, a people are crucial to the long-term Network State Advisory Masters in Sustainability and some viability of rural industries, and it is Committee study towards a Law Degree. I also vital to harness the skills and experience established my own consultancy of past and future generations if we business Duff yco in 2006 and I now are to have vibrant communities and fi nd myself back in Melbourne working industries. with the Sustainability Fund based in Sustainability Victoria.

It’s not what you get in life, it’s what you give.

Sustainability Victoria aims to show the way to using our resources more eﬃ ciently and reducing our impact on the environment, and my work with the Sustainability Fund involves looking after environmental projects across Victoria and liaising with local councils, community groups, and NGO’s. Th e importance of vibrant and diverse communities to support a sustainable future has increased in focus and momentum, and having the opportunity to assess and manage projects working in this area is rewarding as well as challenging.

34 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Sharyn Munnerley Victorian winner2001

• Director, Australian I remain director of the Australian Th e award did, however, draw attention Calf Rearing Research Calf Rearing Research Centre, which to an industry no one had serviced for Centre provides research information and well over a decade, and the outcome has • Author, The ABC of Calf resources for calf rearers worldwide been major advances in research and Rearing and was the ﬁ rst such organisation in learning and state-of-the-art facilities. • Participant, pilot Australia. As far back as 20 years ago For me, the award was a catalyst for program for my aim was to create a centre that new opportunities and exposure, for rehabilitation of young would reform the ailing calf-rearing improving my public speaking skills, criminal offenders industry and supply to rearers the latest and for giving me the conﬁ dence to in methodologies and technologies so take on new challenges, opportunities that they could achieve success. and training.

In 2001 I used the Rural Women’s Th ese days I live in Townsville, Award funds to research, write and managing property investments and publish Th e ABC of Calf Rearing. Th e serviced apartments and preparing book was a resounding success, selling for a major back operation. One of 4000 copies within three days of its my stand-out achievements has been release, and has since been picked up by being part of a pilot program for young Blooming Books and been translated criminal off enders, helping to support into many other languages. I have their integration back into society and also provided advice and services to a to minimise their risk of reoff ending. number of high-profi le clients, among Th e pilot has been so successful it them Nobel Prize winner Sir Gustav has now ‘gone national’. And the Nossal. opportunity to be part of this pilot— believe it or not—was the result of a In my view, the overwhelming response chance meeting with someone in the the research centre received from the audience of one of my award public- public and the media was responsible speaking engagements. for signifi cant reform in the industry and a boom in calf rearing, which resulted in profi table business ventures, value-adding opportunities, superior dairy heifers and an awareness in the cattle industry that calves are in fact a valuable resource. Unfortunately, because of the high cost of both grain and calves, the centre is not operational at present: I felt it was unethical to continue it and to keep providing information and advice when calf rearing in the current economic climate is neither viable nor sustainable.

35 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Lisa Jarvis Victorian finalist2001

When I was young I told my One project I have been involved with grandfather I would return to the is the annual Deans Marsh Sheepdog family farm one day. He laughed and Trials: last year I documented the said I was a city girl. Well, I did return, event. Th e sport involves an amazing and the adventure of learning what it is display of skill by handlers and their to be ‘on the land’ has rounded this city dogs, and the characters of both are so girl out. entertaining. When I came to editing the documentary I was amazed at the Since 2001, when I became involved ‘new’ technology—a few late nights in the Rural Women’s Award, the most whipped up not a bad piece of work! infl uential thing for me has been the It made me realise the importance of fact that the vision I presented was making sure that we as communities taken seriously. Th at gave me great document the events that celebrate who confi dence that I was on the right track. we are and our stories. Watching an And I am still on that track. I have event later provides a wonderful further shortened that mouthful Kyah Valley opportunity for sharing and refl ecting. Niche Agriculture and Sustainable Culture Demonstration Farm to Kyah A friend invited a young Japanese Valley, but the central values of my woman to stay in our area as part vision remain the same. of the Willing Workers on Organic Farms program. I enjoyed meeting her Kyah Valley is developing well, and and learning about the diff erences in I have been growing garlic as a main approaches, and the commonalities. crop for three years, really enjoying One particular weeding tool was highly developing a product to fi nal niche- effi cient and had an action that was market sale. Garlic is a labour-intensive diff erent from the garlic-weeding one— crop to grow organically, and selling most welcome. Gardens are great places through farmers’ markets, direct to to get to know people. the public and at local restaurants and fi ne food outlets means I reach an I am fortunate to live in a vibrant appreciative market. I hope to expand community. I have loved making the the Kyah Valley range of products in transition and feel blessed to share a time. Cut fl owers, vegetables and herbs family farm. I thank the award for the add diversity to the produce off ered. opportunity to be in the company of such inspiring and pioneering women. I have just returned from working part time in a community development role, and I am passionate about pursuing projects that involve developing community micro-enterprises and exploring ways of people working together. Community food-growing projects are crucial, I believe, as are opportunities for people to work together and share time.

36 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Diane Gresham Queensland winner2001

• Director, Subtropical After winning the Rural Women’s During 2004 I began to develop a Dairy regional Award I completed the development of mobile computer training program for development program the dairy industry site, Dairyinfo.biz. the northern dairy industry. From 2005 • Chair, Northern Young Th e skills and knowledge I acquired to 2008 the program was delivered Dairy Network during this process where invaluable, across a wide geographical area, from but technology constantly changes and Kempsey in northern New South during 2008 I totally redeveloped the Wales to the Atherton Tablelands in site. Far North Queensland, using a mobile computer training room with 11 laptop My award ambition was to develop computers. Th e project was funded by for dairy farmers a comprehensive Dairy Australia; it received wide cross- information tool that would oﬀ er an industry support, involved a number of extension to their business, giving industry stakeholders, and trained more them access to the array of information than 320 dairy producers in a range available within the industry. Th is goal of telecommunications and business is ongoing, and the format and content management skills. of websites constantly need interesting change in order to remain relevant to I have found myself in a number of the target audience. bizarre and challenging situations when trying to make the technology workshops proceed smoothly, but ﬂ exibility and resilience always win the day.

Enthusiasm is excitement with inspiration, At the representational level, in 2006 I motivation, and a pinch of creativity. was elected to the board of Subtropical ——Bo Bennett Dairy, which is Dairy Australia’s regional development program for the northern dairy industry. Th is role has led to a number of industry committees and coordination roles. My journey during the past eight years has also taken some sidetracks as a My continued involvement in the result of my award experience. I became wider dairy industry has been coupled involved with a number of women’s with juggling family and dairy farm networks and further developed my commitments. Our three boys are leadership and organisational skills. growing rapidly: the eldest has just Meeting and speaking with women in started high school. Our dairy herd the dairy industry and other industries numbers are set to increase again, raised questions for me about access although the diffi culties posed by to technology and the farmers’ ability drought, fl ood and fl uctuating to use the technology. I became very commodity prices have caused us to keen to help meet the practical needs seriously consider leaving the industry. of farmers and help them improve But such experiences, if not pleasant, their computer management skills— always provide scope for personal and something that meshed perfectly with business growth—something that off ers my award vision of helping farmers opportunity as long as you keep your develop their skills and knowledge and eyes open. so strategically position their businesses in a rapidly changing operating environment.

37 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Lillian Lever Queensland finalist2001

• Member: Koorana, Queensland’s fi rst commercial Since 2007 Gucci has been our main – Westpac National crocodile farm, was established in purchaser, along with a number of Advisory Committee for 1981. I am a founder and director boutique tanneries in Italy. Women in Banking, 2002 of Koorana, along with my husband, to 2006 John. Th e farm has won numerous After participating in the award I was – Advisory Committee on national and state awards for business invited to present papers at the 2002 Crocodile Nutrition, 2003 and tourism. Agricultural Outlook Conference, the to 2005 Queensland Rural Women’s Network – Advisory Committee on As a Rural Women’s Award fi nalist Annual Conference, and the ‘Reaping Commercialisation of in 2001, I received funding from the Rewards of Innovation: profi ting Exotic Skins, 2003 to the Queensland Department of from agricultural change’ Conference. 2006 Primary Industries and RIRDC, and I have also been a member of the • President, Queensland Rural this enabled me to realise my award Westpac National Advisory Committee Women’s Network, 2000 to ambition of taking an overseas study for Women in Banking, the Advisory 2001 tour. I had a fi ve-week trip to France Committee on Crocodile Nutrition • Member, Ministerial Advisory and Italy to attend international leather and the Advisory Committee on Council for Women in trade fairs, to look for markets for Commercialisation of Exotic Skins. Agriculture and Resource second- and third-grade skins from In my application for the award I wrote Management, 2000 to 2001 Koorana and other crocodile farms in about the importance of supporting • Member, RIRDC New Animal Queensland, and to hold discussions isolated rural communities, the need for Products Research and with Italian manufacturers with a view self-suffi ciency, and the central role of Development Committee, to joint venture projects. We already adding value to primary produce. Many 2006 - had a market for our fi rst-grade skins natural resources have in the past been • Winner, 2007 Business with the tanneries in Paris owned or under-used and thought of as weeds Enterprise Award, Queensland part-owned by Hermes, but we needed or vermin. Th e future may well lie in Government Regional to fi nd markets for the lower grade recognising the value of these resources, Achievement and Community skins. Th e trip proved highly successful: capitalising on their uniqueness, and Awards continuing markets were established exploiting their potential as domestic • Invited Paper, Economic and the foundations for joint ventures and export products. It is not only Opportunities for Women were laid. imperative that alternative land uses are in the Asia Pacific Region, In October 2005 I spent another sought and diff erent forms of primary sponsored by the World Bank, three weeks in Italy, meeting with the production engaged in: it is also vital Singapore Management clients I had gained in 2002, as well that the value-adding process be applied University & New York as new contacts, to show them the to all forms of agriculture—traditional University, February, 2009 results of our trials of single-penning and alternative. of crocodiles for three months before culling. Th e success of the single-pen My commitment to sustainable growth trials has led to our skins now being in non-traditional agriculture, my classed as fi rst grade and claiming a very concern for rural communities, and high price on the world market. As a my passion for value-adding to a raw result of the 2005 meetings all our skins product remain with me. Back when I were presold until the end of 2007 to applied for the award I felt like a lonely Hermes and Gucci. In April 2005 we voice, but now I am heartened to see visited the Asian Leather Fair to meet what other rural women are doing in with clients we had gained in 2002 and non-traditional fi elds of agriculture. to fi nd a source of hardware for our I am heartened, too, to see that rural manufactured product. women are having greater infl uence on traditional agricultural practices • To be average scares the hell out of me. and environmental care and that organisations supporting rural women • Dream the unbelievable. Everything is and their communities are being listened to more carefully. possible.

38 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Jeanette Gellard South Australian2001 winner

• Centenary Medal, 2003 My involvement in the Rural Women’s and trying to balance commercial and • Member, Australian Award stemmed from my interest in conservation objectives. Weeds Research continuous learning and the career Council opportunities the agricultural sector I am currently employed as general had off ered me. My original Award manager with the Kangaroo Island ambition was to raise awareness among Natural Resources Management young people of the employment and Board, where I have worked since business opportunities available in the October 2005. I have found this role primary industries sector, to attract particularly rewarding because its young women and men into primary focus is the protection, conservation industries, and to raise the sector’s and sustainable use of our natural profi le in the wider community. resources. In the past 18 months I have overseen the development of a regional natural resources management plan for Kangaroo Island. What has also been You are never too old to set another goal or enjoyable about the position is that I dream another dream. have been able to work closely with ——CS Lewis the farming community, who are the stewards of our soil and water resources and, in many cases, our biodiversity resources as well. Participating in the award process was extremely benefi cial for my own In the past few years I have become personal development. It provided an increasingly interested in the role opportunity for me to refl ect on my of women on boards and have been involvement in the primary industries participating in a Women on Boards sector and focus on what I believed network. Th is has aff orded some to be important about my work, my wonderful opportunities to meet business and the community I live in. women in leadership roles in a range of sectors. I am enthralled and inspired Just days before the 2001 award by the stories of these women; they are ceremony I gave birth to our third achieving amazing things. child, Rachael. I recall that many of my early presentations at seminars and conferences, arising from my award win, involved Rachael sleeping at my feet in her bassinet or being cuddled by an obliging audience member as I rambled on at the podium. Th is set the scene for Rachael, who at age 7 is now a seasoned meeting and conference attender.

Since receiving the award I have switched my career focus from agribusiness to natural resource management. Th is happened in 2002 when I began work with the Department of Environment and Heritage as the commercial operations manager on Kangaroo Island, a role that oﬀ ered some real challenges in managing visitors in protected areas

39 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Tracy Warland South Australian2001 finalist

• Bronze medal, South After participating in the Rural I have long dreamt of inspiring and Australian Tourism Women’s Award I successfully educating both adults and children, Awards, 2008 developed seahorse-breeding program to improve their knowledge of and protocols and marketed and sold attitudes to our oceans and waterways. seahorses both locally and overseas. We are now dedicated to conservation But the business as it was had started of the aquatic environment though to become static, and I felt I was static. living displays, education, research I needed a new direction. My children and the fostering of environmental were adults with their own careers, and responsibility. I felt I had reached a personal ‘use-by date’. South Australia does not have a public viewing aquarium, and it is my ambition to change that. My new facility is the fi rst step. It is essential We can’t solve problems by using the same that our children see the unique and diverse life that exists in our oceans. kind of thinking we used when we created Our children are the decision makers of them. the future, and we need to ensure that ——Albert Einstein they have the requisite knowledge and skills, so that when the time comes they can make the right decisions and know what is at risk. Although I did not fi nd the time or, more importantly, the resources to Since opening on 10 February 2007 make my dream a reality, I did not we have inspired and educated 50 000 give up hope: the motivation was still people. I am still working seven days a as strong as it ever was. So, in January week, but I have a new use-by date. 2007 I moved from Port Lincoln to Adelaide and opened the Seahorse Farm Educational Viewing Facility. Th e location is perfect, my business operating in the Heritage and Museum Precinct of Port Adelaide. Th e building needed a major fi t-out and was not big enough to accommodate a large-scale breeding program and an educational viewing area, so I decided to ‘downsize’ and run a small-scale breeding program with the primary focus being marine education.

40 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Rhonda Tonkin Western Australian2001 winner

• Centenary Medal, 2001 I think I have the best career in the Years of debilitating drought have country—growing beautiful native played havoc with Australia’s wildfl ower wildfl owers and meeting new people industry, but in the face of intense from around the world, day in, day out. pressures our business remains a solid regional employer that continues to I am one of Australia’s leading generate strong export income. One wildfl ower growers and exporters. At of the highlights for me in recent years our farm, the Western Wildfl ower was being selected as one of a group of Farm, outside Moora in the central 20 to tour Japan with leading members midlands of Western Australia, we of the fruit, fl ower and vegetable grow close to 400 diff erent wildfl ower industries from all over Australia. varieties. Our business is the only vertically integrated commercial Tourism is a growing market for us. wildfl ower operation in Western Th e wildfl ower season extends from Australia and is one of the region’s July to November, and we are ideally main employers. Th e ‘Everlastings’ situated—three hours from both Perth wildfl owers featured at the Kings Park and Geraldton—so our farm is a timely ceremony in Perth to unveil the Bali lunch stop. Twenty-four coach lines Bombing Memorial came from our visit us, as do many caravanners and farm. other tourists. Our gift shop showcases the work of local artists and now employs local women who manufacture Know your product and act with integrity. products on site. We also employ overseas students who are multilingual, which enriches the experience of visitors who speak no English. My Rural Women’s Award project involved an overseas study tour to I have enjoyed my 35 years in the explore value-adding and export fl ower industry, and when I retire I opportunities for the industry. Th e propose to write a history of fl ower resultant new opportunities were, exporting from Western Australia. I however, severely hampered by quality have copies of the documentation for assurance problems, the uncertainty our fi rst shipment to Holland, in 1972, surrounding the global economy, and and have experienced the trials and a fi ckle gift market. Nevertheless, the tribulations of a growing industry since knowledge I gained and the networks then. My business has been fl ooded and I forged as a result of the tour have burnt to the ground, yet has survived. been extremely valuable in developing It has been, and continues to be, a my understanding of the demands and wonderful adventure. constraints of the market.

Our business wholesales to every state in Australia and exports to Holland, Germany, Italy, the United States, Japan, Singapore and Israel.

41 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Janette O’Keefe Western Australian2001 finalist

• Western Australian I am a veterinarian by profession and Participating in the award gave me representative, Rural was a partner in our family piggery the opportunity to expand my vision Women’s Advisory at Tarin Rock, near Lake Grace in and bring it to the national level and Council, 2002 to 2005 the Upper Great Southern region of beyond. Many doors opened. Among • Centenary Medal for Western Australia. We no longer have other things, I was off ered the position services to Australian the piggery, and my veterinary practice of Western Australian representative on society and rural has closed as a result of the drought. the second Rural Women’s Advisory industries, 2003 Circumstances required us to move Council. I served in this capacity for • Training and research forward, and I have strengthened my three years, until September 2005. model development resolve to pursue my vision of providing Since then my personal and career viable and reliable veterinary services opportunities have been many and to the rural and remote sector. Th is varied but have served to encourage me has taken many forms—some totally to persist with my vision. unexpected—as a direct result of my involvement with the Rural Women’s At present I am developing an Award. integrated veterinary consultancy that encompasses both conventional Our piggery was an accredited quality- and holistic perspectives and uses assured supplier and minimal-disease the internet portal model. I am also operation; we deployed preventive researching women’s impact in the medicine techniques and early veterinary profession, especially in rural intervention protocols that I used both and remote areas, with a view to writing in my practice and when providing a book. I hope to tell the stories of past on-farm support services for my clients. and contemporary female vets and their My veterinary practice serviced an perspectives on the profession and life area of 500 square kilometres, from as a vet. Wagin to Hyden and Wickepin to Pingrup. It was physically hard to I propose to use the skills and service this large area when demand experiences I have gained in a more was high, and the farmer’s cost of focused, local way through my travelling was often factored into the consultancy and to build a network of pre-treatment discussion. Th e result was support for the portal, as well as for the that I developed a model of support book. Participation in the award gave that allowed for a service that was me much more than that, though— more cost-eff ective and socially and self-confi dence, support, networks, physically achievable for practitioner opportunities, skills, and a belief that and farmer alike. I could achieve this my vision was valued. only to some degree, and unfortunately circumstances intervened and I was forced to discontinue my service.

It is this set of circumstances that continues to motivate me to pursue my vision. With the experience of my practice and the drought, I work to increase awareness and to push for rural veterinary services to be supported and developed, particularly in remote areas. Back in 2001 my vision was to develop an interactive information portal that incorporates the locally available services and brings specialist services to areas where traditionally none have been available.

42 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Frances Bender Tasmanian winner2001

• Raising three fantastic When I think back I am stunned at In 2008 we embarked on a national children to parenthood where our business and my life are now. and international rebranding and • Centenary Medal, In 2001 Huon Aquaculture Company repackaging project that entailed 2002- for service to was a contract salmon-farming development of new products and Australian society and company employing 80 people in packaging using amazing regional rural industries southern Tasmania. Th e business model photographic imagery. We also manage • Board member, was very simple: we concentrated a national advertising program, which Tasmanian Aquaculture mainly on growing the very best salmon began with a spectacular launch on the and Fisheries Institute for others to market under their own shores of Sydney Harbour and featured (TAFI) brands. My Rural Women’s Award world-class chefs. It was there that we • Board member, Food ambition was to investigate potential unveiled our book, Huon Connoisseur’s Industry Council of export opportunities for us to market Guide to Salmon. Tasmania (FICT) directly to Japan. • Helping to create We have sponsored and employed the and run a flourishing Th ese days we are a fully vertically very best international staﬀ who have enterprise and surviving integrated company. We control the chosen to relocate their families to rural the process entire process—hatchery, sea farming, Tasmania to help grow and manage our primary processing, smoking, value- business. We constantly innovate and adding, and marketing under the undertake research to underpin our Huon brand. We are recognised as product and brand. Our marine farm the premium brand of salmon and production statistics lead the world, export to Japan, Hong Kong, China, both in growth and in environmental Singapore, Taiwan, Indonesia, Malaysia, management. the United States, France, and the home of salmon, Norway. We now On a personal note, I am still married, employ 400 people in four states of my children are now 27, 25 and 17, Australia, and our turnover is now well and I am moving on to the next stage above $100 million. of parenthood—being supportive when needed and trying not to embarrass my family too much as I re-ﬁ nd myself! I still undertake some public speaking • If you don’t ask you don’t get. engagements and am quite often the media spokesperson for our company • Life is not a dress rehearsal. and our industry association. My passion for my rural community has not waned.

In 2003 we bought a smoking and value-adding business based in the Adelaide Hills. Th is business, with 100 people employed, had been owned by our largest exclusive customer, and the acquisition gave us immediate access to the premium smoked salmon market in Australia. In 2006 we bought the primary processing factory, which had previously been working under contract, and installed world-leading machinery. In 2008 we built a state-of- the-art, fully recirculating freshwater hatchery—an investment of about $8 million to allow us to control our product from egg to customer.

43 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Jodie Epper Tasmanian finalist2001

Until recently I was the executive offi cer confi dence to lead in the way that best of the Tasmanian Landcare Association, suits me and to tackle challenges I which represents the interests of the previously would have shied away from. community landcare movement in Tasmania. It is a not-for-profi t I am just about to enter a whole new community organisation made up of world with a new set of challenges—the volunteer landcarers across the state world of motherhood, my fi rst baby and its role is to support, promote and being due any day now. provide networking opportunities and strategic direction for the community landcare movement.

My skills lie in communicating with people—in particular, translating government policies and programs into everyday language. I am experienced at working with the media and meet regularly with government ministers and senior bureaucrats.

My Rural Women’s Award vision was for all users of natural resources in Tasmania to have clear-thinking, rational discussions about management of those resources. Th e landcare ethos is the platform, and my position allowed me to facilitate this. Applying for the award was one of the hardest things I have done: it was like having to prove that a ‘city girl’ could make the grade in the rural world. Despite this, participating in the award gave me a much-improved ability to deal with the agricultural sector and with government. I also gained new insights into myself.

I have since held positions of leadership and have mentored my staﬀ and other people in the organisations I have worked in. Th e positions I have held have been very public ones and I have tried to maintain my integrity at all times. Th e award gave me the

44 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Carmel Wagstaff Northern Territory2001 winner

• Successfully raising In 2001 I was recognised in the so. But the most rewarding thing was two great Australians to Northern Territory as a champion of watching many employees develop and adulthood employees and won the Rural Women’s expand, embracing and learning to love • 1998 Northern Territory Award. An enormous honour, the life in these remote locations. Chief Minister’s award gave me a means of promoting Women’s Achievement careers in Australian agriculture— I strove to learn as much as possible Award specifi cally, the northern beef cattle about the land, the industry, the people • Centenary Medal, industry. in it, the history, the fl ora and fauna. 2002—for service to I worked to improve education access Australian society and I was passionate about the industry and and employment opportunities for rural industries the lifestyle it off ered. I loved the harsh people in the bush and was equally beauty of the land, and I recognised energetic about the recognition of and admired the special qualities of the lifelong learning in adults. I was people who lived and worked there. involved in various organisations Armed with a vision of lifting the image lobbying for improved conditions for of rural workers and promoting their people in remote areas. professionalism, I set out to build a network of like-minded people involved After winning the award I moved to in the industry, to develop ideas for Brisbane. I am now employed with the promoting and supporting the industry Queensland Department of Emergency and identifying concerns. Services, in the Ethical Standards Unit. Once again, I am in the company of sincere, compassionate, professional people. And in the end it is not the years in your life that count. It’s the life in your years. Th e award helped me promote my vision of arresting the exodus of ——Abraham Lincoln people from the bush. I hope I made a diff erence, no matter how small. Now that I live in the city, I note, I was worried by the fact that during sadly, that there is still much to be the preceding 27 years I had seen a done to increase awareness among move—or more latterly a fl ood—away city folk of the professionalism and from a career in the northern beef commitment that exists among their industry. Parents, career advisors and rural counterparts. others tended to promote it as a bad I hold in my heart a deep love of the career choice. I also noted that people bush, and I will always be passionate in the industry itself talked down such a about the continued viability of that career choice, sending a strong negative way of life and about training and message. Many good people were lifelong learning for rural people of all chased away by this negativity. ages and backgrounds. Th roughout my years of living on remote cattle stations in Western Australia and the Northern Territory I met many remarkable people across many ages and cultures. Each inspired me to grow and develop. I am sure I would never have become as tolerant as I am today had I not had the good fortune to mix and live with these people. I saw much change over the years—some positive and some not

45 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Miriam Golding Northern Territory2001 finalist

After 25 years of farming in the I have also been privileged to work Northern Territory, moving south at Stewart House School, near Curl has taken some adjustment and Curl Beach, being part of a team posed many challenges. Th ere’s been providing respite and health care for much grief and loss associated with disadvantaged children. Th e programs relinquishing my dream of owning a focus on personal development and successful and profi table family farm. Aboriginal perspectives, which fi ts well with my past teaching experience in My husband, Ian, and I operated remote Australia. an 8000-tree mango farm outside Katherine, along with a central Adjusting to living on the northern packhouse facility, Katherine Gorgeous beaches of Sydney has not always been Mangoes, which picked and packed easy, and I dream of returning to the for the Katherine region’s growers. bush some day. Mad Mim (that’s me) I was also active in rural women’s plans on making a diff erence wherever organisations, including being on she fi nds herself each day. the board of Australian Women in Agriculture and helping organise the 1st Women in Horticulture National Conference, in Hobart.

Since our family’s sea-change to Sydney in 2005, I have kept myself busy, learning how to live diﬀ erently and how to let go of taking responsibility for everything and everyone around me. I’ve discovered yoga, meditation and daily walks to the beach, which have helped me relax and begin to enjoy the world around me.

Keen to fi nd new meaning in my life, I did postgraduate studies in counselling and psychotherapy, and I now work as the discharge therapist at a rehab centre, off ering treatment and support for clients and their families who are suff ering from drug and alcohol addictions, along with anxiety and depression.

46 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Katrina Wright Northern Territory2001 finalist

• Barramond Tropical Th e spice trade was once the stuff of I have now achieved many of the Fruits and Exotic Spice legends, but growing exotic spices goals I set out to achieve through the Farm and selling them on the international Award. I fi nished my diploma studies • WWOOF—Willing market became a reality for me and at Northern Territory University, and at Workers on Organic proved a great and profi table alternative present I am continuing my studies in Farms horticultural industry. New York State. In 2005 in the United • Quality assurance and States I ran a college course for urban food safety standards I have spent more than 10 years dwellers and gourmet cooks, teaching • profit and culinary deeply involved in the industry in them how to grow and cultivate bonsai pleasure the Northern Territory, and my farm, spice trees. It was very exciting and • Bonsai spice trees Barramond Tropical Fruits and Exotic successful, expanding the possibilities Spice Farm, has played an integral role for people with little or no available in the development of the industry’s land. quality assurance and food safety standards. Since participating in the Americans seem to like the medicinal Rural Women’s Award I have written a spices because people are seeking book that describes how to grow spices alternative therapies; in Australia, in for profi t and culinary pleasure; it is contrast, there is far greater acceptance aimed at people with small farms plus of the exotic spices used in the cooking off -farm income. of other countries.

Participating in the award opened up opportunities for me and forced me to Spices constitute an important group of set much higher goals. Do one thing agricultural commodities; they are virtually every day towards your goal and at the indispensable, and opportunities abound for end of the week you have progress; at the end of the month you have more; this alternative industry. and at the end of the year you have achievement.

How to ﬁ nd help and labour at little or no cost was one of my big problems, but it became a problem solved. My farm became a member of an organisation called WWOOF—Willing Workers on Organic Farms. Overseas students were very interested in staying and working on an exotic spice farm. Four or ﬁ ve students stayed weekly, and energy and enthusiasm levels were high. I highly recommend this organisation to other farms: when the students are about, the farm is a hive of activity. Everything is humming. I understand why in the old days farmers had lots of children.

47 48 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award 2002 Participating in the award ...

Robbie Sefton Sandra Doyle Ruth Quigley Carol Mathew Joanne Butterworth-Gray Mary Lankester Suzanne Nation June Gill Susan Berlin Carol Johnson Angela Whittington Tracey Ebert Pamela Williamson Jeanette Reader Christine Mann Kate Hadden

49 2002 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Robbie Sefton New South Wales2002 winner

• Advisory group As a farmer and a communicator, Another program making a diff erence member, Regional I am passionate about building in regional communities is our Hunters Women’s Advisory vibrant, sustainable rural communities and Gatherers project. Receipt of the Council, since June and committed to creating diverse Rural Women’s Award bursary in 2002 2006 opportunities for rural Australians. allowed me to pilot this innovative • Retired board member, program, which I have since further Australian Rural With my husband, I am a business developed. We maintain a unique Leadership Foundation, partner in a 2900-hectare property network of communication ‘hunters July 2007 producing fi ne wool, crops, cattle and and gatherers’, creating a two-way • Retired board prime lambs in northern New South fl ow of communication between the member, Australian Wales. I am also director of Sefton & bush and leaders in industry, politics Wool Services (The Associates, a national communication and business. From some 20 locations Woolmark Company)— and marketing consultancy based in in rural Australia we receive regular amalgamated into Tamworth. information on the social, political, Australian Wool industry, business and media mood. I want to change the conversation Innovation, November Th ese reports help us identify the local about rural Australia and encourage 2007 ‘infl uencers’ and the current issues, young people to return to the country • Board member, which in turn determine the direction once they’ve gained education and Australia Day Council and focus of policy decisions and our experience, to create successful (New South Wales) communication strategy. businesses and caring communities. With this as my long-term goal, my Th e Hunters and Gatherers project focus in the past few years has been on leads to more eff ective communication developing and implementing programs between policy makers and constituents and communication campaigns for in rural, regional and remote clients seeking to engage with rural Australia. And with more eff ective communities and build the confi dence communication comes the opportunity and capacity of rural Australians. for improved service delivery and better uptake of off ered programs that are more likely to achieve their aim of Do not go where the path may lead; go where improving the welfare of rural, regional and remote Australians. there is no path and leave a trail. ——Ralph Waldo Emerson In addition to these two programs, Sefton & Associates continues to work with a variety of national clients from government departments, research and Creating Rural Leaders is a leadership development corporations and large program Sefton & Associates developed businesses to develop and implement and designed specifi cally for emerging communication strategies designed to leaders in rural and regional industries, reach audiences living and working in businesses and communities. It is our rural, regional and remote Australia. fl agship program, and we tailor it to suit the needs of our individual clients and their stakeholders. Feedback to date from participants has been very positive, and we are currently evaluating the long-term outcomes of the courses.

50 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Sandra Doyle New South Wales2002 finalist

At the time I participated in the Participating in the award with some Rural Women’s Award my husband truly wonderful women helped me and I were running a Boer goat stud look ahead and move into alternative on the Southern Tablelands of New farming enterprises. Being city born South Wales. Our main interest in the and bred, I often thought I was not enterprise was the goat-meat market, cut out to handle the drought, and and we were successful in producing I admired women who could smile high-quality meat goats that were prized through the hard times. Refl ecting on by a number of exclusive restaurants in those women has given me the strength Canberra and Sydney. to keep going, to seek alternatives, and to eventually decide on an alternative But years of drought put an end to farming enterprise. what seemed to be a very promising niche market. In 2004 we were forced to sell off our breeding herd and fi nd a new way of using our land. We kept our full-blood Boer does and a couple of our best full-blood bucks, and we now breed a few does once a year, for sale mainly to new breeders starting out in business. Th is is proving quite successful, although it is a relatively small enterprise.

We have turned most of our farming enterprise over to alpacas: they eat far less than goats. Our ambition is to ‘ﬁ ne-up’ the quality of our wool while targeting mainly the cottage industry. We have been researching carding machines that can handle more bulk than we are able to process by hand. Our eﬀ orts have been somewhat frustrated by the fact that a machine in our price range does not produce the results we want. Nevertheless, we keep investigating.

51 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Ruth Quigley New South Wales2002 finalist

I am a partner in a mixed-farming My involvement in the award led to business producing cotton, wheat, new learning opportunities. It built my olives and beef cattle outside Trangie, conﬁ dence in public speaking and in in north-western New South Wales. marketing support and taught me to be unafraid of trying new ideas and to take advantage of every opportunity. No problem is insurmountable if you break it A stand-out example was being part of Austrade’s New Export Development down into manageable pieces, make lists and Program, which has opened up huge prioritise. opportunities for exporting olive oil to China. Never lose your sense of humour. Part of my award ambition involved encouraging other rural women to My main farm responsibilities are become interested in using the internet. administration and marketing, and my One of my clients was in fact Kate alternative farm enterprise is my olive Schwager, who went on to become grove, which produces olive oils and 2006 Rural Women’s Award New soaps under the brand Woodbine Grove South Wales winner for her project Olive Oil but is very much a sideline on marketing rural towns and their these days. Tough seasons and poor industries on the web. returns have seen me return to work in my former occupation, as a nurse. I have been out of the profession for 20 years but, having done the ﬁ rst-line emergency care course, I’ve slotted right back in.

I also run a small web-based design business that is slowly growing. I teamed up with fellow Rural Women’s Award recipient Kate Schwager, from Wee Waa, to operate Webteam Australia, which provides web services such as domain registration, website hosting and web design services. Much of our development eﬀ ort focuses on promoting rural centres and towns, and promoting the bush to the broader web audience. Kate and I work well together, and we complement each other’s talents—hers in sales and mine in management.

When I entered the award I believed—and I still do—the internet could provide a useful and cheap communication tool for rural industries and regional communities. I speciﬁ cally developed the ozcotton.net website to encourage the sharing of ideas and information.

52 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Carol Mathew Victorian winner2002

• Director Western Water I began an alpaca stud in 1995. I was I spent six years as a director of the Corporation, 2005 - an escapee from the city and knew very Australian Alpaca Cooperative. Th e 2009 little about farming, and this meant I cooperative has continued to grow and • Member and had to learn a great deal very quickly. I is now a major company, exporting Chairperson, RIRDC started with four alpacas and the goal in its own right to overseas markets as Rare Natural Animal of learning about genetic gain and well as supplying the domestic market. Fibres Advisory breeding towards fi ne, heavy-cutting Two trips to Peru have been a highlight Committee, 1996 to fl eeces. I have always loved research and of my participation in the industry. 2009 development, so this has been my main I have learnt much about alpaca • Successful participation focus in the alpaca industry. fl eece, processing, and the remarkable in a new rural industry breeding achievements of the ancient • Development of a five- I was appointed industry representative Incan people. star alpaca stud to the RIRDC Rare Natural Animal • Volunteer Support to Fibres Advisory Committee in Sadly, in 2008 I realised it was time Refugees, Sudan and 1996, and I am now the committee for me to retire. After much angst, I Ethiopia chairperson. Th e funding I received have dispersed my herd. Th is was very as part of the Rural Women’s Award successful commercially, and I still have has been invaluable in supporting the people contacting me about ‘my girls industry, particularly in establishing the and boys’, but I do miss them. I am, starting profi le of the foundation stock however, very pleased I took the leap of and the subsequent development of a faith into farming and stud breeding. genetic evaluation program. I practised what I preached, and my stud was the fi rst stud in Victoria to receive a fi ve- star rating in this program. We have also researched animal reproduction, embryo transfer and artifi cial insemination.

Don’t spend time on wishful thinking, give it a go.

Another important consideration has been value-adding to Australian alpaca ﬁ bre. Th e bursary meant I was able to travel to New Zealand, Japan, the United Kingdom and Italy to learn about the markets for products and about processing of the ﬁ bre. Again, RIRDC research has been at the forefront in gaining information on processing.

53 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Joanne Butterworth-Gray Victorian finalist2002

• Chair, Gippsland Food I became chief executive offi cer accommodation. I have been chair of and Wine Tourism for the Victorian Wine Industry the Gippsland Food and Wine Tourism Group Association in April 2006, with the Group and deputy chair of Destination • Deputy chair, task of representing and promoting the Gippsland, along with providing Destination Gippsland interests of the wine industry across input into the Gippsland Agribusiness • Above all, raising half a Victoria. Board and the Victorian Food Tourism dozen children, five of Reference Group. them daughters, into Since that time I have been able to adults I respect and implement some major structural Th e award’s leadership program admire changes to the association, including taught me much about myself—most a complete rewrite of the constitution importantly, that I need to take time to so that the 21 wine regions in Victoria assimilate in order to understand myself are now represented on a council, and others. Understanding myself which allows every region to infl uence better has helped me listen better, policy development. Th is organisational communicate and engage with people, change took about 18 months to eff ect, and help them share in a vision and but the impact has been enormous collectively move forward. in terms of empowering people and giving each region equity and a sense of individual ownership of statewide outcomes.

Listen to others, they have so much to offer

My Rural Women’s Award ambition concerned the realisation of Gippsland’s potential as a sustainable agribusiness centre oﬀ ering employment and business opportunities for rural women and using as its basis a regional food brand for raw and value-added products.

My experience and expertise have been in marketing and promotion and in value-adding with regional produce. I have owned and operated, in partnership with my husband, a fruit and berry farm to which we value- added by developing an epicurean centre complete with restaurant and

54 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Mary Lankester Queensland winner2002

• Receiving the AFFA Th is year my husband, Tony, received fruit ventures and was instrumental in In-Market Experience from Rio Tinto an off er to become the establishment of the Association Scholarship, 2002 the corporation’s fi re rescue offi cer. for Tropical Northern Queensland • Working with Austrade Th e off er was too good to refuse, so Wineries. and Qld State we moved further north, to Weipa, on Development in Japan, Cape York Peninsula. I look forward to Th e award brought me many 2003 a change and a break from the frenetic opportunities and many new networks, • Founding Chair pace of the past few years. along with new skills and training. For Association of Tropical all this, I am very grateful. North Qld Wineries My Rural Women’s Award ambition Incorporated was to develop a business for myself • Exporting into Asia and and a regional tourism and primary Europe industry venture through wines made • Over 100 commercial from tropical fruit. Th e idea was to national and use the second-grade fruit that was international wine being discarded because it had minor medals blemishes and abrasions. Paradise • Winner of the Tropical Fruit Wines, complete with Australian Boutique cellar door, was very successful, both Label Design, Paradise as a viable enterprise and as a tourism Gold Wine venture for the region. • Australia’s Most But Paradise Wines was directly in the Professional path of Cyclone Larry, which devastated Winemaker, Tasmanian Mission Beach in 2006 and wiped out Wine Awards, 2007 the winery. Th e dishwasher for glasses • Winner of the and the water tanks were the only Excellence in things left standing. Th e cyclone left Communication 2008 us with no tourism industry, no crop to make wine from, and a substantial debt. In the years following Larry I have spent a huge amount of time ‘on the road’, travelling to shows, expos and fi eld days, marketing and selling my wines.

Among the highlights of my experience are being named Australia’s Most Professional Winemaker for 2007 by the Tasmanian Wine Awards and paying oﬀ my business loan. At a personal level, I learnt a great deal about winemaking, business and budgeting, marketing and selling. My business was also the catalyst for other tropical

55 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Suzanne Nation Queensland finalist2002

• Participant, government My journey began in 1999, when In 2003 I was chosen to participate trade missions to Asia I bought my family’s property and in the inaugural year of the Industry • Australian Business returned home. Since then I have Partnership Corporate Governance Corporation selection to overcome many obstacles, confronted a for Rural Women Program. My attend Beijing Olympics number of diffi culties, and enjoyed the industry partner was the Grape and • Participant, Industry rewards of my work. Th e fi rst challenge Wine Research and Development Partnership Corporate was diversifying from the family Corporation, and as part of the Governance for Rural beef cattle and grain operation and program I did the Australian Institute Women Program, 2003 establishing a vineyard, followed by a of Company Directors course. Th e winery, cellar door and an olive grove. years that followed were fi lled with hard work, excitement and recognition With whispers of a grape glut predicted as my range of traditional and infused to hit the market in 2004, I had to wines grew. I have taken many trips to ‘think outside the square’ in order to Hong Kong, Korea, Japan and China to avoid this looming problem. So in attend international trade shows and to 2000 we began the necessary research meet clients. into creating an innovative wine infused with herbs. Th is solution allowed us Among my highlights have been to add value to our traditional wines, accompanying the Queensland Premier creating a new niche-market product and the Toowoomba Regional Council that has been the catalyst for our Mayor on trade missions to Asia, subsequent expansion. having our wines served at international dinners, a personal visit to my winery For me, 2002 was a year of by the Queensland Consul-General accomplishments. I was selected as for Shanghai and Beijing, and being a Rural Women’s Award fi nalist for selected by the Australian Business my infused wine project and the Corporation to attend the Beijing completion of building my winery. Olympics. Unfortunately, by this time I was also chosen to participate in the hectic pace of work had taken its the third World Congress for Rural toll, and illness prevented me going to Women, held in Spain; this I followed the Olympics and going on other trade with a Queensland Department of missions with government offi cials. Primary Industries study tour of Spain and France. I was also awarded the In 2009, though, with renewed vigour, Micro Business Award for Agriculture I look forward to the coming decade— in Queensland and was appointed to living out my dreams, networking Queensland’s Biosecurity Advisory with like-minded people who believe Council and various other boards. A in themselves and are prepared to step big year and very fulfi lling for me as a outside their comfort zones and think businesswoman. creatively, and producing new and innovative products.

56 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award June Gill South Australian2002 winner

• Founding chair, South Th e Rural Women’s Award gave me the Alas, in 2005 I was diagnosed with Australian Women in opportunity to take up the challenge kidney disease, and I have since Fishing and write a much-needed book that had to back away from work and • National president, would support women and men in the commitments. But in my mind I Women Industry seafood industry, drawing on strategies know there are many capable men Network Seafood developed primarily during my 35 years and women who can continue to lead Community of working in the industry. and be ambassadors for the seafood • Member, Rural industry, and I know I have played a Women’s Advisory My involvement in the wild-catch small role in their emergence. Group fi shing industry extended from grass- • Author, Equilibrium roots practical eff ort to executive and As I refl ect in 2009, I am no longer leadership positions. I was founding working in primary production, yet you chair of South Australian Women in do wonder and never forget where you Fishing and helped create the fi rst came from and, as we all understand, national voice for seafood women that can be a mixed blessing. To be through the industry network Women sure, it has its joys, both large and Industry Network Seafood Community, small, frequent and rare. It also has of which I became national president, its frustrations and disappointments. along with being a member of the Rural Being a woman working in the seafood Women’s Advisory Group. industry is not easy. For many it can be a lifelong responsibility and, I am sure Each of us is a unique and amazing being, for most of us, a lifelong worry too. possessed of special gifts and talents. We are all here to use our lives, use our gifts, to serve our industry in some way. We can take inspiration in the greatness of others, but we each have our own greatness that cries out to be expressed. Today, take a moment to reflect on and be inspired by the greatness that is you. I developed a guide to help women and men understand the professionals and the system they must deal with daily. Th e book, Equilibrium, became a reality in 2003, and 1000 copies were printed and distributed Australia- wide. It has been welcomed for its practical insights into ‘the system’, both public and private. I believe it helped shape strategies and remove barriers and continues to do so today. I was able to travel and promote the book throughout Australia, supported by industry and community groups.

57 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Susan Berlin South Australian2002 finalist

• Centenary Medal, Th e concept of Island Pure was born As a result of my association with the 2003—for contributions out of a desire to have control over our food industry and value-adding, I was to small business enterprise’s entire production chain, asked to sit on a number of boards, • Board member, ultimately allowing us to control our among them Agriculture Kangaroo Agriculture Kangaroo profi tability. In 1992 my husband Island and Good Food Kangaroo Island and Good Food and I, along with senior partners, got Island, on both of which boards I Kangaroo Island the business on its feet. In 2002 we spent a time as chair. I sat on the • Member, Premier’s bought out our partners and rebranded Premier’s Food Council as a voice for Food Council and doubled the size of the business, small regional food businesses; this was resulting in a small regional enterprise an industry-led council that shaped that has weathered drought and a rocky government food policy in South fi nancial climate with ease. Australia. I was also a member of an advisory board to the South Australian Island Pure, located on Kangaroo Tourism Association. Island, produces sheep-milk products for wholesale and retail and is open We have two beautiful, individual to visitors. We run our 260 hectares children, who are now my main focus under a grazing system for sheep, and outside the business. we add value by grazing sheep we have bred specifi cally for their milking capabilities. We harvest the milk in a purpose-built dairy and process the milk into cheese and yoghurt. We then package on site and market throughout Australia. Taking 30 000 visitors on interpretive tours each year has a big positive impact on the marketing of the products and on our cash fl ow.

My participation in the Rural Women’s Award occurred at about the time I won the South Australian Telstra Women in Business Award 2001 and received the Premier’s Young Leader Award in the food industry and a Centenary Medal for contributions to small business.

Having researched the proposal I put forward for the award, I pursued other avenues of funding for my research, eventually obtaining an Advancing Australian Agriculture Innovations grant. Today our business beneﬁ ts from the innovations I was able to introduce and has itself been recognised through the Premier’s Food Awards and the South Australian Great Regional Awards.

58 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Carol Johnson South Australian2002 finalist

I was known in my region as the My Rural Women’s Award ambition ﬁ rst and only female manager of the was to motivate other women to Millicent saleyards complex, which become involved in the livestock I managed for 13 years. Under my industry and to lift the image of leadership the saleyards achieved a saleyards as a venue for livestock number of milestones, including exchange. I hope that through my accreditation for quality assurance years at the Millicent saleyards complex under the terms of National Saleyards I achieved this to some degree. Th e Quality Assurance Ltd, accreditation Livestock Transport Association of for Saudi livestock export preparations South Australia honoured me with an procedures, and accreditation for the award for Notable Achievement for European Union. We also embarked on Excellence in Saleyard Management a major expansion program to add to and Service. the complex a bull-selling ring and nine buyers’ cattle-delivery pens. During my tenure the throughput of cattle at the saleyards greatly increased, and the stock that went through the yards consistently commanded the highest prices in South Australia.

Believe in yourself and go for it.

After 13 years in the job, and given the eﬃ ciencies I had achieved and the downturn in cattle numbers as a result of drought, I was able to make myself and the job redundant. I now work for the timber industry, as Occupational Health and Safety Rehabilitation and Return to Work Coordinator and Human Resource Oﬃ cer with the company LV Dohnt—a mouthful of a title but a job I am enjoying immensely.

59 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Angela Whittington Western Australian2002 winner

• 40 Under 40 Award, Since winning the 2002 Rural Women’s My role is to understand and oversee 2002 and 2007 Award my life journey has changed everything that goes on every day and • Imaging the South— immeasurably, although still within the in every facet of the business and, Telstra Business foundation of proudly being a woman more importantly, to know when Awards Innovation building a successful career in a regional to step in and take over. Th e role is Winner for Western area of Australia. Winning the award varied, to say the least—18 locations Australia, 2007, and has fundamentally shaped my life and spread across Western Australia, 70 South West Business career because it has given me access to staff , 20 ‘tele’-radiologists spread all of the Year 50 to 200 the south-west as my base. over the world, a highly sophisticated Employees, 2008 IT infrastructure, industrial relations • Telstra Business Back in 2002 the award off ered me a change, fi nance and budgeting, Women’s Awards wonderful opportunity to review in operations, commercial contract Hudson Corporation detail the plum-fruit industry. Th e negotiations with private providers and and Private Award for summer harvest of 2003 saw us for government, and general lobbying at Western Australia, the fi rst time move on from being all levels of government. Our primary 2008 just growers to exporting directly into clinical sites are in Bunbury, Busselton China. In the six years since then the and Mandurah, three of the fastest market for Western Australian plums growing regions in Australia. has plummeted as a consequence of the largely unforeseen growth in We are a working model of an Chilean exports to China. New freight enterprise that has overcome major containers with long-life capability now hurdles in operating solely from rural mean that Chilean fruit is regularly and remote locations. We have created landed in Asia at less than Australian a business that focuses on quality and production costs. Australia’s signing technology, delivering state-of-the-art- of a free trade agreement with China services that are at the leading edge of will, however, have a huge positive our industry worldwide. We have now impact on Australia’s fruit industry and applied the Imaging the South model could mean the eventual return of the to the UK-based Global Diagnostics Chinese market. operation, which is fast becoming a major player in the UK and European market. Surround yourself with good people. Empower For me, it has been wonderful to have them to be the best they can be and the team the opportunity to work at the helm of a larger business through a period will excel at any pursuit. Don’t be frightened of enormous change. Th e pinnacle of to challenge yourself. my career with Imaging the South was in 2008: I was awarded the prestigious Telstra Business Women’s Hudson Private and Corporate Sector Award for We sold out of farming, and I took up a Western Australia. Another big change full-time career as chief executive offi cer since 2002 is that I have become the of Imaging the South, a company that mother of three delightful children, provides diagnostic imaging services Th omas, 5, Evie, 4, and little Jesse, 2. to rural and remote areas of Australia, using world-class technologies to achieve the highest quality radiological reporting and consultancy.

60 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Tracey Ebert Western Australian2002 finalist

Farming on the south coast of Balancing and using my time well Western Australia has its challenges is the next challenge. I continue to and triumphs. My husband and I work on the farm, managing our grain farm coarse grains and sheep near marketing program and ‘odd-jobbing’ Ravensthorpe. Seasonally, we have had while our children are at school fi ve a roller coaster ride, having annual crop hours’ drive away. I credit the award yields of historic highs and historic with giving me the confi dence to lows. We look forward to consecutive start a facilitation business, allowing years of less excitement. me to work on some very interesting projects that have resulted in rewarding I became a fi nalist in the Rural outcomes for our region. A new project, Women’s Award as a result of my still in its infancy, continues to linger. involvement as chair of the Fitzgerald Sharing it with the award recipients Biosphere Marketing Association, this year at the reunion and with my which was established to develop inspirational women friends at home a recognised brand for the region may just give it the ‘legs’ it needs. and encourage the community to responsibly produce market- edge products and services. We were successful in developing and establishing a brand for the region. Th e challenge then became securing the necessary quantity and quality of agricultural produce to market the brand. As it turned out, our extensive trials proved that the region was not positioned in such a way that the brand would off er a good enough return for the growers. Tourism, rather than agricultural produce, was the better avenue for promoting the brand, so we chose to disseminate our fi ndings to the region’s two main grower and tourism groups for further direction and implementation.

61 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Pamela Williamson Western Australian2002 finalist

• Deputy president, After I participated in the Rural that I have been slowly developing Hyden Shire Council Women’s Award the continued some more value-adding projects with downturn in agriculture and a lack of chooks. Some of the older varieties are funds left me with a huge defi cit—too being lost, and our fi rst purebred stock big to fi nance my award ambition of are now a reality, with the fi rst saleable farming saltwater fi sh. animals ready to leave home.

On the recreational side, I still have the honour of being the ﬁ rst and only • One person CAN make a difference female executive on the board of the local pistol club, although now the • Live each day as if it were your last. membership is at least one-quarter female. Th e local quilting group I started years ago is still going strong— I stumbled across soap-making and these days without me. Last year I also since then have researched, trialled celebrated 21 years as a square dance and established a niche market for caller for our local group, and I wrote hand-crafted olive oil–based soaps, and published a book to commemorate creams and candles. Many of the the event. soaps and creams have been developed for problem skins. Th e candles are My small business, which operates practical, and I simply make them for from a cottage in Hyden, will celebrate fun. At present I am looking at ways 25 years in December 2009. One part of extracting oils from ﬂ owers and of the business has always been aimed plants, so that I can use the oils in my at nurturing the other parts. Despite products. I now have three wholesale the passing years, I have always tried outlets, and the entire production to keep this and my enthusiasm to the is a ‘one-woman’ operation. I have forefront. I believe that participating some important decisions to make in the award strengthened my desire to concerning production and marketing. help women achieve their potential.

Two years ago I also embarked on a new project, prompted by my neighbour’s diagnosis of breast cancer. We organised a large fundraiser, and I produced pink body butter and hand- dyed pink and blue socks. I now do a range of hand-dyed socks in a variety of outrageous colours, the proﬁ ts going to the Cancer Council. I am also a consultant to UnderCoverWear, an Australian direct-marketing clothing and lingerie company. Th is year we held a fundraiser for the National Breast Cancer Fund and held the top party in Australia for November and December.

Where to next? Th e ﬁ sh farm is never far from my mind, and we have streamlined some of our thinking. In 2008 my husband bought me a very old pre-loved excavator, which is part of the plan. While waiting to get into

62 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Jeanette Reader Tasmanian winner2002

My husband, Phil, and I continue Th e award experience also changed our to operate a mixed cropping and family dynamics and my involvement livestock enterprise in the small in the farm: I no longer do as much farming community of Toiberry in manual work, choosing instead northern Tasmania. We own 400 to support the farm by doing the hectares ourselves, and we lease the oﬃ ce work and book-keeping and neighbouring farm. Th ese days we through generating oﬀ -farm income. are more involved in the cattle side Additionally, the award helped open up of the enterprise and less involved in new conversations within the family: cropping, which means fewer peas, whereas in the past I would have left poppies and high-value seed crops. a lot of the decision making to my Cattle have become our main activity, husband, now all important decisions and we forward-contract to the local are talked about as a group and we now feedlot market. have a farm succession plan, so we all have a clear picture of our future.

Do it now or else it won’t get done!

My Rural Women’s Award ambition was to seek new opportunities for farming families through expansion into new industries and new value- adding opportunities and markets. My award project involved investigation of and trial work on production and processing of Asian vegetables as a new opportunity and industry for farming families in Tasmania.

Farming will always be a challenge. I don’t think conditions have improved very much for farmers: we seem to still be ﬁ ghting battles we started 10 years ago, we always seem to ‘cop’ second best, our returns continue to go down while our input costs keep going up, and our margins just keep getting tighter.

To make ends meet I have returned to the workforce part time, working with special-needs children at the local primary school. Th e job is very challenging but also very rewarding. I would never have contemplated taking on this job had it not been for the award and the exposure to knowledge and networks it oﬀ ered.

63 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Christine Mann Tasmanian finalist2002

• Executive member, For the past three years I have been In the last few years I have registered Rural Financial working to build up my aerial a business name, Clearview Mapping, Counselling Service of photography business, but just when I and started to develop a web page. I Tasmania think things are going well it all seems have also spent a large amount of time • Advisory member, Rural to come to a halt. In 2006 and 2007 building a house on the family farm, Youth Organisation of I spent well over 200 hours taking which I hope will give me access to Tasmania aerial photos in Tasmania, New South satellite broadband so I can keep up to • Continued involvement Wales and Queensland for a forestry date with technology. Dial-up internet with the Agfest field company and then spent many hours in the bush is a trial I am still enduring. days committee incorporating the photos in a mapping program, to allow them to be used for I continue to juggle aerial photography, management and planning decisions. In mapping, land surveying, volunteering 2008 the amount of aerial photography for the Agfest fi eld days and helping the company required fell to nothing out on the family farm—never doing as a result of a change in management, the same thing for very long. Among and so other Tasmanian forestry all this is my expertise in global businesses have become my main positioning systems, expertise I share clients. with the agricultural community. My ambition is to develop more markets I have also taken aerial photos for and spend more time marketing my a farm-mapping business based in business. I now have a well-developed Smithton in north-west Tasmania. Th is product, but I need more markets has, however, had its diffi culties, not in order to off set the limitations the least of them being waiting for cloud- weather conditions create for aerial free days in an area characterised by photography in Tasmania. very challenging weather conditions. Cloud seems to cover the area for 363 days a year, which does not make for the clearest of photos.

One simply cannot take aerial photos while ﬂ ying above 1500 metres if there are clouds at 1000 metres, and I have come to the conclusion that I would like to develop a scenic aerial photography business. Th ere is a market for this product, but trying to break into it is another challenge, there being a number of well-known professional photographers in the business. When the real estate boom was happening there was demand for aerial photos of farming properties, but now real estate agents are reluctant to spend that extra dollar, and most Tasmanian agents fail to recognise the beneﬁ ts of aerial photos.

64 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Kate Hadden Northern Territory2002 winner

• Production of the Tiwi I won the 2002 Rural Women’s Award Th e Tiwi Land Council now employs Islands Regional Natural on the 14th anniversary of my working 12 land and marine rangers, their wages Resource Management in natural resource management. Now, being paid through industry investment Strategy, 2004, the first seven years on, the pace of change on the islands. Th e rangers’ work proves such strategy in the and the need for adaptation seem that development and conservation Northern Territory exponential. We are no longer talking can co-exist and can in fact support • Recipient, McKell local or national: we talk global. It is each other. Natural resource–based Medal for excellence hard to know what we, as communities, industry is now an important employer in natural resource can do. But, all in all, the most on the Tiwi Islands, in both direct and management, 2007 important thing is that natural resource contract employment. Th e rangers management is about people and work with developers and their Tiwi should always be about people and their colleagues to ensure that cultural and livelihoods. natural heritage values are maintained. A new college managed by the Tiwi Education Board delivers high- quality teaching with direction from Always do what is right for you. Tiwi elders. Th e expansion of job ——My mum opportunities on the islands through careful natural resource use and protection has meant that students at the college now have a reason to go to Although the concerns that captured school. us in 2002 might have changed, the need for resilient and sustainable rural Th e next seven years will no doubt communities has not, no matter what throw up a new set of challenges, but if the challenges. Th e award allowed me our rural communities stay resilient we to travel to Nunavut, in Canada, where can meet them. I am looking forward the Inuit are recognised as successfully to seeing how far we can go. building a sustainable system for advancing socio-economic development through natural resource use. My discussions with Inuit representatives and the Canadian government gave me valuable insights into governance and processes and a new set of tools to try back home. Seven years on, I am still using insights given to me by the Inuit people.

My work with the Tiwi Land Council and landowners remains centred around the Tiwi people ‘getting a life’ away from the very destructive welfare cycle and using the most valuable assets the Tiwi Islands have to oﬀ er—people and natural resources.

65 66 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award 2003 Participating in the award ...

Milada Safarik Megan Mosely Anna Aldridge Kaye Scholfield Desley Vella Teena Mammino Sharon Starick Heather Burdon Erica Starling Suzanne Woods Lee Adamson Ringk Beverley Wilson

67 2003 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Milada Safarik New South Wales2003 winner

• Master of Scientific My journey since receiving the Rural I have since had the opportunity of Studies, Newcastle Women’s Award has been one of trials being exposed to the world of stem cell University, 2004 and tribulations but most importantly research. I have completed a course on • Two scientific papers of self-discovery. My achievements in stem cell isolation and participated in published the aquaculture industry were exciting, an International Society of Stem Cell • Participant, human and the recognition I received through Research annual meeting in Australia, embryonic stem cell the award was most benefi cial. My looking at the foremost scientifi c training workshop, award ambition resulted in the world’s developments. Th is has resulted in me Australian Stem Cell fi rst cultivation, at the Aquabait facility, assisting with research trials for adipose- Centre, Melbourne, of the marine tube worm Diopatra derived stem cell lines for autologous 2006 aciculate for the recreational bait transfer for therapeutics such as arthritic industry and engendered a desire to symptoms in canines and improved continue and succeed. recovery after cruciate ligament surgery. Although I am interested in this fi eld I went on to complete my thesis on and would like to continue my research this species of marine invertebrate, one day, my immediate aim is to focusing on intraspecifi c density become a high school teacher of biology eff ects on growth—very important for and chemistry. ecological reasons as well as from the aquaculture viewpoint. Th is led me to publish my fi rst research paper in the journal Scientia Marina: I put together the paper using my contribution at the 8th World Polychaete Conference in Madrid in 2004. I have since published a second paper with a colleague; it deals with aspects of jaw growth in this species of polychaete and the evolutionary importance of this.

Th is led to the next chapter of my journey, which evolved in ways quite other than I would have expected. Unfortunately, for unforeseen reasons Aquabait did not hold my future and I was forced to re-examine my priorities. But my passion for the project kept me nearby for some time, working alongside my father while I was being led down a more personal career pathway.

One of the many career options I had tried had been teaching, and this became my new passion: I began teaching aquaculture to mature students at TAFE. (Whilst still at Aquabait I had on several occasions supported local high school students for work experience and tours.) Eventually I moved back to Sydney, and my love of animals led me into the veterinary ﬁ eld, where I dabbled in veterinary nursing and grooming.

68 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Megan Mosely New South Wales2003 runner up

• Environmental I live with my husband, Andrew, and In the last six years we have Achievement Award, family near Cobar, in the Western made important environmental Great Cobar Business Division of New South Wales, where improvements to our land, successfully Awards, August 2008, we run two properties, Etiwanda and reversing the degradation and fi nding and Orana Regional Manuka Stations, together comprising eff ective ways of regenerating the Business Excellence close to 26 000 hectares. landscape. We are working on restoring Awards, October 2008 and rejuvenating the water, mineral • Winner, Western Th e properties are managed and carbon cycles by increasing ground Catchment Carbon holistically; we work to balance the cover with predominantly deep-rooted Cocky of the Year, social, environmental and economic native perennial grasses. Since setting November 2008 outcomes both for now and for these priorities, changing the enterprise • Nominee, McKell future generations; we make profi ts mix and looking at the system as a Medal for outstanding and environmental improvements whole, we have noticed dramatic natural resource through carefully considering, testing changes in our pastoral enterprise and management, and monitoring our decisions. For can see that we are having a positive November 2008 our family, profi t is not solely defi ned impact on our environment as a ‘whole’ in dollars and cents: it has the wider by using holistic management the defi nition of family togetherness, a animals’ habits to improve the land we sense of achievement and purpose, care for. and the creation of ecological and intellectual wealth. My vision continues In November 2007 we travelled to the to be to see primary industries and United States to attend the Holistic their people better balance profi tability, Management International Conference the environment and their lifestyle by in Albuquerque, New Mexico, to embracing holistic management. be among and learn from holistic management practitioners who have been working this way for up to 20 The best way to predict the future is to years in arid parts of the United States create it. and elsewhere. ——Peter Drucker In 1999 we made the decision to switch enterprises from a merino wool producing enterprise to a red During the past decade we have meat producing enterprise. Making been developing and expanding our the choice to feed the world instead knowledge of holistic management of clothe it! Today our operation runs and new ways of approaching white dorper fl eece-shedding meat environmental problems. We have sheep, meat goats and cattle. attended a holistic management course, a ‘Grazing for Profi t’ course, and fi eld Th e decision to change was due to days on conservation farming and our exposure to holistic management minimum tillage. We have continued thinking and decision making; we have with the Grazing for Profi t process, never regretted it and have never looked moving through to board level in the back! last two years, attending quarterly meetings to further advance our knowledge and to learn from other farmers.

69 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Anna Aldridge Victorian winner2003

• First and only female I am a qualiﬁ ed winemaker and Spanish family company. My role member of the marketer and ran a marketing focuses on direct marketing, developing Viticultural Society of consulting business based in Victoria’s e-commerce and online public relations Victoria, founded in Yarra Valley from 1999-2007. Clients as well as media relations. I have 1906 included Southcorp Wines, De Bortoli continued my consulting business in • Member of Yarra Valley Wines, Evans and Tate, Oakridge direct marketing and media relations Dandenong and the Estate, Cumulus, Philip Shaw Wines for wine, food and tourism industries. Ranges Tourism Board and the Yarra Valley Winegrowers • Eight winning Association (YVWGA). submissions for the Victorian Tourism It was the needs of the YVWGA which Awards on behalf of prompted me to apply for the RIRDC Victorian agribusinesses Rural Women’s Award. Th rough an • Orchestrating five Yarra extensive tour of New Zealand’s wine- Valley Wine Programs- growing regions, I was able to bring bringing 40 leading back fresh approaches to viticulture, trade and media into winemaking and marketing, Th is in the Yarra Valley for turn facilitated my role in establishing 2 days of intensive the YVWGA’s marketing arm: the Yarra seminars with the Valley Wine Network. I was able to winemakers introduce a number of initiatives for the • Two beautiful teenage Network, notably a strategic marketing daughters, who are plan for the sustainability of Yarra committed to making Valley wines in the international arena. a positive difference to I count that as my greatest achievement the world around them during my 10 years of consulting, coupled with the rewards that come from working with producers to take their product to market.

Carpe diem. Seize the day.

Th e Rural Women’s Award directly funded my designing and writing the Yarra Valley Wine Network website www.wineyarravalley.com which united the winemakers together under the brand Yarra Valley.

Eighteen months ago, I took on a part time role as media and direct marketing manager for the Wingara Wine Group- which owns Australian wine brands Deakin Estate and Katnook Estate. Wingara is owned by the Freixenet Group of Spain, makers of Cordon Negro, the highest selling sparkling wine in the world. It is proving a fantastic experience and learning process for me—working with Australian wines, owned by a leading

70 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Kaye Scholfield Victorian runner2003 up

• Member: Th e idea of promoting learning for from a wholly merino operation to one – Glenelg Hopkins rural communities’ sustainability was focusing more on prime lamb, cropping, Catchment what led me to participate in the Rural and so on. Community Advisory Women’s Award in 2003, but at that Committee, time my interest was wool. Th e common I have learnt there are many ways a rural – Western District links between my interests then and woman can have an infl uence. I made Health Services now are rural people and communities, a conscious choice to support change, Community agriculture, sustainability and education. often behind the scenes. At present I Engagement am, a member of several committees, as Committee Our community, with like-minded well as the Glenelg Southern Grampians – Standing Tall School people from RMIT University, engaged Local Learning Employment Network. Mentoring in a range of activities, including hosting In addition, one of my most gratifying Committee of hundreds of international students in tasks has been to be the inaugural chair of Management the 1990s, which in turn led to the the Southern Grampians Youth Network. • Inaugural Chair, Southern establishment of an RMIT University In 2008 we received a Victorian Grampians Youth Network campus in Hamilton, a rural community Strengthening Communities grant three-and-a-half hours’ drive west of to pilot rural youth strategies—local Melbourne. Historically, the region had solutions to local problems. Th is work is prospered ‘on the sheep’s back’, both exciting because it covers a wide range of economically and socially, but in the areas, geographically and organisationally. past few years the dominance of the wool industry has diminished and new I am also fortunate to be involved in a industries—such as temperate-climate range of research areas—from natural cropping, blue-gum forestry and sand resource and agricultural research, based mining—have made a strong impression on the Potter Farmland Plan of the on the local community. 1980s, to youth, education and rural technology. Working with like-minded people is immensely satisfying. We’re a CAN DO community One of the most exciting projects came about when we noticed the same Th e thing that does not change, though, people were always being invited to is the importance of human capital in be on committees while new people regional centres—to take advantage were coming to town and not being of changing opportunities and to ‘included’. I gathered together a network increase the adaptability, resilience and of women who are community leaders. sustainability of rural communities. Using an email tree, we invited other Just as important, or perhaps more so, women to a gathering. We have held is the need for a strong and informed two such gatherings so far: at the fi rst rural voice in infl uencing responses to function 70 women booked in; 90 some of the most important challenges booked in for the second, half of them Australia faces. Since being involved being new to the area. We designed with the award, my interest in advancing this network to be sustainable, fl exible, these themes has grown. I gained my inclusive and with a built-in succession doctorate in 2005 and since then have plan. And fun! been working in whatever capacity I Being involved with the award has raised can to promote the development of my profi le and given me credibility, human capacity and the voice of rural confi dence and a voice. Th is has allowed people through my work as Manager me to make a commitment to my local of Partnerships and Projects at RMIT community and to other local rurally University in Hamilton and through based women who seek to make a my community activities. I also have diff erence. an active role with our family farm, which itself refl ects many of the changes taking place in rural Australia as it moves 71 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Desley Vella Queensland winner2003

• Diploma, Australian Institute of Company Directors, 2004 Nevertheless, our Community Bank®, • Advanced Diploma, Business Management, 2005 a publicly listed company, opened • Chair, Babinda Community Bank® Branch, Bendigo and Adelaide its doors for business in June 2006. Bank, 2006 to present Community members bought $600 000 • Director, Bendigo and Adelaide Bank Community Bank® Strategic worth of shares to fi nance the business. Advisory Board, 2008 to present Within 18 months we had reached • Committee member, Far North Queensland Regional Advisory profi tability, paid a dividend to local Committee, 2004 to 2008 community shareholders, and funded • Continued representation on sugar industry productivity and over $20 000 in community projects. management committees • Founding member, Russell Landcare and Catchment Group, and Th e Russell Landcare and Catchment Chair, 2007 to 2008 Group, of which I was a founding member and president (2007–08), was incorporated only three weeks before When one door shuts, another opens. Cyclone Larry devastated the region. In its two years of operation over prepared. Subsequently, over $19 million $120 000 in funding has been spent was secured in the region for projects on rehabilitation works, revegetation ranging from low-GI (glycaemic index) plantings, cultural activities and sugar to an environmental audit of community planting days. In late the sugar industry, environmentally 2008 the Russell catchment was sustainable waste-water management allocated a further $100 000 as part for the sugar mills, ethanol technology, of the Reef Rescue Package Systems mill rationalisation, green power and Repair Component for projects in the women in sugar. I was grateful for the catchment to improve water quality and opportunity to serve on the Regional reduce run-off to the Great Barrier Reef. Advisory Group and be in a position to guide and reform the local sugar industry. In June 2008 I was elected inaugural Queensland director on the Strategic Th e concept for the ‘Cane-Cutter Our town needed a bank. In late 2005 Advisory Board of the Bendigo and Barracks—a cultural ecotourism community members asked me to Adelaide Bank Community Bank®. venture’ was to establish an on-farm chair a committee to investigate the Having completed the Australian tourism venture and use some of feasibility of establishing a community Institute of Company Directors course the returns to fund environmental bank in the local town. I gladly accepted has greatly assisted me in this role. rehabilitation works. Th e project was this role because I saw it as a chance underpinned primarily by a personal to support my community in taking Th e award has opened many doors. Th e and community need for economic and ownership of the local economy, assisting knowledge I gained from the Australian environmental sustainability in the local local businesses, creating local jobs and Institute of Company Directors course sugar industry. generating funding for community has been invaluable, as have been the projects. networks established with women, rural Opportunities for achieving my industries, natural resource agencies, project objectives, to a level far beyond Late 2005 and 2006 were very government and the banking sector. expectations, arose after I received the challenging—for me personally and for Although I initially set out to establish Rural Women’s Award. In 2004 I was the community, with the establishment an individual on-farm venture, I was appointed a member of the Far North of the Babinda Community Bank®, the able to use the skills learnt, opportunities Queensland Regional Advisory Group founding of the Russell Landcare and gained and contacts made to achieve my as part of the Sugar Industry Reform Catchment Group, and dealing with the goals at the regional and broader scales. Program (2004 to 2008). Th e role of aftermath of Cyclone Larry, which hit this group was to develop a regional in March 2006. My community was a Overall, the years since I won the award response to the challenges facing the disaster area: more than 80 per cent of have been overwhelmingly positive, and sugar industry and to identify solutions buildings, both in town and on farms, I look forward to further opportunities that were sustainable. A regional strategic were damaged and crops were destroyed. to contribute to agriculture and rural plan championing change, innovation, It took two years to rebuild and longer communities. value-adding and diversifi cation was for farms to recover production.

72 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Teena Mammino Queensland runner2003 up

• Queensland Tourism I am a macadamia and sugar cane over 60 outlets throughout Queensland, Retailing Award grower in the Childers district, in and the business grows daily. We also • Central Queensland/ the Wide Bay – Burnett region of have an on-farm retail outlet that is Sourthern Reef Tourism Queensland. I am married to Anthony, open to the public every day, and we Retailing Awards— a third-generation cane grower, and we have a vendoring vehicle that we use to inducted into the Hall of have three children. In 1996, in the retail our products at major events such Fame face of a sugar cane price collapse, we as the Woodford Folk Festival and the • Queensland Primary diversifi ed into Mammino Gourmet National Country Music Muster. Industries Product Ice-Cream, value-adding to the Marketing Award macadamias we grow in Childers to Th e award gave me a high profi le in • Bundaberg Business create one of the largest ranges of the rural, tourism and manufacturing Manager of the Year macadamia ice-creams in Australia. sectors and many opportunities to be • Gold Awards at the a guest speaker and to encourage and Royal Queensland Dairy My Rural Women’s Award ambition help others to turn their ideas into Produce Awards was to complete the Ice-Cream reality. It also opened up opportunities • Food Safety Supervisor Essentials course at Gilbert Chandler I did not know existed, and in 2007 we • Internal Auditor University in Melbourne and then secured from the federal Department Diploma use my new skills to expand our ice- of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry cream range and market our product a grant that helped us expand our throughout Queensland. We have also factory and to design and have made expanded our range to incorporate pre-printed packaging to streamline dairy-free sorbets. operations. I have met many interesting and talented people, and this has opened up marketing opportunities for us. We currently employ four staff , but Live while you are alive and sleep when you we expect this will increase. are dead.

Since I participated in the award we have won numerous other awards, among them a Queensland Tourism Award for retailing, the Queensland Primary Industries Award for Product Marketing, and gold at the Royal Queensland Dairy Produce Awards for seven ice-creams in our gourmet range. I was also named Bundaberg Business Manager of the Year in 2004.

My aim continues to be to expand the business domestically and, in the long term, overseas and to create alternative value-adding business and employment opportunities in the region. Mammino Gourmet Ice-Cream is now stocked in

73 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Sharon Starick South Australian2003 winner

• Participant, Murray– Today my husband, Matthew, and I Being involved with the award Darling Basin manage a farming business consisting of helped me improve my knowledge Leadership Program, a 165-sow piggery and 1000 hectares of of change-management processes, 2003 cereal and grain legumes on properties with a particular focus on the • Director, Land and located between Mannum and Cambrai management of natural resources. Water Australia and in South Australia. Th rough my project I was able to National Rural Advisory develop a greater understanding of the Council Life has changed substantially for me, diversity and complexity of natural • Deputy presiding personally and in business, since I resource management concerns in the member, South received the Rural Women’s Award. At Murray–Darling Basin and some of the Australian Natural that time my vision was for agriculture economic and social implications of Resource Management in Australia to be dynamic and responding to these concerns. Council prosperous and for natural resources— • Chair, Natural land, water, vegetation and habitat—to As a result of this new knowledge and Resources Committee, be managed sustainably. Th is would be my improved self-confi dence I have South Australia Farmers supported by an active and committed become more involved in natural Federation community, and the importance resource management and the pig of the ‘human resource’ would be industry at various levels. At present acknowledged. In this way future I am, among other things, a director generations would be able to benefi t of Land and Water Australia and the from rural Australia, economically, National Rural Advisory Council, environmentally and socially. My vision a member of the South Australian is still valid today. Pig Industry Development Board, deputy presiding member of the In 2004 our third daughter was born, South Australian Natural Resource and my involvement in managing Management Council, and chair of the natural resources became more South Australian Farmers Federation intense with my appointment to the Natural Resources Committee. Th is Community Advisory Committee for has allowed me to continue my the Murray–Darling Basin Ministerial involvement in decision making at the Council. My role changed from one of regional, state, Murray–Darling Basin working in my region to help people and national levels as well as develop change their farming practices to one a network of friends and colleagues of seeking greater infl uence on decision throughout Australia. making at the state and national levels.

All this was happening at a time when my husband and I were moving our business away from its focus on egg and pork production to producing a quality pork product for the fresh meat market in Australia and activating a succession plan in order to set up Matthew’s parents for retirement.

74 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Heather Burdon South Australian2003 runner up

• Australian Livestock After our fabulous Rural Women’s I do not miss having a full-time job Transporter of the Year, Award reunion in 2005 and a two-and- and am greatly enjoying some ‘me time’ 1999 a-half-year stint selling heavy vehicle in an eff ort to improve my health and • South Australian Road insurance, I decided that was not the fi tness. I love fresh air and gardening Transport Industry career path for me. Although I found and spending quality time with family Woman of the Year, working again in the transport industry and friends. Th is new-found freedom 1999 rewarding and stimulating, the fact also aff ords me the opportunity to • Australian Trucking that I seemed to be ‘on call’ 24 hours a travel around Australia with my Association National day, seven days a week left me feeling husband, following the fortunes of our Trucking Woman of the I had stepped back in time to the days thoroughbred horses, which is great fun Year, 2000 of operating our livestock transport and very social. • Australian Centenary business, which was defi nitely not what Medal for contribution I wanted. My latest challenge is to learn more to the transport about the stock market and the trade industry I have worked in the livestock in shares: while the market is so low transport industry for more than I intend to invest. Wish me well, but 35 years, operating with my husband a then life is a gamble, isn’t it? successful livestock carrying business, Argyle Transport Pty Ltd. I have also been active in numerous industry associations. Additionally, I was instrumental in developing Truckcare, the quality management system for livestock transporters, and was for a number of years the Truckcare promotions offi cer for the Australian Livestock Transporters Association.

I continue to enjoy looking after the administration of our diversiﬁ ed farming properties, where we crop, grow lucerne hay and clover for seed, and run ewes, lambs and cattle.

During the past 12 months both our daughters have married, and we have been blessed with the birth of our ﬁ rst grandchild, Toby, whom I adore and love spending time with. Th e past year has also seen many hours spent redecorating our beach house. Th is has been rewarding and enjoyable, and it has reinforced my love of photography, which I hope to turn into an income- producing venture. I am currently putting together seascape collages for sale in a local beach store, a project I hope to expand.

75 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Erica Starling Western Australian2003 winner

• Director, Seafood Since I won the 2003 Rural Women’s Islands, a new aquaculture operation for Cooperative Research Award and published my Australian the farming of tuna and other marine Centre Tuna Handling Manual: a practical fi sh. Th e process of moving from • Continued guide for industry change has been my wild fi shing to fi sh farming entailed a representation on constant companion. fundamental shift in my thinking. fishing industry management I was owner and operator of Indian 2007 was a challenging year for me. committees Ocean Fresh Australia, a fi sh packing, I had been looking forward to taking • Master of Business wholesaling and distribution operation a year off , having packed tuna and Administration, 2007 that processed for some 16 vessels swordfi sh for 13 years, but in January fi shing the southern and western I found myself preparing to take on tuna and billfi sh fi shery. But poor 50 000 baby mulloway at short notice. exchange rates, high fuel costs and Th ese fi sh arrived in late February, stagnant markets led to a decrease in and I ended up conducting a pilot the number of vessels my business was trial in Geraldton harbour—with no handling. Finally, in November 2007 experienced staff and no idea of how we packed our last tuna and swordfi sh to take care of my new ‘babies’. It was in Geraldton from the sole remaining a steep learning curve, but I have now vessel in operation. (Most vessels either assembled a great team of people and transferred to other fi sheries or were resources to draw on for my new venture. sold for other purposes.) Th is decline It has been an expensive education and happened over a period, and I was a rollercoaster ride. Fortunately, I was fortunate in not having to retrench any already aware that, just when you think staff . I had a creative group of women you know all the things that can go working with me, and they moved on wrong, another curve ball is thrown from to other fi elds, such as ‘going back to left fi eld. I survived the year, though, school’ and motherhood. and we are about to start commercial harvesting on the pilot farm.

It is not the strongest of the species that Th e award has given me exposure to a survives, nor the most intelligent, but rather network of other women in rural and the one most responsive to change. regional Australia, and I always enjoy hearing their stories and learning how ——Charles Darwin creative they are in adapting to change. Th e Australian Institute of Company Personally, the timing was convenient: Directors course has served me well, my two boys were very young and I was and I am looking forward to doing able to juggle my way through their a refresher in 2009, time permitting. early school years. I also managed to I have been elected to the board of complete a Master’s degree in Business the recently incorporated Seafood Administration and was happy to Cooperative Research Centre and enjoy achieve my goal before turning 40, working with a diverse and professional completing my fi nal assignment at team. I continue my involvement in 10.00 pm the night before the big day. management committees associated with the fi shing industry. I am also In 2006 and 2007 I started to take working towards obtaining better on some work for my parents’ fi shing support services for children who have company, which was also suff ering from type 1 diabetes and live in Western the rapid changes in wild fi shing in Australia: my eldest son has had this terms of both profi tability and security disease since he was 4 years old, and of access. I intended to just help out both suff erers and their families in where I could, but I ended up taking on regional communities do not have a project that had been simmering away adequate access to the specialised teams in the background since 1999. Th is based in Perth. involved setting up, at the Abrolhos 76 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Suzanne Woods Western Australian2003 runner up

• President, Western As grain growers on a small-ish property For the next fi ve years we continued Australian Women in outside Calingiri in south-west Western working on the business, developing Agriculture Australia, we saw value-adding to raw a loyal base of Western Australian • Chair, Heartlands WA material as a crucial step on the path to customers. Our constant challenge purchasing more land and increasing was to increase volume in order to our productivity. Our strategy was to achieve economies of scale. Freight to produce speciality fl ours and we began the eastern states was prohibitive, so we with soft wheat fl our. Emdavale Farm were unable to develop commercial or Flour became a fully fl edged business retail markets outside Western Australia; in 2000. further, the larger supermarket chains adopted a policy of reducing suppliers Our fi rst client was a large Western and off ering more ‘home brand’ Australian biscuit manufacturer; a products, so supplying the retail market number of independent supermarkets became increasingly diffi cult. Our and speciality food stores followed, largest commercial customer had been and volumes greatly increased with bought out by a national company, the listing of our products with one of and it chose the national supplier for Australia’s largest supermarket chains. its fl our, so the viability of our business Th e business is administered from the was diminishing. In 2007 we decided farm at Calingiri, and a food broker in to wind it up. Perth manages the supermarket visits and ordering. Processing is done on a Our farm business has taken a diff erent contract basis in Perth, and our retail direction, and we are now part-owners packaging is also outsourced. of an export hay–processing company. I have taken on a number of regional Having been a secondary school leadership roles, including being teacher, I had only a limited knowledge president of Western Australian Women of marketing, but I did know how in Agriculture, chair of Heartlands to learn, and learn we did. We took WA (a fl edgling marketing group for every opportunity to gain a better the Wheat Belt region) and board understanding of our products, and member of Heartlands Country and marketing ourselves as well as our Goomalling and District Community products has become a way of life. By Financial Services (Bendigo Bank). Th e 2002 I was fully employed as marketing knowledge I gained through the award manager, accounts manager, product experience, and the networks, have development offi cer and general given me a strong foundation from dogsbody at Emdavale Farm Flour. I which to move on to the next challenge had also given birth to our fi fth child life presents. and was still responsible for book- keeping for the main farm business, so life was pretty full.

Participating in the 2003 Rural Women’s Award opened up so many new worlds for me. I was able to research the grain value–adding industry as it existed in Australia and visited a number of millers, speciality grain product businesses and research units along the eastern coast. Living on the western seaboard can be isolating, and it was terriﬁ c to experience the depth of the markets nationally.

77 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Lee Adamson Ringk Tasmanian winner2003

• Three fine, strong, Since I won the Rural Women’s Th e award bursary allowed me to travel healthy children living in Award in 2003 we have carried out to New Zealand with a 4-month- a happy rural family an extensive and thorough breeding old in tow. We confi rmed that our • A whole-farm program at our recently acquired business goal was feasible using the plan A comprehensive property. We developed a micro- Kiwis’ exceptional abilities in intensive business plan business plan to determine the size our horticulture. Th e trip also broadened developed with the property needed to be, then we bought our minds to other possibilities and, assistance of the Killiecrankie, a 25-hectare holding with although diversifi cation seems a huge Northern Tasmanian a boundary fence and a small spring- amount on our plate, the business Development and West fed dam as the only improvements. plan we recently developed has helped Tamar Council Since then, we have added a house and us recognise fi nancial and marketing • Wildlife habitat sheds, divided the property into cell- constraints as well as opportunities. management with the grazing areas, excluded habitat areas, assistance of Tamar and improved reserve connectivity. To Th e award gave me many opportunities, Natural Resource this we have added a diverse range of but it has also been a cause for sad Management intensive horticulture and stock. We refl ection on the opportunities missed. • Shelter belt and reserve have also expanded as a family and now In particular, I wish I had budgeted for establishment with the boast three busy young children. maintaining the networks I established assistance of Private during the bursary’s life. Despite this, Forests Tasmania Originally Killiecrankie was established though, I remain confi dent that the • Rehabilitation of to grow Tasmanian wildfl owers for long-term goals of our business are degraded farmland commercial cut-fl ower sales; this has beyond the ‘hobby farm’ label and are been slow to develop, not only because realistic for developing a rural enterprise of family demands but also because of that refl ects our ethical and quality the intensive capital outlay needed and standards while supporting our wish the poor environmental conditions. for balance between work and family. Killiecrankie has been in drought Th e support of the rural community we since we bought it, but we continue to live in is invaluable, as have been the develop infrastructure at times when opportunities industry bodies provide planting has stalled. in the form of subsidies and grants: without these, our goals of a sustainable rural enterprise would not be close to realisation. Oh! Do not attack me with your watch. A watch is always too fast or too slow. I cannot be dictated to by a watch. ——Jane Austin

Although the fl ower-growing enterprise has been slow to take off , we have successfully developed a whole- farm plan; fi nalised a business plan and fi nancial analysis; applied for and gained three grants to manage threatened species, established reserve connectivity and protected crops by using windbreaks; and obtained funding support for developing the business plan.

78 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Beverley Wilson Northern Territory2003 winner

• President, Northern I no longer work in the rural sector students, of which there are many. My Territory Isolated adding value to a wild harvest of feral favourite school is Laramba, about Children’s Parents pigs. Instead, I am a numeracy teacher 200 kilometres north-west of Alice Association, 2005 to for the Northern Territory Open Springs, but Jilkminggan, Barunga, 2008 Education Centre, and my work takes Alekarenge, Alcoota and Mulga Bore • Distance education me to some of the most isolated and are also special. portfolio holder, beautiful parts of the territory. Northern Territory Another highlight is working in a small- Isolated Children’s I worked in the Northern Territory team environment. During 2008 my Parents Association, pastoral industry for over 30 years, colleague, Josie Roberts, and I presented 2008 to present most recently focusing on feral pig a workshop at the Mathematical production and processing. My Teachers Association Northern Rural Women’s Award ambition was Territory Conference in Alice Springs to establish a viable and accredited and at the Australasian Association of harvested pig meat industry in the Distance Education Schools Australian territory, but circumstances such as Conference in Darwin. high grain prices, competition and alternative meat imports meant I was Th e award and the accompanying unable to secure viable markets and leadership courses have had a wonderful users for the pig meat. and lasting impact on my ability to perform my everyday tasks to the highest standard and my conﬁ dence to take on new challenges and experiences. Do to others as you would like them to do to you

In my role as numeracy teacher I work in Rapid Creek but travel regularly to small communities throughout the Northern Territory. Along with the other members of the numeracy team, I develop and deliver mathematics programs to the remote-community teachers. Th ese programs are tailored to provide substantial and sustainable numeracy outcomes for Indigenous secondary students. Additionally, in collaboration with the remote- community teachers, I deliver lessons to the students using IDL (interactive distance learning) technologies. I have been working at the Open Education Centre since 2005, when my youngest son, Eric, completed his primary school education through Katherine School of the Air.

One highlight of my work is visiting the communities and working with dedicated teachers and enthusiastic

79 80 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award 2004 Participating in the award ...

Rebecca Arnott Lorroi Kirkby Marilyn Lanyon Beverley Fisher Claudine Ward Dee Dunham Jeanette Long Laura Fell Diana Morrison Wendy Newman Diane Rae Sandra Gillanders Lee Berryman Megan Hoskins

81 2004 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Rebecca Arnott New South Wales2004 winner

• Board member, In January 2008 I began my own My vision for my industry is to be part Foundation of business, Precision Operations, of a true beef industry supply-chain Australian Agricultural specialising in food and agribusiness alliance, where all players work towards Women marketing. It is proving a most the common goal of increasing red • Foundation of rewarding experience, and my learning meat consumption through branded Australian Agricultural curve continues to be exponential. Th is product of consistent quantity and Women representative initiative followed four years working quality. on the National Rural as national brand manager for the Women’s Coalition Australian Agricultural Company and, Winning the Rural Women’s Award before that, various roles in the beef gave me the opportunity to investigate supply chain, in Australia and abroad. the branded-beef market in the retail As brand manager I was responsible for and food services sectors in the United strategic marketing of the company’s States, the United Kingdom and Japan premier 1824 brand of beef. Earlier on, and to gain a better understanding of I had been the fi rst female beef cattle branded beef and the opportunities for offi cer to be appointed by New South Australian product. Th e most obvious Wales Agriculture. and immediate outcome of my trip was the development and promotion of a My interest in branded food speciality red meat section featuring products—in particular, beef— branded beef in Coles supermarkets—a stemmed from the two years I collaborative eff ort between Coles and Just do it. spent working for a beef producers’ Meat and Livestock Australia. cooperative in the Hunter Valley. Th e group was part of a broader supply- Th e award has allowed me to gain chain alliance aimed at producing and a much broader understanding of value-adding to premium beef 52 weeks Australia’s major trading partners and of the year. their branded-beef products, along with the challenges and opportunities facing Five years with New South Wales the Australian red meat industry. It has Agriculture, as its fi rst female Beef given me credibility and recognition Cattle Offi cer (or ‘Beefette’), gave me a in my industry, opened up networks, broad understanding of the Australian and brought access to industry and beef industry and meat quality. I government leaders. Many doors did stints at Casino, Moree, Albury, have opened; this includes attending Cooma and Wagga Wagga and so was and speaking at various events and exposed to many diff erent production functions. My public speaking has systems in varying environments. I was improved as a result, as has my self- fortunate to spend fi ve years abroad, esteem. too, working, studying and travelling. Among the highlights were gaining a I cannot recommend the award Master’s degree in the United Kingdom highly enough, and I will continue to and Canada, my thesis topic being the encourage as many women as I can to management of the Calgary Stampede. apply. I also worked on a feedlot in Colorado and spent two years in Zimbabwe, working for the Zimbabwe Farmers Union and Zimbabwe Animal Breeders and running a commercial herd.

82 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Lorroi Kirkby New South Wales2004 runner up

I was raised on a 10 000–hectare Participation in the award gave me a sheep station north of Bourke in unique opportunity to promote the north-western New South Wales, dorper industry and the importance and it was there I realised how crucial of rural women; it also extended my it was that Australian agriculture skills and expanded my contacts in engage in sustainable practices. As a agriculture. Further, I have had the qualifi ed veterinarian and an accredited opportunity to attend and speak at international export embryo transfer numerous conferences: the Western veterinarian, I am one of a handful of Division Young Farmers Conference females working in the fi eld of artifi cial in Broken Hill in 2004 was a defi ning breeding technologies in the sheep moment for the development of my industry. confi dence and public-speaking skills.

I am a dedicated dorper breeder and, I have big ambitions for myself and in partnership with my husband, for the dorper industry. Th e dorper’s Justin, own the Amarula Dorper Stud popularity is increasing in other at Gravesend in northern New South countries, and I can see that the breed Wales. My vision of seeing agriculture is going to become one of the largest embrace the dorper as a profi table worldwide. My ambitions are to and sustainable meat sheep alternative increase the level and sophistication of has become a reality. Th e exposure artifi cial breeding facilities on farms resulting from participating in the and to become one of the world’s best- Rural Women’s Award gave me the known dorper breeders and exporters. opportunity to promote dorpers to a Not a bad goal to aim for. wider audience, and the agricultural community has now discovered the economic benefi ts this animal off ers. In recent years demand has outstripped supply, so we have intensifi ed our embryo transfer program in order to increase the number of lambs born each year.

One of my award ambitions was to become a dorper judge, and ultimately an inspector, and to travel to South Africa to further my training and education. We have now completed three dorper courses—a junior course at Narromine and the ﬁ rst and ﬁ nal senior courses in South Africa—and are now selling Amarula dorpers into South America, India and Asia.

83 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Marilyn Lanyon Victorian winner2004

• Premier’s Award for With 160 hectares of red and green Th e biggest help to me has been Innovation tomatoes, I loved playing around with my belief in my product and • Gold Australian recipes. A dear Italian friend said, encouragement from family and Packaging Award ‘You should make what Mum used friends, who say, ‘You can do it’. It • Vogue Entertaining to make’—just a handful of ‘this and has sometimes been tough starting a and Travel Best New that’. It took about fi ve seasons of fi ne- new business, particularly because we Product Award tuning before it was just as his mother have been continuously in drought • Finalist, National made. Over the years and after extensive since we began. But not once have I Australia Bank market research, it became obvious regretted starting Simply Tomatoes: I Agribusiness Award that the thinly sliced and pickled green have received so much help from fellow tomatoes fi nished in extra virgin olive manufacturers, as well as fi nancial oil and with oregano and garlic was a support from the federal, state and local product not found anywhere other than governments. Help is out there. Just Italy. seek it out and ask.

Growing tomatoes was viable at As the recipient of a Rural Women’s Take small steps and the beginning, but good prices and Award, I have enjoyed being a think big. contracts became diffi cult to secure, guest speaker, sharing my story and so a family decision was made to start encouraging listeners to believe in up a new business. Simply Tomatoes themselves, as I do now. Th e bursary began in 2002. We used our skills not gave me the opportunity to travel only to grow tomatoes: we also became overseas to learn about marketing, and the processor and marketer. We are what I learnt has contributed to our proud of the fact that our products are business growth. Th e award also assisted produced ‘from seed to packet’ and my personal development in business processed by hand in the commercial management, especially through kitchen on our property. Our small attending the Australian Institute of business now employs 16 part-time Company Directors course and the casual staff from the area, producing encouragement to attend workshops. specialty products that are sold through Th ese activities also gave me many 350 outlets around Australia and in networking opportunities. many countries elsewhere. Simply Tomatoes has received Our latest international venture is with numerous national awards—being a franchised gourmet retail store in recognised for its business, packaging My brother and I grew up on our Kuwait. Our fi rst order was placed and and product. Th is could not have been family farm in the Mallee of northern after two months a replenishment order achieved without the support of many, Victoria. I have always had the ‘love of has been despatched. Dean & Deluca particularly our wonderful employees. the land’ in my heart and after I met is the fi rst of many stores throughout We are proudly ‘Australian owned, the ‘love of my life’, Ian, we married the Middle East, and we have worked grown and manufactured, from the and bought a property near Boort in closely with the buyer for many months: tomato seed to the fi nished product, by north-central Victoria. At the end of our aim is to ‘grow together’ During the Lanyon family’. the 1970s we moved onto our irrigation my recent visit to Kuwait to meet with property and started growing tomatoes the procurement team, I was invited to for processing factories, in partnership become their Australian agent sourcing with Ian’s brother and wife. We did this unique artesian products for their for almost 30 years. Life was busy for glamorous stores. Th is is an exciting me, as a farmers’ wife, raising our fi ve new phase in our export program. children, attending to our employees, After revisiting Dubai this year to and driving trucks to the silos at exhibit at the Gulfood 09 Trade Fair: harvest time. Our children are now we now have a distributor who is going grown up and we are blessed with fi ve to service the chefs in the fi ve and six grandchildren to spoil. star hotels, including the Royal Palace.

84 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Beverley Fisher Victorian runner2004 up

• Runner-up, Australian When my husband and I took over the I recently ran a nationwide Marmalade Women’s Weekly family orchard outside Cobram in 2000 Challenge, and I approached Charles Legend of the Land, the future looked bright, but within Woolley from Across Australia to judge 2005 12 months we were confronted with the competition. He was delighted declining markets, frost damage and and enjoyed tasting all the contestants’ drought, problems that have persisted marmalades ‘on air’. I have also spoken ever since. We decided that if we were ‘live to air’ to the nation: I don’t think I to survive we would have to diversify could have done that without the help and value-add. and conﬁ dence I received from the award.

What does not kill you makes you stronger.

I researched our options and contacted other citrus growers. With the support of another family, we started a small juice company, Riverview Juices, which became the ﬁ rst juice company to make fresh blood orange juice in Victoria. Th e company began by selling juice in the local region, including to the local supermarkets and at farmers’ markets. Several other growers joined us and we established a board of directors; the business has since grown to become an interstate concern.

Th ere were, however, some diﬀ erences of opinion, and my husband and I resigned from Riverview Juices to pursue our own enterprise. Th e business we have formed, Tranquil Hills Fruit Growers, runs a successful farm tour business and valued-adds in a number of areas. We now sell fresh juice plus frozen zest and peel to chefs. We also make a speciality marmalade, biscuits and citrus salt, which is a blend of dried peel, herbs and spices.

My involvement in the Rural Women’s Award resulted in good media exposure for our farm, which has featured on Wine Me, Dine Me, Discover Down Under and Coxy’s Big Break. And as my conﬁ dence has grown I have been game enough to tackle more and more challenges.

85 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Claudine Ward Queensland winner2004

Since winning the 2004 Rural Women’s for the Gulf of Carpentaria commercial Award and fi nishing my book on fi shermen meant that many fi shermen women in the Gulf fi shery—Do You Go and their families would approach Out on the Boat, Too, Luv?—I have been me to seek advice that is not available experiencing a series of highs and lows, through any agency. seemingly in line with the highs and lows of the fi shing industry. In 2008 I returned to shore, this time with an important project to manage. For several years we had been talking If you think you are beaten, you are; if you about a major refi t for the Turtle, and think you dare not, you don’t; if you’d like to it was now or never, so all the men win but think you can’t, it’s almost certain steamed away on the other boats. Talk about move the furniture! Around the you won’t; if you think you’ll lose, you’ve lost. fi shing industry in Karumba bets were For out in the world you’ll find success begins placed on whether the Turtle would with a fellow’s will: it’s all in the state of ever be put back together and make mind. the start of the 2009 season or whether we would all go mad beforehand. As it turned out, the Turtle steamed If you think you’re outclassed, you are. You’ve out of port the day before the season got to think high to rise. You’ve got to think opened—bright, shiny and new. I wish highly of yourself before you can ever win we had known the rain was not going a prize. Life’s battles don’t always go to the to stop. stronger and faster man, but sooner or later While the refi t progressed I spent six the man who wins is the man who thinks he months teaching at the local judo can. club—something I don’t get to do often while fi shing. I enjoyed the interaction, I spent late 2004 and most of 2005 especially with the team I took away to looking after and encouraging my competition, who were so proud of the husband in his battle with non- medals they brought home. Hodgkin’s lymphoma, a battle that at Th e Rural Women’s Award has given the moment he is winning. During this me an opportunity to add my voice period I left the boats but continued to to those trying to advance the views run them from shore. of the fi shing industry. Additionally, Th e start of 2006 saw us back at the participating in the Australian helm of the Turtle, the ‘mother ship’ Institute of Company Directors course of our vessels, and fi shing nearly full encouraged me to continue to grow time. Having sat out for quite a while, and learn new skills. I hope this will I was able to look around and re-assess continue into the future. some of the priorities in my life. Health is one thing the fi shing industry has a problem with—depression among both those going to sea and those who are left at home to sort out day- to-day concerns; lack of time to look after the physical health of those who need to go to sea; and the need for people to be encouraged to seek help before physical and mental problems become insurmountable. My position as secretary and environment delegate

86 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Dee Dunham Queensland runner2004 up

• Maker of the Best In 2004 I was the principal of to close the cheesery. We have ahead Cheese, Sydney Royal Coolabine Goat Cheese Farmstead, of us another hard year of treatment, Easter Show, 2003 one of only two farmsteads producing including a bone marrow transplant, • Grand Champion goat-milk cheese in Queensland. I have but we remain hopeful of a bright Cheese, Brisbane Royal always been passionate about my goats future for my granddaughter. Show, 2002 and my cheese and about instilling in • Grand Champion the general community an appreciation At present I am writing a book about Nubian Goat Breeder, of rural produce and rural people. my life—not an autobiography as Brisbane Royal Show— such but a book that shares some past five consecutive years Coolabine won a number of prestigious experiences, some fascinating stories awards, among them Maker of the Best and tales of engaging people. Who Cheese at the 2003 Sydney Royal Easter knows what the future holds? It might Show and Grand Champion Cheese not be the end of my goats and my at the 2002 Brisbane Royal Show. I cheese-making after all. was also named the Grand Champion Nubian Goat Breeder at Brisbane Royal Show for ﬁ ve consecutive years.

Th e Rural Women’s Award bursary was a huge boost for me: it allowed for some vital equipment upgrades in the cheesery and, more importantly, it enabled me to introduce the ‘Farmstead Experience’. A one-day workshop open to the general community, the Farmstead Experience, was designed to impart skills in the art of cheese-making and an awareness and appreciation of the importance of Australian agriculture and farmers.

Unfortunately, family illness led to the closure of Coolabine Goat Cheese Farmstead about 18 months ago. My granddaughter was diagnosed with leukaemia and, with the disease and its treatment all-consuming and the farm a family aﬀ air, we had no choice but to close. It was devastating having to say goodbye to my beloved goats and

87 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Jeanette Long South Australian2004 winner

• Centenary Medal Winning the RIRDC Rural Women’s for Partners in Grain and as South • Board director, Award in 2004 was a turning point in Australian board representative for Grains Research my life: it enabled me to participate in Australian Women in Agriculture. and Development a mentoring process that helped me Corporation overcome some personal barriers and In 2005 I became the inaugural • National Project develop my conﬁ dence to set what I chair of the Ag Excellence Alliance, Manager, Partners in had thought where unattainable goals. an organisation that develops links Grain One of these was to be on a board in between grower groups and natural • South Australian the agricultural industry. After being resource management boards in South board representative, appointed to several state government Australia. It has been rewarding to work Australian Women in board positions, my most signiﬁ cant with a team committed to developing Agriculture achievement in this regard is my an organisation from the ground up. • Inaugural chair, Ag recent appointment to the board of In 2007 Bill and I formed Australian Excellence Alliance the Grains Research and Development Bee Services Pty Ltd with one of our • Masters Business Corporation. former employees and a long-time business associate. We are developing a pollination service for broad-acre You can achieve anything if you put your mind agriculture and horticulture across Australia. to it.

Since winning the award I have focused on building our consultancy business, working alongside my husband, Bill. Th is has involved developing business plans for farmers as they recover from drought, as well as management of several projects. I have developed my facilitation skills through training and now facilitate succession planning for farm families and strategic plans for agribusiness and community organisations. More recently, I have received training in facilitating the delivery of a coaching course. Developing coaching skills in rural Australia is vital if individuals are to adapt to change in the diﬃ cult environment we live in.

Bill and I continue to farm—wheat, barley, lentils, lambs and wine grapes. Like many others, we are ﬁ nding this challenging in the current ﬁ nancial and climatic conditions. I continue developing the skills of rural women in my role as national project manager

88 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Laura Fell South Australian2004 runner up

• Member, Agriculture Fifteen years ago my husband and I Planning Group, a member of an and Horticulture bought a poultry farm in the McLaren advisory board for the University of Training Council Inc. Vale region, south of Adelaide, South Australia, and a member of the • Master of Business achieving a long-held ambition to South Australian Farmers Federation Administration become farmers. We raised meat Rural Sustainability Taskforce. • International trade chickens for 13 years, and two years consultant—Middle ago we made the transition to rearing Recently I have been focusing on Eastern markets turkeys. We now grow under contract broader aspects of Australia’s farming • Member, South for the Aldinga Turkeys brand of fabric and infrastructure. I became a Australian Farmers Inghams Enterprises, raising the birds director of Animal Health Australia Federation Rural from day-old poults to marketable age. and gained much satisfaction from the Sustainability Taskforce way that organisation’s planning and • Chair, South Australian My interest in the long-term direction work over many years helped Australia FarmBiz State Planning of the chicken meat industry led identify, contain and then eradicate Group me to take up state and national equine infl uenza. • Executive chair, industry leadership positions. I became I have also developed an interest in Environmental Energy particularly interested in maintaining distributed power generation, and with Australia Pty Ltd Australia’s quarantine standards, colleagues I established Environmental • Director, Animal Health on-farm biosecurity, animal health Energy Australia, where I have the role Australia and welfare, and the international trade environment. To support my of executive chair. Th e company is leadership roles, I studied for the currently in the fi nal pre-construction Graduate Certifi cate in Management phase of establishing a 130-megawatt through Adelaide Institute of TAFE peaking power station, which will be and then went on to do the University located in a regional centre in order to of South Australia’s Master of Business facilitate continuity of the electricity Administration degree, which I supply. completed in 2004. Additionally, I was recently accepted into the Australian Rural Leadership Have no small dreams, for they have not the Foundation’s Course 15 and through power to stir the hearts of men. this embarked on another fascinating ——Victor Hugo journey of personal growth, meeting and working with other equally In parallel with my studies, I set about committed people who share a passion developing opportunities for Australian for rural Australia. businesses to trade in the Middle East, Th e award has been pivotal in giving and in 2002 I led a small delegation me the confi dence to take on the many to Baghdad, being the fi rst Australian challenges and opportunities that woman to go there on private business have presented themselves to me and in recent decades. I have since led the belief that I can achieve the goals delegations to other Middle Eastern I set. It heralded for me a period of countries, as well as parts of South East unprecedented personal learning and Asia and the Caribbean. growth. Receiving the Rural Women’s Award bursary and participating in the Australian Institute of Company Directors course gave me extremely important training, as well as the confi dence to take on other board positions. I have been chair of the South Australian FarmBiz State

89 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Diana Morrison Western Australian2004 winner

• Carnarvon Shire In early 2000 a state and federal On a personal front, our family councillor government project to cap the free- partnership has grown to include two • TAFE board member fl owing artesian bores in the Gascoyne daughters-in-law and farming interests • Grandmother region was implemented with huge in the mid-west. My husband and I success. It not only allowed stock have taken a step back and moved off watering systems to be revolutionised the home property. but also opened the doors for diversifi cation in an area previously Th e award created an amazing number known only for the production of sheep of opportunities in some of the most and cattle. Th e Gascoyne now boasts unlikely areas, and after four years it both corn and sandalwood grown still opens doors for me. under irrigation and perennial grasses feed-lotting cattle in a formerly arid region. Th e wasteful open bore drains are now part of history.

My small eff ort to create change had its beginnings with access to this bore Grow for tomorrow. water. Some species of ornamental fi sh seemed to thrive in the warm, saline water and, with the support of the Rural Women’s Award bursary and considerable research, a new business made its way into the bush. My award ambition involved two fact-fi nding missions—one to New South Wales and Queensland and the other to Singapore—combined with extensive trial work on the farm, to resolve some of the diffi culties associated with the production of ornamental fi sh in saline artesian water.

Th e potential of ornamental ﬁ sh as a new industry for the Gascoyne region has now been proved, with very satisfying results, and the business supplies aquarium ﬁ sh to both Western Australian and eastern states markets.

90 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Wendy Newman Western Australian2004 runner up

• Finalist, Community When I moved back to Western branding initiatives. I learnt some Services Industry Australia’s Wheat Belt in 2000, after valuable lessons, including to promise Award—Outstanding an absence of 20 years, I was struck by only what you can deliver and to work Service by an Individual, the innovation, energy and community with others so that you can deliver. I 2004 pride, especially among women. also learnt clever branding tips such • Co-convenor, ‘Women I met so many wonderful women as that the sum of the whole is worth Unite: working together involved in so many interesting small more than the parts, yet the parts must for rural Australia’, businesses, often acting in isolation, have minimum standards in quality Australian Women in with little support and with few and service, and telling the story of the Agriculture Conference, resources, and with sheer passion region, product or service needs to be Perth, 2006 motivating them. I was also struck done in an authentic yet creative way. • Development of Curtin by our region’s vulnerability because University Women of its dependence on broad-acre It has been an awesome experience to in Rural Leadership agriculture. Th e increasing impact of see the Heartlands Regional Branding Program, 2007 the global economy, combined with Group grow and be so successful, to the • Delegate, Rural land management problems—including extent that the model is now being used Women’s Summit, water, salt and more recently prolonged to support other industry sectors in the Canberra, 2008 drought—were forcing this industry region—tourism, the arts, motor sports, to redeﬁ ne itself. Diversiﬁ cation business services, and so on. From little became something that interested me things big things grow. Well-supported, enormously. positive and focused networks are powerful mechanisms for growth and change.

I have been fortunate to sit on Never doubt that a small group of committed numerous advisory bodies at the state citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is and federal levels as an advocate for the diversity and opportunity found the only thing that ever does. in the regions and the economic ——Margaret Mead and social infrastructure required for making things happen. Participating in the award gave me an invaluable opportunity to meet other wonderful At the same time, I joined the inaugural women and men involved in committee of the Heartlands Regional innovation and promoting rural Branding Group, established to market Australia, its people and its businesses. the region’s diversity and support In turn, these experiences have those involved in value-adding and provided rich case studies to bring diversiﬁ cation, especially in terms of to my consulting business, which creating a strong network for mutual specialises in individual, organisational support and assisting with branding and community capacity building. I and broader marketing. From 2001 have been able to combine knowledge to 2007 I chaired this group; it was so and experience from a diverse exciting to see these businesses grow, career in human resources and rural some of them becoming international development to design and implement exporters. Th e commitment and action learning programs for people tenacity of these people never ceases to who live in rural Australia and are amaze me. committed to growing better lives, As the recipient of a Rural Women’s businesses, industries and communities. Award bursary, I was able to travel to How lucky am I? Victoria, South Australia and New South Wales to examine other regional

91 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Diane Rae Tasmanian winner2004

• Recipient, Telstra In March 2001, after visiting Tasmania August 2006 saw the arrival of Business Women’s for a holiday, my partner and I decided Australia’s only privately owned Award for Business to give up life in Queensland’s Sunshine Awassi sheep. We discovered a fl ock Innovation, 2006 Coast hinterland and move to the on the mainland and negotiated the • Tasmanian Community island state for good. purchase of 45 sheep. Apart from East Achievement Award, Frieslands, this breed is the only other 2009 With the help of a New Industries milking breed in Australia; the breeding Development Grant, Grandvewe stock are wholly owned by a Middle Cheeses, Tasmania’s only organic sheep Eastern syndicate and were unavailable dairy and cheesery, was born. Our fi rst to ordinary Australian farmers until pregnant fl ock arrived on the farm in Grandvewe’s ‘fi nd’. Th e result is we August 2002 and milking of our fi rst can now cross-breed and work towards 40 ewes began in November that year. creating a unique Australian milking Th e fi rst milking took three-and-a-half breed. hours, and we produced 2.5 litres of milk. Fortunately, things improved after In September 2006 I returned to that. Th e very fi rst year we made yogurt Europe under a federally funded and hard cheeses and sold them in the scholarship to further study sheep retail market in Hobart only. cheeses. In June 2007 I went to Europe again, to study more complex sheep cheeses with Europe’s best boutique Live your life in such a way that when your manufacturers. feet hit the floor in the morning, Satan shudders and says, ‘Oh no! She’s awake!’

We opened our cellar door to the public in December 2003, and the response was so great that we had to discontinue our retail supply to ensure that there was enough cheese available for the cellar door.

I used the Rural Women’s Award bursary to travel overseas for seven weeks, learning about East Friesland sheep and their management requirements. Th e most important thing I learnt was that the ewes need access to a shed in the winter months. Th us was the ‘Sheep Hilton’ built and ready 10 minutes before it was needed on 1 July 2005.

We received a Regional Food Processing Grant in June 2006 for our initiative of manufacturing verjuice, vincotto and a pinot paste from wine grape surplus, and we embarked on installing a manufacturing kitchen and winery on site.

92 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Sandra Gillanders Tasmanian runner2004 up

• Telstra Tasmanian Early in 2004 I moved from a successful ‘Helping people help themselves’ Business Woman of career in accounting and business remains our focus, ensuring that we the Year 1999 (Private management to my own business help people ‘turn their dreams into Sector under 100 consultancy and people-development reality’ and provide solutions and results Employees) organisation. I had my own model for our clients. • Telstra Tasmanian for serving customers through values- Business Woman of driven service and outcomes-focused As a role model for women in the Year 2002 (Private programs. business—in particular, demonstrating and Corporate Sector) that you can achieve whatever you want • Inaugural Honour Roll As managing director of the Business if you have the desire and vision—I of Women, 2005 Savvy Group, I am proud to have aim to empower women of all ages and designed and delivered the highly in any location to have the future they successful Business Savvy program to want. Regional Tasmania oﬀ ers many almost 200 Tasmanian small business opportunities for women to have the owners, a project worth $470 000 perfect work–life balance. and supported by the Australian Government through AusIndustry.

There are no mistakes, only learning opportunities. Take the time to reflect and learn from your experiences: they will richly reward you. Also remember, ‘No one can make you feel inferior without your consent’. ——Eleanor Roosevelt

I am also principal consultant with and owner of Inner Development and Business Solutions Consulting Australia. Th rough our consulting services we have delivered funding of over $1 million to our Tasmanian clients, provided strategic direction for many businesses, oﬀ ered coaching and mentoring to several hundred business owners, and aided in market development for a number of industries.

Our people-development portfolio continues to grow, having a wide array of clients from micro- and small businesses, the corporate sector and all tiers of government. We have trained over 2000 people since the business began in 2004.

93 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Lee Berryman Northern Territory2004 winner

My life has changed greatly since Our farm outside Darwin grew being a recipient of the Rural Women’s mangoes as the principal crop: bamboo Award in 2004. We sold our farm in for fresh shoot production was the September 2007, moved to a 2-hectare secondary crop. Th e farm was also property closer to Darwin, and made pivotal to bamboo research, being the momentous decision to retire. part of the Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research’s project on improving and maintaining Everything on earth has a purpose—and that the productivity of bamboo for quality includes you! Your purpose in life provides timber and shoots in Australia and the you with an inner drive that, once you tap Philippines. Until we sold our farm I continued my involvement in the into it, can give you immense fulfilment and Northern Territory Women in Primary unlimited joy. Industry group, the Northern Territory ——Anthony Robbins Minister for Primary Industries Horticulture Advisory Group, and mango industry networks and industry Participation in the Rural Women’s bodies. I was the only female member Award development activities and of the board of the Northern Territory undertaking the Award project Mango Industry Association and provided me with a unique opportunity the founding member of Northern to assess our plans and business goals Territory Women in Primary Industry. at an early stage of development. While these formal involvements ceased Following completion of my Award with the sale of the farm, I remain in project on the viability of bamboo contact with the Women in Primary shoot production in the Northern Industry group members. Territory, which showed that production was marginal, we decided As a retiree, I am now involved in rural to pick bamboo shoots only when activities at the community level—for the Northern Territory season was example, pottery, qigong, dance and well ahead of Queensland and New craft groups. I have also begun a South Wales production. Th is decision distance diploma in ceramics from the was further revised in the following Australian National University School season, when we ceased cutting shoots of Art, providing both a challenge altogether and allowed our bamboos to to and an update of my skills and thicken into windbreaks, which while knowledge. not income producing in themselves have a positive impact on farm Th e RIRDC Rural Women’s Award production and fi nal income. Although provides invaluable opportunities for no longer growing bamboo, our ‘love rural women to develop business and aff air’ with bamboo has continued and leadership skills towards increasing I fi rmly believe that bamboo has much their participation and contributions to off er as a sustainable product with within their businesses, industries many uses; though possibly not with and communities generally. Th e Australia’s current mindset. contribution of the award to the achievements of recipients continues long after the formal development and opportunities cease.

94 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Megan Hoskins Northern Territory2004 runner up

Five years ago I switched career paths, Although I learnt a great deal about from being an entomology research and soil and plant health, translating that extension offi cer with the Department knowledge to the industry proved far of Business, Industry and Resource more challenging, largely because of Development at Katherine Research the fact that, although there is strong Station to working on Victoria River industry support for biological farming, Research Station, a cattle station there are many interpretations of what at Kidman Springs, south-west of the term means and how best to put it Katherine. into practice. Despite some challenges though, trial work with a small number Kidman Springs is in the Victoria River of committed growers has proved very district, which is one of the main cattle- promising. Notably, one mango grower producing regions of the Northern has delivered higher yields, better fruit Territory. Th e Research Station, quality, less chemical use and other covering 31 000 hectares, is managed interesting benefi ts. and funded by the Department of Business, Industry and Resource Development, and the research eff ort focuses on native pasture, grazing and beef cattle herd management.

My commitment has always been to biological farming. I am convinced that sustainable farming practices must be embraced by all primary producers if rural industries are to survive and prosper.

Participating in the Rural Women’s Award gave me the resources to improve my knowledge of the principles behind successful biological farming and the tools and techniques available to farm in this way. I attended two important workshops: Nutri Tech Solutions was a four-part seminar series covering the management of minerals, microbes, plants and pests; the Soil Food Web Interaction and Beneﬁ ts to Plant Production program provided detailed theoretical instruction on and practical skills in soil biology, soil chemistry and molecular biology.

95 96 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award 2005 Participating in the award ...

Jennifer Bradley Kate James (Woodward) Sue Markwell Elaine Paton Anne Osborne Delphine Puxty (Bentley) Lisa Rowntree Lyn Dohle Maureen Dobra Deborah Oberon Amanda Way Laura Richardson Ann Palmer Sarah Fea

97 2005 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Jennifer Bradley New South Wales2005 winner

• Chairperson, I work alongside my husband and Th e knowledge I have accrued and the Tooraweenah Prime two children, running a 1400-hectare contacts I have made and developed Lamb Marketing cropping and prime lamb production in the lamb industry since winning Cooperative enterprise and Border Leicester stud in the award have been invaluable. I have • Producer the Central West of New South Wales. become more involved and taken on representative, TAFE new positions in my industry. My self- New South Wales Since 2001 I have served as a board confi dence has grown, and this has Animal Welfare Council director for the Tooraweenah Prime allowed me to express my opinions on • Co-owner, New Lamb Marketing Cooperative, and matters concerning the lamb industry Armatree Border I currently chair the board. Th is and lamb producers. Leicester Stud cooperative is one of the largest producer marketing groups in the I am committed to developing better state and has been in operation since marketing options and transparent 1995. Among other things, as director, feedback to our producers, who I organised and ran numerous fi eld produce a world-class product. Th e days, prepared a quarterly newsletter past fi ve years have been diffi cult for for members and coordinated media producers, but I remain excited about reports. Th e cooperative is unique in the industry’s prospects: I believe that the lamb industry, with a membership lean meat yield on carcasses and genetic of 90 producers marketing some gain will deliver the biggest benefi ts to 55 000 lambs over the hook to both processors and producers in the processors in four states. near future.

Make everything I do count.

In my view, the main problem facing members of the cooperative, and lamb producers in general, is the lack of consistent and reliable feedback from processors on simple, measurable characteristics such as fat score, the weight of individual carcasses, and lean meat yield. Th e Rural Women’s Award aff orded me the opportunity to travel to Western Australia and New Zealand during 2005 to investigate the feedback delivered to lamb producers via kill sheets and benchmarking opportunities. Th e diff erences in the type and quality of feedback off ered to lamb producers are enormous.

98 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Kate James (Woodward) New South Wales2005 runner up

• Member, New South In early 2004 I was responsible for Over the years I have continued to Wales Dairy Industry all aspects of the establishment of help my husband run our Wallawong Conference and Ag a specialty cheese factory based in Murray Grey Stud. Th is includes many Start Muswellbrook, in the Upper Hunter aspects of stud cattle management • Director, New South region of New South Wales. Hunter on two properties and an annual on- Wales Rural Assistance Belle Cheese produces high-quality property bull and female sale. We Authority and Hunter hand-made cheeses and yogurts from are planning to move into full-time Mutual Limited the milk of Brown Swiss cows. Along primary industry within the next three with my cheese-maker role, I was years because we want to raise our responsible for production, fi nance, family on a farm and practise more marketing and administration of a small sustainable agriculture than is possible business that has fi ve staff members. from a distance. I have also become very interested in permaculture and am Hunter Belle Cheese has had committed to reducing our impact on considerable success, winning six gold the environment. medals for its soft and hard cheeses in Australian Specialist Cheesemakers Since participating in the Rural Association shows and the Fromage du Women’s Award I have become Monde award in the fi rst fi ve years of involved in a number of rural operation. Furthermore, I facilitated the organisations in New South Wales, fi rst school-based traineeship in cheese- including being appointed a member of making—Food Processing (Dairy)—for the New South Wales Dairy Industry one of my junior employees, who went Conference and Ag Start and being a on to manage the factory in 2008 so director of the New South Wales Rural that I could take time off for the birth Assistance Authority. Th rough these of my fi rst child, Stirling. organisations I can contribute to policy making for the benefi t of people in As any mother would know, agriculture and regional areas. Recently motherhood is the most joyous I have also become a director of the and demanding job there is. When local credit union, Hunter Mutual interviewed about balancing her Limited. career and motherhood, I heard our Governor-General, Quentin Bryce, say Without a doubt, the award has given ‘Women can have it all, but not all at me the self-confi dence and the profi le the same time’. Th is rang true with me: to take on industry positions and to I realised I was ready to take a break better use my talents and skills for the from my business career and enjoy benefi t of the agricultural sector, the precious time with my son while he is environment and my local community. young. Fortunately, I was able to sell the business at the end of 2008 and it will continue in 2009.

99 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Sue Markwell Victorian winner2005

• Finalist, Wakefield Club Th e latest chapter in my career began Th e award also enabled me to meet Women in Racing Award in 2001, when I returned to Gisborne, many vets and researchers I would • Keynote speaker, Victoria to manage Tremon Stud, not normally have been able to make graduation ceremony for one of Victoria’s most respected contact with. Th e knowledge I gained Melbourne University thoroughbred horse studs. Th e stud had is invaluable. I have been able to use it, Glenormiston students earned itself a reputation for quality and the conﬁ dence I gained, to expand Member, Women In care and world-class facilities, providing Tremon’s student work-placement Primary Industry Advisory for the breeding and caring of horses, program and mentoring program for Panel from foaling mares to yearlings and female students. • Member, NMIT Equine racehorses. But it was keen to move Degree Curriculum forward, build on its successes, and Committee determine its future direction. I became the ﬁ rst female manager of the stud.

Th e stud branched out from its base of breeding and agistment to a more comprehensive range of services, including a specialised horse after- care and recovery agistment and an artifi cial insemination clinic for standardbreds and performance horses. Th e development of specialist facilities to treat horses with specifi c illnesses and injuries opened a new market, between the level of care off ered by veterinarians for acute patients and general agistment services for horses with minor problems.

Th e Rural Women’s Award bursary enabled me to travel to Australian and New Zealand veterinary hospitals and clinics to learn about the latest advances in rehabilitation for horses; this involved traditional, complementary and integrated approaches to care. Th e result of the tour was that I was able to expand by 300 per cent the range of illnesses and injuries Tremon Stud can treat, and the list of horses that have returned to racing or performance continues to grow. Many of the horses have gone on to successful careers, and several have won prestigious races.

100 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Elaine Paton Victorian runner2005 up

• Centenary Medal, for It all began when I went to the second the political processes of providing services to women Women on Farms gathering, at Sea advice to government and policy through community- Lake in the Victorian Mallee. I hadn’t development. Th is in turn led to building initiatives been to the fi rst gathering, but at the further opportunities, among them the • Who’s Who of second I met women whose experiences Victoria Women’s Council (1996–97), Australian Women, resonated with mine as a member of an the National Forum on Women in 2009 extended farming family doing it tough, Agriculture and Resource Management who loved the land but was frustrated (1997), the Victorian Advisory by the lifestyle and the stereotype of ‘the Team on Women in Agriculture and farmer’ always being a bloke. I went Resource Management (1997 to 2002), to the gathering as a farmer’s wife and the Women in Rural Communities returned home a farmer. Advisory Group (2002 to 2005) and the fi rst, second and third International Since April 1991 my journey has Conferences for Women in Agriculture followed the road of community (in Melbourne, Washington DC and development, particularly for women Madrid respectively). in agriculture and rural communities. I was convenor of the 1993 Tallangatta Participating in the Rural Women’s Women on Farms gathering. At Award enabled me to attend and the same time I joined the steering graduate from the Alpine Valleys committee that formed what is now Community Leadership Program. A dull woman has an Australian Women in Agriculture. I also I’m still writing the Step Out and became inaugural chair of the Upper Make a Diff erence manual. It hasn’t immaculate home. Murray AgCare Rural Counselling progressed far because I have been Service management committee. busy doing my leadership training, serving my community as chair of the In 1995 the coordinator of the Tallangatta Community Education Tallangatta Community Education Centre management committee, and Centre asked me to develop and present being president of Australian Women in a program for rural women’s leadership Agriculture. In this last role I attended training. Th is highly successful three- the National Rural Women’s Summit day event, Step Out and Make a in 2008, and I represent Australian Diff erence, was a trigger for a number Women in Agriculture on the National of women to step out and take on Rural Women’s Coalition. I attended leadership roles in their community the Prime Minister’s 2020 Summit, or industry. It was always one of my the National Rural Women’s Summit ambitions to ‘write the manual’ for and spoke at the 2008 launch in Lae others to be able to run a similar event of the Papua New Guinea Women in or series of classes. Agriculture Development Foundation.

For the next 10 years I continued Th e need for accessible, aff ordable to farm with my husband and to be and appropriate training in good involved in community development. governance, political processes, My activities extended to state community development and leadership of the rural counselling leadership will always exist while there groups and continuing development are women living and working in rural of Australian Women in Agriculture communities. And if these women through its committee and as newsletter are to be able to step out and make editor for fi ve years. a diff erence in agricultural Australia with confi dence in their skills and In 1991 I had also learnt that it is knowledge, there will always be a need OK to be ‘political’. I joined the for initiatives such as the RIRDC Rural Victorian Rural Women’s Network Women’s Award. Reference Group, and this led to a whole new world of understanding

101 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Anne Osborne Queensland winner2005

• Assisting in the My Rural Women’s Award project itself broadened my horizons and given establishment of focused on gaining a greater me additional confi dence that my skills Australian Native Food understanding of the key consumer are not industry specifi c. Industry Limited and demand barriers for the Australian serving as a founding native produce (or fl edgling ‘bushfood’) My ‘spare time’ has also been put to director industry, from the perspective of both good use. I have attended various short • Establishment of the raw produce and value-adding. Not courses covering a range of areas (food Australian Produce surprisingly, the primary barriers to handling, export, liquor licensing, web Company demand were revealed as a lack of design, and marketing) in order to • Establishment of the information—about the products extend my small business knowledge Naturally Australian themselves, how to use them, and how and skills, as well as participated in Company to even fi nd the information—as well strategic planning initiatives in my local as shortcomings in the availability, community and taking on external consistency and quality of the products directorships. Ever conscious of the and produce. need to continue to ‘practice’, I have used my professional skills to help Make it happen. Since winning the award I have been my partner expand his international fortunate in the opportunities that have software engineering service and become available to me to continue consultancy business. to help my industry, expand my network and augment my skills. I was My original business, Boofanugs, honoured to be able to assist in the has been transformed from a small establishment, over about two years, value-adding enterprise into diff erent of the peak Australian representative entities, each of which has a distinct body for our industry, the Australian target market. Although Boofanugs Native Food Industry Limited, or still makes its gourmet products, it ANFIL, and then serve as one of the no longer distributes them; nor does founding directors for a further two it deal in the raw produce market. years. Th is involved drawing on my Instead, I now manage the Australian specialist corporate governance–related Produce Company, which is a specialist knowledge, skills and experiences from Australian native providore with a completely diff erent industry to guide clients throughout Australia and and educate a group of talented people, internationally. Th rough this entity I to enable them to make informed am able to continue to promote my decisions that would aff ect the long- chosen industry and off er solutions term strategic direction of ANFIL. for customers and producers. In Th ese people were generous in sharing addition to this, I manage the Naturally their own experiences, which further Australian Company, which promotes expanded my knowledge of diff erent various wonderful value-added products aspects of the industry. During this from throughout regional Australia, time, I also continued to pursue my including the Boofanugs range. other full-time professional career in Th ere is still some way to go before my the fi nancial services industry, which vision—that Australian native produce involved mentoring and facilitating the and products become part of our development of women and men, both Australian cultural identity—becomes young and more mature. a reality. Nevertheless, with important In mid-2007 I chose to step outside developments and advances occurring my comfort zone to explore new almost daily in the industry, a growing opportunities. I took up part- interest in our products and, more time employment in the utilities importantly, the consistent entry into sector. Here, I was able to apply my our industry of younger generations professional experience and knowledge eager to learn, that reality is becoming in a completely new industry, which has ever more likely.

102 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Delphine Puxty (Bentley) Queensland runner2005 up

Born on a small farm in England, I I am dedicated to the adoption of grew up in Western Australia, in and innovation and technology in rural near the hills surrounding Perth. My industries and, in turn, to managing extended family has strong pastoral the social impacts of change. I have a links, and this initially inspired my strong commitment to the involvement interest in rangelands. My childhood of young people in rural planning, as dream was to run a property: I have in well as the development of training part fulfi lled this through my career. avenues for all generations involved in rural industries. I have held the position My most recent role has been as of secretary and remain a director of General Manager—Corporate the Future Farmers Network, a not-for- Development with one of Australia’s profi t organisation that aims to keep largest vertically integrated beef and young people in rural industries abreast cattle companies, the North Australian of career and business opportunities Pastoral Company. Th is role brought and in touch with one another. I also with it fi ve main areas of responsibility: have a strong interest in practical ways continuous improvement, compliance of sustainable living for both rural and with legal and other requirements, urban people. human resource management, internal communication, and external and Before becoming General Manager— public relations. I developed and Corporate Development with the implemented management systems to North Australian Pastoral Company, ensure the continued environmental I was Property and Environmental integrity and quality of beef and Planner with the company, Land cattle produced by the company and Management Extension Offi cer with helped the company gain ISO 14001 the Department of Natural Resources, certifi cation for environmental and Co-ordinated Natural Resource management. Monitoring Offi cer with the South West Strategy, the last two positions With the support of the Rural Women’s based in Charleville, Queensland. I Award bursary I travelled to the have a Bachelor of Science degree in United Kingdom to study the extent natural resource management from the to which agriculture contributes to University of Western Australia. rural communities’ development by being responsive to consumer needs At present I am on maternity leave, and developing effi cient, eff ective caring for our fi rst child, Alice. and sustainable supply systems. I also discovered there are considerable diff erences in how foreign trade in beef aff ects producers’ and consumers’ behaviour in both Australian and British markets.

103 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Lisa Rowntree South Australian2005 winner

The past should be a springboard, not a major olive processors, and responding hammock. to concerns raised. Th e Voluntary Contribution Regulations were gazetted in February 2009, and the new system My husband, Jim, and I have been Longridge property. As I write this, will be in operation for the 2009 olive involved in olive growing for 12 years. we have fi nally reached the planting season. I will shortly sit down with We were the fi rst people in our area stage, and our farm has all manner of my committee to formulate fi ve-year to recognise the great potential for equipment and people busily at work and one-year plans to help us achieve diversity in our region and to plant helping us make our dream come true. the goal of ‘marketing olive oil to the olives. Our region, the Limestone world’. Coast, is now renowned as one of I am still enthusiastically involved in the great olive-producing regions of the state and national olive associations. Th e Australian Olive Association is Australia. Our farm-management I am now in my seventh year as Olives doing fantastic work on behalf of business has also grown considerably: South Australia president and my fi fth all olive growers in relation to some three new farms have come into year representing South Australian inferior imported oil and our reputation our care, one of them owned by an growers on the board of the Australian as quality producers overseas. We have Indonesian family who are passionate Olive Association. developed a national code of practice about Australia’s clean, green and launched a new industry brand, My goal was, and still is, to market environment and about producing Australian Extra Virgin. olive oil to the world. Back in 2006 we nourishing food. formed a steering committee to look Coping with the demands of our olive Early last year Jim and I decided to at joint marketing ventures and fi nd grove, our farm-management business plunge further into the olive industry out how such a venture might help and the various committees and boards (and debt) and plant another 80 000 South Australian growers. Out of this, a I am on at the same time as raising trees in a high-density format on our group called Encounter Olive Australia four enchanting children has been was formed; it continues to thrive. challenging. I am fortunate to have Th is year the Olives South Australia an excellent husband and a wonderful committee and I are looking at ways of mother, who has helped out over the helping growers in the bulk oil sector. years with child care and daughter care Various strategies have been discussed, (me) when needed. Our eldest son, and we are making good progress Tom, is now at Adelaide University with our ideas. At the national level, I studying mechatronic engineering; was chair of the National Restructure Harrison is in year 11; Lachlan is in Committee and am pleased to report year 8; and our daughter, Taylor, is in that we successfully achieved our goal of year 5. Life continues to be chaotic, creating a much more unifi ed structure funny and interesting, and I wouldn’t for the Australian Olive Association and have it any other way. the state branches. Winning the Rural Women’s Award • President, Olives South In order to achieve my goal of seeing gave me confi dence, reason and Australia Australia recognised domestically encouragement to get out there and • South Australian director, and internationally as a producer of fi nd markets, promote our great Australian Olive Association high-quality extra virgin olive oil and product, and educate people about the • Chair, Consumer Awareness, olive products, I realised we needed virtues of extra virgin olive oil. I have Marketing & Promotion to have all olive growers ‘singing from been a speaker at many events—even Committee, Australian Olive the same song sheet’ and fi nancially at a doctors convention in Adelaide, Association contributing to projects. In 2008 we where I was able to talk about all the • Board member, Premier’s employed a consultant to help Olives health benefi ts of extra virgin olive oil. Food Council South Australia introduce a voluntary Encouragingly, most of the doctors • Chair, Governing Council, contribution scheme under the were already aware of how benefi cial it Coomandook Area School Primary Industries Funding Scheme is. But there is still so much to do, and • Director, Rowntree Act. Th is involved putting together I look forward to seeing my industry go Management a presentation, consulting nearly all from strength to strength. • Wife of one and mother of four the olive growers in the state, meeting

104 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Lyn Dohle South Australian2005 runner up

I grew up on a sheep and cattle Bureau, Agriculture Kangaroo Island property in the Western District of (the peak primary producer body Victoria. One of three girls with a on the island) and natural resource mother who was actively involved in all management committees. I have aspects of farming operations, I have also taken a role on the island’s been involved in farming from the time hospital board in order to extend my I was old enough to open and shut a community activities. gate. So began a lifelong passion for agriculture. Th e award and the networks that resulted continue to have an amazing In my fi nal year at school I studied impact on my life and have certainly Environmental Science, which began broadened my views and aspirations. to awaken me to the importance of agriculture being sustainable. After completing my studies—a Bachelor of Agricultural Science (Hons) at Melbourne University—I was fortunate to start work on Kangaroo Island, as the island’s fi rst soils offi cer and fi rst female extension offi cer. I am now the senior soil and land management consultant with Rural Solutions SA and with my partner, David, run a sheep and cropping property on the island.

Since 2005 I have completed my Rural Women’s Award project on ‘life balance’, which allowed me and a group of island women to investigate the supports and the skills required to determine life’s priorities and to reach a better balance between the many facets of our lives. Th e group is still going strong and has involved many new people since its inception.

Life has also been ‘exciting’ since 2005: I have travelled to Peru, India and Bhutan and worked hard to ensure that Kangaroo Island was drought declared in 2007. Along with this work came the running of workshops and ﬁ eld days to support landholders and heavy involvement with the Department of Primary Industries and Resources South Australia (PIRSA) response—from livestock assessment and coordinating fodder requirements to mental health support—to the devastating bushﬁ res of December 2007, which burnt out almost 20 per cent of the island. I am still involved in numerous industry organisations, such as the Agricultural

105 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Maureen Dobra Western Australian2005 winner

• President, My story is rather unusual in that, Th e business has grown from producing VegetablesWA instead of my daughters inheriting my 200 kilograms a week, in 1996, to • Chairperson, Vegetable business, my husband and I and our 17 tonnes a week. We service our Producers Committee eldest son inherited theirs. customers twice a day fi ve days a week of the Agricultural and then again on Sundays. Sometimes Produce Commission My husband and I have been in the only a few hours elapse between • Member, Ausveg vegetable industry most of our lives. harvesting, delivering to a customer Advisory Committee Initially we owned a business that and being on a consumer’s plate. We • Runner-up, Bill Stevens sold hardware, irrigation products, have been innovative, too, purchasing Award for Excellence chemicals and tractors to growers. After and building machinery specifi cally for for WA Vegetable we had had four children we decided our food processing and our farming Growers, 2008 to grow vegetables ourselves. Our practices. At present, we employ 42 • Treasurer, Gingin business expanded to the point where people, 35 of them being from our local Chamber of Commerce we were renting several properties, so community and 7 are international • Chairperson and now in 1980 we decided to consolidate and backpackers. Of the 42 people, 11 are treasurer, Gingin buy one property. We found suitable employed part-time, 7 are casual and Telecentre land and water 5 kilometres from the the remainder are full time. Our ages • Runner-up, Family town of Gingin, north of Perth. Th e range from 17 years to 72 years. My Business Awards for soil was heavier than we had been used business was one of the fi rst vegetables Western Australia, to, which was what we wanted, and growers, in Western Australia, to 2008 the quality of the water was extremely achieve an environmental accreditation. • Sponsor, Regional good. Th is would be our Shangri- Business Idol for la. We were very naive, though, and With the Rural Women’s Award bursary Western Australia, soon experienced diffi cult growing I was able to visit other salad growers 2008 conditions. A new business venture and processors in New Zealand, came along, so we left Gingin for three France and Holland, to learn about years. their growing circumstances and the diffi culties they faced, such as shortages of water and labour.

Share your knowledge and experience. Th e award has also given me the opportunity to promote the fresh We returned in 1987 and started a new vegetables of Western Australian and life. Gourmet vegetables had started to also that of our nation. It has also appear and become trendy. Diﬀ erent- given me a voice to encourage others to coloured carrots, beets, turnips and ‘just have a go’. Winning the award has radishes were grown. Th en came brought recognition to our community colourful and strange-looking lettuces. of Gingin and to the vegetable industry Initially the lettuces were for decoration in general. We are not just market on the side of a plate, but as cafe and gardeners: we are vegetable farmers! al fresco restaurants became popular so Additionally, my peers have come did these lettuces, and the demand for to recognise the knowledge and the mixed salads increased. qualities I possess, to the point that I am now president of VegetablesWA, In 1996 one of my daughters the peak body for vegetable growers in started to cut lettuce leaves for a Western Australia. customer of mine. Th e demand for the leaves exceeded expectations and I have been amazed at myself and the she persuaded her sister to join her reception I have had after speaking and form Th e Loose Leaf Lettuce to and meeting people from all walks Company. After two years of building of life. To be told that I ‘inspire’ is their business and reputation the girls incredible. I love my job, and I want decided to go on a world trip, and we to portray it as I see it. Achieving a inherited the business from them. lifestyle!

106 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Deborah Oberon Western Australian2005 runner up

• Recipient, Albany In 1996 I began a hobby natural skin the price was too high and the lack of Chamber of Commerce care business because I was becoming consumer understanding of ‘certifi ed and Industry Export increasingly concerned about the many organic’ was hampering our marketing. Award chemicals used in skin care products • Grant recipient, and the multinationals’ exploitation In time, the term ‘organic’ became Austrade New Exporter of women’s fears and insecurities in a very successful marketing tool in Program relation to ageing. My vision had been Western Australia, leading to the to create a sustainable manufacturing release of a number of skin care ranges and export business that would use that were described as ‘organic’ but the region’s locally grown produce and did not have certifi cation—and not provide employment opportunities in necessarily any organic content. Lack the south-west town I lived in. In 2003 of legislation to prevent this misleading I engaged in the business full time and marketing meant that products of this began the research needed to achieve kind could be released into the health- organic certifi cation for my products. food shop market much more cheaply, exacerbating the problem for ranges such as Elemental.

In late 2007 we switched to what was Life is a journey of learning to live by one’s a more successful marketing strategy, values rather than one’s goals. releasing a practitioner’s range for beauty therapists and completely withdrawing from the health-food shop market. By this time, however, my In 2004 Elemental Skin Care was the enthusiasm for my Elemental journey second skin care range in Australia was waning: burn-out was getting me to achieve internationally accredited down. Th e beginning of the economic organic certifi cation and the fi rst downturn in Asian markets in 2008 led Western Australian range. During the to the loss of two contracts, at which business’s most successful period, I was point I decided to sell the company. employing fi ve dynamic, committed I have since relocated to an ‘ecovillage’ women who were all on salary-reward in the Currumbin Valley in packages that gave them shares in the Queensland. With two other women company. Participating in the Rural I run a cafe based on traditional and Women’s Award brought me much- slow-food cooking methods. We are in needed publicity and was integral to my the process of establishing an organic securing a number of overseas contracts. food cooperative and developing Over the years I learnt much about networks throughout the valley in order the ‘tyranny of distance’ and the to use as much locally grown produce importance of timing when striving as we can in our cafe and through the for market success. Th e release of cooperative. We use our passion for the Elemental Skin Care into the Western food we cook to educate people about Australian market took place at a time nutrition, organics, sustainability and when the market was not ready for the the true value of food, which is that it prices that needed to be charged for an brings us together as family, friends and organic skin care product. East coast community. ranges were becoming very successful, but Elemental was too undercapitalised to break into that market. Although we managed to gain access to some of the Asian markets, we faced the same problem we did in Western Australia:

107 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Amanda Way Tasmanian winner2005

I am a principal of Clearwater Fisheries, If I were asked what was the main a fi sh-production operation that focuses thing the award has given me—in mainly on the southern rock lobster. addition to discovering a wonderful Over the years I have been active in my group of women who participated in industry and my local community and the Australian Institute of Company have held the position of Tasmanian Directors course—I would sum it up Director of the Women’s Industry in one word: confi dence. Th e award Network Seafood Community. has given me confi dence to forge ahead and, despite the hurdles, to keep going I also coordinated the Tasmanian rock and not be afraid of failure. lobster industry at the Wooden Boat Festival, the 20th Anniversary Rock Lobster Dinner. More recently, I set up my own direct marketing business, Lobsters Direct, which couriered fresh lobster, courtesy of Australia Post, to any centre in the country. But 2008 proved a disastrous year: I was forced to close down Lobsters Direct, and we are only now getting back on track.

My Rural Women’s Award ambition was to see the Tasmanian rock lobster industry expand and diversify into new markets and become a viable, sustainable industry. My award activity involved further research into marketing and product commercialisation, along with two study tours to tap into the expertise of others involved in the industry. My study tours—to Sydney to attend the Seafood Directions Conference and then on to Western Australia and New Zealand—were wonderful. Th e big lesson for me was that no matter what industry you are in the diffi culties and challenges are the same. ‘Th inking outside the square’ and fi nding innovative ways of marketing are what make the diff erence.

108 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Laura Richardson Tasmanian runner2005 up

• State president, Rural At the time I participated in the Rural My main interests now concern being a Youth Organisation of Women’s Award I had been voted state director and company secretary of the Tasmania Inc. president of Rural Youth Tasmania Deloraine and Districts Community • Director, Meander and had a number of aims for that Bank, the Chudleigh Agricultural and Valley Financial organisation, including ensuring Horticultural Society, and local netball Services Limited that its membership remained stable and basketball associations. I enjoy and that it continued to be a vibrant being involved in my community and organisation leading the way for other believe that the more you put into your rural youth groups around Australia. community the more you will have Th is was reﬂ ected in my award project, returned to you. which involved exploring the strategies other rural youth–based organisations overseas—namely, Young Farmers in the United Kingdom and Macra ne Ferme in Ireland—employed to attract and keep young people in agriculture and maintain strong, energetic organisations.

The most effective way to do it, is to do it. ——Amelia Earhart

Th e award enabled me to take a short study tour, which gave me better insights into programs run by these like-minded organisations and that could be adopted in Tasmania. Th e project led in part to some initiatives within Rural Youth Tasmania and partnering with Tasmanian Women in Agriculture on a number of proposals, such as the Super Drivers on Rural Roads program and the signing of an agreement with Tasmania Together to strengthen rural communities.

Overall, the award aﬀ orded me a fabulous opportunity and assisted in my own development and that of an organisation that has had a major inﬂ uence on me. Since handing over the role of state president I have remained involved with Rural Youth, but as time goes by my participation is diminishing.

109 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Ann Palmer Northern Territory2005 winner

I have worked in the Northern Territory Management Board, which is jointly crocodile industry for the past two funded by the Commonwealth and decades, being involved in all aspects Northern Territory governments. I am of crocodile farming, from hatchlings responsible for managing grants and to feeding and nutrition, breeding and funding for sustainable enterprises. production, and the marketing of skins. I have found it very interesting working on both sides of the crocodile industry in the Northern Territory—that is, in Don’t not do it because you don’t know if you industry and now within government. Th is has given me a much broader can. Just try. understanding of the business and the importance of working together and communicating to secure a bright My Rural Women’s Award ambition future for the industry. was to see my industry recognised internationally as one that is eﬃ cient and sustainable and a major supplier of crocodile skins on the world market. Australia’s crocodile industry is still in the development stage and is very small in comparison with our overseas counterparts in South Africa and Th ailand.

Winning the award allowed me to extend my knowledge of the domestic industry and its practices and of world markets for crocodile products and worldwide production methods. Although I am conﬁ dent that there are new export market opportunities out there for crocodile products and by-products, my research has led me to conclude that identifying and securing those markets and establishing relationships with potential new customers will take much more time and eﬀ ort.

Th ree years ago I resigned from my position as manager of Crocodile Farms NT in order to establish a consultancy, including working with Indigenous crocodile enterprises. My eﬀ orts led me to conclude that the Northern Territory industry was too small to sustain a viable consultancy, so I took up a position with Northern Territory Parks and Wildlife, working in the area of permits and concessions in the business operations unit. I have recently taken a position on the Natural Resource

110 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Sarah Fea Northern Territory2005 runner up

Since 2005 our lives have been sizes, depending on the stock and • Gaining full certification as a very exciting in many ways. In my the management team’s situation. Soil Food Web Advisor, 2005 Rural Women’s Award application Biological diversity is observed, • Pathways to Rural Leadership I noted that, although working for measured and recorded both above the course, 2007, and National the Northern Territory Agriculture soil (visual assessment, photo library Young Farmers Forum, 2006 Department was rewarding, the culture and journalling) and below (soil food • Participant, National Young of the organisation was not receptive web analysis). Th is way we can quantify Farmers Forum, 2007, to the idea of biological farming being what eff ect the management system is extended to industry, even though having on the soil, pastures and herd some industry members health. In 2007 the Kan Do team began When the student is ready to were already embracing the working with the Lachlan catchment in learn, the teacher will appear. principles and needed greater New South Wales and, encouragingly, guidance. I was making thanks to lots of negotiating and Most farmers are intimately progress in increasing their networking, plus some federal funding, familiar with their farm awareness, but in the interest 10 sites have been born. Our goal is for machinery, to the point of of my clients and my own the project to extend nationally. being able to repair and personal situation (with Th e core of the holistic training for adjust these machines for two young children) I felt it was best to start my own me was the Decision Making Process peak performance. Sadly, consultancy business. Th us Module, and I was keen to give other few farmers have even half Bare Essential Agricultural women in business an opportunity this level of understanding Resource Management, or to be exposed to a life-changing about the mechanics, BEAR Biologics, born. experience—for that is what it is. attunement and operation of With the aid of a Federal Women My journey has involved in Agriculture grant, the Northern their soils. Their machines learning more and more Territory Agricultural Association, and are complicated, but not about our soils and holistic management educator Helen as complex as our natural production systems and Lewis of Inside Outside Management, systems. If a machine has a about the people I have I was able to facilitate the running a critical part missing, it won’t had the pleasure of working several decision-making workshops for function. However, natural with. Having been exposed women in agriculture and supporting to the principles of holistic industries in the Northern Territory. systems are self-organising management whilst on and adaptive and can a cattle station in the I have also been familiarising myself regenerate as well as continue Kimberley in 2002, I was with the subject of carbon emissions to function (although in altered eager to do the course. I and carbon credits because I want to form) when some components fi nally managed to do so help people involved in agriculture with Clair O’Brien and her receive economic rewards for good are missing. management of soil health. In 2007 I ——Dr Arden Anderson family on their property Coodardie, at Mataranka, attended Dr Christine Jones’ workshop Healthy soils are the key. south of Katherine. With in Western Australia at which the fi rst MANAGE FROM THE GROUND the practical elements of ‘dollars for soil carbon stored’ project UP! the course being observable was launched, and I hope to add that ——My ‘tag line’ on my right there working on their aspect to all our Kan Do sites. property, my lessons were far business cards I am now about to embark on another more profound. We began journey of self-discovery: we have our ‘Kan Do’ project during this time, chosen to sell up, leave the Northern and the learning journey since then has Territory and travel throughout been immense. Australia while I home-school the Th e aim of Kan Do is to show the children. We will be looking for a new principles of holistic management by place to live, whilst enjoying the many an easily replicated demonstration learning experiences our great country site model that can be of varying can provide.

111 112 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award 2006 Participating in the award ...

Kate Schwager Mary Howard Yvonne Jennings Cate Bell Martha Shepherd Ann Radke Heather Baldock Roxanne Prime Bev Logue Di Holly Heather Chong Cheryl McCartie Janette Hintze Pippa Krafft (Clarke)

113 2006 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Kate Schwager New South Wales2006 winner

• Diploma in Rural I am the marketing person for Th e Rural Towns Package has been Business Management, Webteam Australia, a website the catalyst for a number of good Tocal College development business owned by fellow outcomes. It has provided the • Finalist, Business Rural Women’s Award recipient Ruth opportunity for a new business venture Enterprise Awards for Quigley, from Trangie. After eight years and an alternative income stream for a New South Wales, as the publicity offi cer and secretary of number of rural women. It has brought 2006 and 2007 Wincott and three years as president the communities involved together by • Silver Award for design of the local chamber of commerce, I promoting the towns to a larger and of the www.narrabri.net relinquished the reins to concentrate on previously unknown audience. It has website the Webteam business. initiated networks and conversations between people inside and outside the communities. And it has brought new investment and tourism into the towns If there is no light at the end of the tunnel and the broader regional community. you have to go down there and turn the Personally, the award led to a dramatic bloody thing on. improvement in my public speaking, ——Sara Henderson mentoring and teaching, and leadership skills. It has also brought me credibility as a leader in the wider community and the cotton industry, as well as My award ambition was to take the improving the fi nancial prospects of my Rural Towns Package to communities business. across New South Wales, as a means of promoting the importance of We have been able to diversify the agriculture to rural communities and package to include website hosting, attracting tourists and, with them, development and design, email hosting much-needed revenue for rural areas. and domain registration under the Th e package is essentially an easy-to- umbrella of Webteam Australia. We use web development program that are the Australian arm of a wider builds small town websites in a user- community of website developers, friendly way and at minimal cost. My using the prize-winning HTTP Suite, a objective was that the websites would content-management system provided be established by rural women, who by UK-based Ligante Ltd. Businesses, have an intimate knowledge of their networks and rural towns can all use communities, the towns, the businesses the same system. Our team members and the people, while off ering them an are located in rural New South Wales, alternative income source. Norway, the United Kingdom, Ireland and India. To date, eight rural town websites have been established as a result of the Th e next stage is the launch of the package—Cobar, Narrabri, Moree, Southern Cross Communities site, Trangie, St George, Hughenden, which is scheduled to take place in Mungindi and Wee Waa—and other 2009. Th is site will for the fi rst time towns are interested. Th e websites have link the towns and communities proved extremely successful for the involved to other towns in cyberspace. towns involved: Wee Waa and Narrabri It will become a showcase for rural both have recorded 45 to 55 advertisers towns, with the objective of promoting and have gained good revenue results, the large variety of agricultural and all sites have generated revenue over industries in Australia. and above the costs involved.

114 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Mary Howard New South Wales2006 runner up

• Advanced Certificate in Participating in the Rural Women’s the organisers invited me to speak Aquaculture Production, Award allowed me to attend the at the conference. Th is experience 1998 Australian Institute of Company again increased my understanding of • Australian Science Directors course in Canberra. Fitting catchment management, the evaluation Network Aboriginal the study and assignments into my of wild-harvest fi shing, and the impacts cultural awareness daily life was diffi cult: it took two on those fi sheries of land-based training, 2007 attempts to complete the course. But development. I have since been invited • Water Recycling I am glad I stuck with it to the end, to speak at several functions and look for Agriculture graduating in September 2006. Th ere forward to talking to members of the and Horticulture were many challenges on the domestic Country Women’s Association in 2009. Applications course, front, yet I learnt to live with the lawns 2007 unmown and piles of washing waiting I am a subcommittee representative • Speakers Bank for the next assignment to be fi nished. with the Western Sydney – South program, Speak Up! Creek Regional Irrigation Business Partnerships, which is a group associated with the Cooperative Research Centre for Irrigation Futures, I can make a diifence if I honestly try. based at the University of Western Sydney. Th e Hawkesbury–Nepean catchment supplies water for the city In March 2006 I was accepted as a of Sydney and its suburbs, and South director with the Hawkesbury–Nepean Creek is one of the most polluted Catchment Management Authority. waterways in the Hawkesbury River Initially, this meant lots of reading system. and evaluating and learning, but the appointment has allowed me Th e 2008–09 prawn-harvesting season to continue my prior involvement in the Hawkesbury started late but has in total catchment management. I been very productive and is expected am passionate in my belief that the to produce harvest fi gures not seen for sustainability and productivity of several decades. Additionally, rain in the aquatic ecosystems depend on good catchment below drinking-water dams management of entire catchments. has been very promising in the past 18 months, and my time at work has Networking and promotion of wild- increased as a result. harvest fi sheries in New South Wales led me to become accepted as a director I am also chair of a committee devoted (New South Wales representative) to developing housing for the aged and of the Australian Women’s Industry disabled in my local village, Wisemans Network Seafood Community, which Ferry. After eight years we have fi nally has further expanded my knowledge started to make progress, and we hope and skills. Th ere is much to be done land will soon become available and in New South Wales to network the the concept of building a house for the seafood industry, and time continues to elderly and disabled in the area will pose a challenge for me. become a reality.

In 2007 I submitted an abstract to enter the Australian Water Association’s Enviro 08 conference and exhibition. My abstract, entitled ‘Aquatic ecosystem productivity is reliant on water managers and sustainable cities’, was accepted as a poster presentation, but after I had completed my paper

115 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Yvonne Jennings Victorian winner2006

• Election as a local My Rural Women’s Award ambition— great program and is working to bring government councillor, SOAR (Step Out, Aspire and Refl ect) it to completion in 2009, when we will 2005 to 2012 with Support—is a women’s leadership have a week-long festival of women’s • Business and program that recognises not only the leadership. Th e program began with a Professional Women incredible potential of rural women two-day SOFT (Shaping Our Futures Australia Inaugural Pat but also the reality of the demanding Together) retreat run by the New Harrison Leadership environment they operate in. Th e South Wales Rural Women’s Network. Award, 2007 SOAR with Support project benefi ts We have 18 wonderful women of • Facilitation of funding our local rural women by off ering diverse backgrounds, cultures and and participation of them the opportunity to grow, learn ages participating in the program and Victorian women in and lead through the delivery of the another three women per participant South African Study SOAR program, which provides a supporting them. Tour and Conference systematic yet fl exible support network. Th e project allows women who are not Th e award gave me standing in a for Women in actively involved in their community conservative rural community where Agriculture, 2007 to develop personally as well as give women are seen as supporters, not • Creation and something back to their community. leaders. Th is was the beginning of implementation of It off ers leadership training and the development of a public profi le the SOAR (Step Out, experiences in a supportive, encouraging that helped me do well when I was a Aspire and Reflect) and non-threatening environment candidate for the local government with Support women’s locally, regionally and in capital cities. elections. leadership program, On completion of the SOAR program Th e combination of the award, sitting 2008 participants will have advanced their on the Women in Primary Industries knowledge of community development Advisory Panel, and becoming a practices, local services and supports and graduate of the Australian Institute of will have rural leadership opportunities Company Directors gave me a sound and greater overall self-awareness, knowledge base and the confi dence to capacity and confi dence, as well as stand up publicly and say that not only expanded personal support networks. is it OK for women to fi ll leadership Th e award bursary enabled me to travel roles but that there are also many able to Canada in 2006 to attend the Rural women to fulfi l this role. When I do Development Conference, where I yet another guest speaker ‘gig’, I say I learnt of many innovative and creative am beyond pussy-footing around this community development practices. In subject; I also deliver a deadline on 2007 I also travelled on a community when we will have more women in development study tour through South leadership roles. Africa and on to the fourth International Now that I have been elected to a Women in Agriculture Conference. second term as a local government In 2008 a partnership between councillor, with overwhelming Australian Women in Agriculture and community support, I have further Swan Hill Business and Professional opportunities to ensure that we have Women obtained a grant from the greater representation of women in local Department of Families, Housing, government and in senior management. Community Services and Indigenous What was that Hilary Clinton Aff airs. A project management group, misquote? Something along the lines One can never made up of women from the two of ‘Th ere is a special place in hell for consent to creep organisations plus the Mallee Sports women who do not take other women Assembly, the Country Women’s with them’. I want and need other when one feels an Association, the Koori community, the women working with me so I can do impulse to soar. Victorian Community Engagement my best and so we can do our best. ——Helen Keller Offi cer (Women, Drought and Climate Change), Local Logic Place and Swan Hill Rural City Council has devised a

116 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Cate Bell Victorian runner2006 up

I have been involved in the fi shing business employs only one other person industry for the past 30 years, working and the business is mainly involved as a deckhand, boat builder, accounts in working with the Department of clerk, process worker, export manager, Primary Industries and the Catchment and logistics and human resources Management Authority on the manager. From 1985 my business movement of fi sh from the waterways grew from being a husband-and-wife as they dry up. outfi t to a medium-sized operation specialising in carp products for both I now work with a third-party auditing the domestic and the export markets company full time, working in the areas and employing up to 18 staff . of HACCP (hazard analysis and critical control point) plans and auditing fi sh, meat and poultry. Th is has been one of life’s learning curves for me as I travel May your dreams and reality never be too far around Victoria and see the way the apart. drought has changed so many people’s lives and the impact of the lack of water on the vast, changing landscapes.

My commitment to a sustainable future for the ﬁ shing industry and to the role of rural women is evident in the positions I have held—among them as board member of the Women’s Industry Network Seafood Community, Consolidated Fishermen Pty Ltd, the Fisheries Co-Management Council and Seafood Industry Victoria. Th e ﬁ shing industry has become a leader in adopting and implementing food safety regulations, and I have undergone training and am an accredited associate food safety auditor.

My Rural Women’s Award ambition involved further study of food safety and practical experience in order to achieve full accreditation as a food safety auditor, which would allow me to move beyond the seafood industry to other agricultural sectors. In 20005 my ambition was achieved and I became accredited as a Principal Auditor Food Safety Scheme.

Since I participated in the Award my life has changed greatly. Th e drought has had a dramatic eﬀ ect on my business: where once we were exporting European carp for human consumption to the European Union and Israel at the rate of about 30 tonnes of processed product a week, today the

117 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Martha Shepherd Queensland and2006 Australian winner

• Innovator in Residence, My Galeru story began in 1997, when so create a larger business entity. In Centre for Rural and my partner, David Haviland, and I September 2006 we formed Galeru Pty Regional Innovation, purchased a 4.5-hectare bare pasture Ltd. Queensland block in the Sunshine Coast hinterland. • New Industries Our intention was to combine With added skills and expertise, as well Development Program environmental regeneration with a as greater economies of scale, Galeru In-Market Experience high-value niche enterprise based on has been able to engage a marketing Scholarship the fruit of native Australian rainforest agent, achieve full HACCP certifi cation • Director, Australian trees, which we planted as an orchard. and develop a new range of shelf-stable Native Food Industry By 2003 we had enough fruit to begin products that are sold to the high-end Ltd marketing a range of value-added food service market both domestically • Delegate, Terra Madre- gourmet bakery products and fruit and internationally. World Meeting of Food sauces, with the unique fl avours of our Th e award gave me the opportunity to Communities-Turin, primary crops—two rainforest lillypilly learn a great deal about value chains, Italy species, Syzygium leuhmannii and which, I believe, hold the key for • Honorary senior S. fi brosum—which we trademarked as many farm businesses—particularly fellow, University of rainberries and raincherries. in peri-urban regions where subdivision has created many small blocks of valuable farm land that are not viable for traditional crops and Be the change you want to see in the world business models. It also gave me new —— Mahatma Gandhi opportunities to research agri-food innovation for peri-urban regions and I’ve been invited to present my paper Peri-Urban Innovation: Features of Initially we sold our products online sustainable agricultural enterprises for and via local farmers’ markets and had Southeast Queensland at the upcoming a tremendous response. What we did International Society for Systems not expect, though, was the number Sciences Conference. of other people who, having seen Th e award prepared me to secure an our value-added products, were also In-Market Experience Scholarship to interested in growing these native trees. investigate new processing technologies It was obvious there was an opportunity and market opportunities for our native for a larger business, but I could not fruit. As a guest speaker at numerous envisage a model whereby a group of events, guest lecturer on value chain small growers could combine—unless management and agri-business at the we bought their fruit and took on University of the Sunshine Coast and the risks and fi nancial obligations of University of Queenland-Gatton I have processing, packaging and marketing greatly enjoyed sharing this story and its the product. learnings, and I have developed many Th e Rural Women’s Award bursary new relationships that I will carry with enabled me to research a new me always. collaborative business structure, the value-chain business model, for its application to small, high-value niche products such as ours. With expert mentoring, I studied other agribusiness value chains, met with prospective grower partners, and developed a fi nancial and legal structure for a small group of growers to join us and

118 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Ann Radke Queensland runner2006 up

• Grower of the Year, My husband and I live on the beautiful contribution to the conservation of our Queensland Nursery Atherton Tablelands, inland from Cairns native fl ora. Industry Association, in northern Queensland. We have been 2002 bushwalkers all our lives and care deeply Over the years we have also developed • Rural/Remote about the Australian landscape and the a keen interest in the sustainable Manager of the Year, native fl ora. You can’t walk through the development of the forestry industry. Australian Institute bush without noticing the plants you are Until quite recently native forests were logged extensively to satisfy Australia’s of Management walking past, so native plants are literally timber demand. Declaration of World Queensland, 2005 ‘in our blood’. Heritage put an end to this in our region, • Nursery Person of We were both high school teachers for but of course Australia’s need for timber the Year, Queensland about 10 years, but by the time we were remains. It seemed logical to us that the Nursery Industry in our early 30s our native plant hobby solution to conserving our native forests Association, 2007 was becoming all-consuming, so we while at the same time meeting our • Rural Business of the left teaching in 1987 to establish our timber requirements lay in the breeding Year, Mareeba Chamber own native plant nursery. We called the of elite trees that could increase the yield of Commerce, 2007 nursery Yuruga Nursery because yuruga of existing plantation estates. means extensive views, and our location on the edge of an escarpment aff ords We were the fi rst people in Australia beautiful views northwards across the to crack the code of clonal production Mareeba plains to the mountains of the of elite eucalypts for commercial Daintree some 100 kilometres away. hardwood plantations, and from this has grown our spin-off company, We began the nursery from scratch, Clonal Solutions Australia. We now building everything ourselves—with have extensive clonal production our bare hands—and the nursery greenhouses and a tissue-culture quickly grew to employ about six laboratory, servicing the needs of the people. We thought this was pretty forestry industry throughout Australia. To strive tirelessly good! So we continued to pour all our for the conservation profi ts back into the nursery and kept Participation in the Rural Women’s Award was a wonderful experience of Australia’s native on expanding, eventually winning some large contracts in the late-1990s, which for me. I mixed with fantastic people flora and to thus really put us on the map. We now whom I would never otherwise have leave the world a have about 50 full-time employees and met, and I benefi ted greatly from their produce plants by the millions. wisdom, experience and inspiration. better place. Since then, I have had many Our passion is the amazing and opportunities to speak at functions, diverse native fl ora of tropical workshops and conferences and to north Queensland’s World Heritage encourage others to reach ever higher rainforests and the savannahs, in their journey through life. Th e award heathlands and rainforests of the Cape has increased my profi le and opened York Peninsula. When we started the many doors, and my life has been nursery, virtually none of these plants greatly enriched by the experience. had even been heard of, let alone been cultivated. In the past 20-odd years we As is so often the case in rural Australia, have trekked and travelled throughout everything I have achieved has been the region, collecting propagating in partnership with my husband. I material and observing plants in the take pride in my various awards as a wild, and we have introduced over celebration of the value and richness of 1000 new tropical native plants to husband-and-wife partnerships and of horticulture. Th e gardens, landscapes families living and working together in and wildlife corridors of our local area rural Australia. are now dominated by the native fl ora of our region, and we feel proud that we have been able to make a practical

119 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Heather Baldock South Australia2006 winner

• Member, South Sustainable agriculture and viable, of the more recent projects was Australian Partners vibrant rural communities are two of the establishment of a local visitor in Grain Reference my passions, and I am fortunate that information outlet: I am a member of Group and the South my lifestyle allows me to be involved the management team and the trainer Australian Genetically in both, providing the opportunity to of over 70 volunteers who staff the Modified Crops meet many people, stretch my horizons, venue seven days a week. Advisory Committee and make valuable contributions. • South Australian My many and varied interests have convener, Producers With my husband, I have been a resulted in my being asked to be guest Forum broad-acre dryland farmer for over speaker at functions in my region, • Branch secretary, South 30 years, although the recent run usually to speak about leadership and Australian Farmers of severe drought years has added my particular journey but also about Federation extra challenges and new meaning to encouraging volunteerism in rural areas. ‘dryland’ farming. Th e severity of the current drought Winning the Rural Women’s Award has and its eff ects on all sectors of our opened many doors for me and off ered community compelled me to convene many opportunities; more importantly, a crisis meeting of local people it has given me the confi dence to representing various demographics and contribute at a higher level. My award with links to diff erent organisations. A project of running six forums on drought counsellor and a mental health genetically modifi ed crops, with fi ve worker accepted my invitation to take highly qualifi ed speakers presenting part. From this original meeting others independent information on various followed, working groups were formed, aspects of genetic modifi cation, gave and actions identifi ed and acted on, all my confi dence a further boost. of which helped support individuals, businesses and the community as a whole. To accomplish great things, we must not only plan but also believe. Although I have always lived with a ‘can do’ attitude, my Rural Women’s Award has certainly nurtured that I joined the South Australian Advisory attitude, increased my confi dence Board of Agriculture in 2006, moved and skills, introduced me to some onto the executive in 2007, and am wonderful friends and networks, and now also treasurer. Board membership allowed me to extend my contribution allows for involvement in meetings at to agriculture and my region’s rural various levels, representation of my communities. region, the opportunity to prepare submissions to government, provision of guidance on various agriculture- based projects, infl uencing policy making, and networking with people throughout the state.

During 2008 I renewed my links with the South Australian Community Builders Program, standing in on occasions for the state facilitator at the introductory retreats. My other community development and tourism involvement is voluntary, and I have been involved in numerous projects and events over many years. One

120 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Roxanne Prime South Australia2006 runner up

• Advocating for rural I am an artist, and my visual research outlet for my energies during this trying women through the during the past fi ve years has revolved time. arts around representing women in a rural setting. My exhibition ‘Feminisation I have enjoyed the extended network of the Bush’ was shown in a number that participation in the Rural Women’s of venues, including at the Cleve fi eld Award has aff orded me and the insights days. Works have been included in a into the diverse nature of agriculture touring art exhibition and published in in Australia. It is encouraging to see reviews and art magazines. rural women continuing to contribute so much to our communities. Now, as always, it seems to fall to the women to maintain the social fabric and heart of A journey of a thousand miles begins with a the country. Change is being forced on single step us all, and we need to continue to move ——Confucius forward and evolve if we are to have a meaningful and viable future.

I have been a partner in a rural enterprise for the past 26 years and have served my local community as president of the Wharminda Branch of the Country Women’s Association and with numerous school, church and charitable organisations; more recently, I have been on the Western Board of Country Arts SA.

Four years of drought in the past ﬁ ve years have seen our local communities lose ﬁ nancial, social and personal resources. Dryland farmers are naturally resilient, but this has tested even the hardiest. One of the greatest disappointments has been to see entire generations lose heart and take up a life that no longer includes agriculture. Th is is particularly concerning because of the relatively high average age of farmers in Australia.

We recently had 45 millimetres of rain, so, although it came at a time that is useless for our cropping program, once again optimism and hope for the future are rising. As the older people are fond of saying, ‘It always rains after a dry spell’.

Like the members of so many farming families, I was employed oﬀ the farm during 2008, working as a youth development coordinator with the local health service. Th is has been a good

121 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Bev Logue Western Australian2006 winner and Australian runner up

My story began with 80 tonnes of Department of Agriculture and Food. unsaleable canola and the emerging Th e department also set up its own awareness of carbon management. small seed crusher and biodiesel processor. Th e support we received from the department, local ABC Radio and Western Australian politicians was Always look for the silver lining. fantastic. At the federal level, however, an already complicated system for biodiesel fuel excise was exacerbated Th e property we share-farm, Riverside by the passing of the fuel tax credits Sanctuary, is an eco-tourism farmstay; legislation in July 2006. Th is is still the owners, the Porter family, operate aff ecting the regional development of the farmstay and we, the Logues, farm smaller biodiesel facilities throughout 8000 hectares of wheat, lupins and Australia. canola. Investigation of the farm’s carbon footprint led to the prospect But our plan for a northern crushing of using canola seed grown on the facility in the mid-west of Western property for our own fuel. Australia was mostly aff ected by the 2006 drought. Our production of My brother-in-law set up a ‘backyard’ canola fell from 1500 tonnes in 2005 biodiesel processor using the canola to 7.47 tonnes in 2006 and next to we were unable to sell, and soon nothing in 2007. With confi dence in my husband, Phil, had developed a canola production at an all-time low, dedicated biodiesel processor in the our goal of self-suffi ciency was not to old shearing shed. Th e benefi ts for our be achieved. Th e benefi ts of the award cash fl ow, the environment and our continue, though, with the knowledge machinery meant we were targeting that, like others before us, we have 100 per cent biodiesel to replace fossil demonstrated that local fuel production diesel within three years. Th e main can be a reality. We salute those who impediment was the lack of crushing continue to grow, process and use their facilities in our northern Wheat own crop. Belt area. Th e crusher processes the seed into oil and meal, and the oil is Th e award has given me many converted into fuel in a process called opportunities to be a guest speaker ‘transesterfi cation’. and to encourage others and help them understand the processes, both So the idea was born to form a physical and administrative, involved in cooperative of about 50 farmers to biodiesel production. make 3 million litres of biodiesel from 8000 tonnes of canola. Th e benefi ts would be local employment, using the meal from the seed as stockfeed, and independence of international fuel prices. At the time Hurricane Katrina struck this was very topical. We look on biodiesel as a ‘seed in, fuel out—year in, year out’ scenario and argue that the cost of the seed is to be taken over the long term.

Development of the business plan was supported by my Rural Women’s Award bursary and the Western Australian

122 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Diana Holly Western Australian2006 runner up

• Graduate, Foundation I am a typical rural woman, passionate bug. We had three emerging farmers for Leadership about most things rural, having lived on our hands and only 1600 hectares, • Regional Achievement my whole life on the land. I married a which wasn’t enough to employ and Award, 2005 fourth-generation Western Australian feed us all. So until recently we ran • Southern Regions farmer, and we have three children, a successful aquaculture business Community Leadership 3500 sheep, six dogs, two cats, using underground salt water to grow Award, 2006 four horses and an array of rescued barramundi, a venture that provided • FACET and SEHRA wildlife. Like many people involved in an income additional to that from our Conference Hidden agriculture, we’ve experienced pressures wool and grain enterprises. Treasure Case Study, in the past decade, particularly the 2007 diffi culties confronting the grain and It has been through these endeavours wool sectors and the detrimental eff ects that outside opportunities and of this on our small rural communities. experiences have arisen, enabling me to gain numerous new skills and meet supportive and like-minded people. Participating in the Rural Women’s Life is too short to spend in a box. Don’t be Award was one of those experiences. afraid to step out of your comfort zone, try All have contributed to giving me the to do something new. You’ll never know what confi dence and support to initiate the you can achieve for yourself or others unless Hidden Treasures of the Great South, a project that has brought together seven you give it a go. shires and 14 rural communities to form a promotional and development tourism partnership. Th rough the I’ve always believed that diversifi cation partnership our communities are and alternative industries could aid the slowly but surely seeing themselves sustainability of both farms and the in a diff erent light, which is bringing broader community. Fear of failure, back a sense of pride, confi dence, lack of support from others and lacking enthusiasm and self-esteem. Tourism the courage to ‘step outside the box’ is just one industry that is compatible are often the biggest hurdles. I chose to with primary industries, and it has the jump some of these hurdles and hope potential to create new and diverse that over the years I have encouraged opportunities for our communities. I others to do the same. will continue to encourage others to step outside the box and experience Twenty years ago being fourth dog something new whenever the in the yard wasn’t enough for me. I opportunity presents itself. wanted to explore and try new things, add value to our very traditional farm business, and maybe help others do the same thing. I started dabbling in small alternative rural enterprises, with mixed success. First, I planted 1.2 hectares of native fl owers, by hand with a garden trowel, and we proceeded to have two of our driest years on record; as a result, few plants survived. Next came ‘techno colour’ free-range pigs, which were good for several years but the market wanted boring, solid colours, such as large whites, and lots of them. Th en 10 years ago my husband caught the diversifi cation

123 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Heather Chong Tasmanian winner2006

My business started in 1999, when we invited to comment on the trial scheme moved to Tasmania from Singapore that has been introduced. and started planting apricot trees. Since then our own orchard has expanded Th e award has also given me many and we now manage other trees—in opportunities to be a guest speaker—a total, about 150 000 trees. In the wonderful chance to encourage and season we employ 250 to 300 people help others turn their ideas into reality. for picking and packing; this number is It has been an amazing journey for me: expected to grow to about 400 when all the award has helped me grow both the trees are in full production. personally and professionally. I heartily recommend to everyone that they take the time to be involved: the personal insights and the rewards are amazing. Be not simply good; be good for something. ——Henry David Thoreau

I am Chief Executive Oﬃ cer of QEW Orchards, a 50 000–tree apricot orchard that produces over 1000 tonnes of fresh apricots each year for the domestic and international markets, and until recently I was Chair of Summerfruit Australia, the peak industry body for growers of summer fruits in Australia. I have also been involved with a number of industry organisations, among them the Rivers and Water Supply Commission, the Tasmanian Institute of Agricultural Research Advisory Board, and the Women in Horticulture Export Working Group.

Seasonal labour is recognised as problematic. Th e labour shortage is the biggest threat to horticulture’s prosperity. Th ere are many new plantings of trees in Tasmania—mostly cherries—and for the stone fruit, tourism and retail sectors a major shortage of labour is forecast for the future.

Th e Rural Women’s Award bursary enabled me to travel to other countries to see how they deal with the labour problem and how they import short- term labour to cover the shortfalls. Th e award also meant that people in the state and national governments knew I was interested in this area, and I was

124 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Cheryl McCartie Tasmanian runner2006 up

• Board member, Dairy Since 1996, when I moved with my Participating in the Rural Women’s Tasmania, November husband, Th eo, to Tasmania from Award has helped me engage with many 2008 New Zealand, our family dairy rural women and their families and • Delegate, National farming business has grown from to learn about and understand what Rural Women’s contract milking and share-farming to aff ects people in all areas of agriculture Summit, 2008 owning our own farm. We expanded and in rural Australia generally. I have our business by increasing the cow been able to develop my skills and numbers, buying land, and taking on confi dence, to improve our business another share-farming job. Because we and to help our employees further their supply raw milk, our business growth careers in the dairy industry. I have has depended on the growth of our a strong belief in the sustainability of dairy farming and, understanding the importance of research, extension and development to our industry, I Snowflakes are one of nature’s most fragile continue to be involved in projects and things, but just look at what they can do activities that benefi t dairy farmers and when they stick together. families in rural communities.

own skills and our understanding of the external factors that inﬂ uence our bottom line as well as the changes we need to make to keep the business productive and proﬁ table. Hence the idea of once-a-day milking for the entire season.

Our focus has always been sustainable farming practices, with a pasture-based system and a whole-farm approach that embraces innovation to improve our systems and the management of our valuable natural resources. We also need a ﬂ exible workplace in order to meet our family’s needs and those of our employees.

Th e opportunities presented to me since 2006 to encourage and help others have been very rewarding: when visitors come to the farm I am happy to tell them about what we do and why and about the pitfalls and successes. Continuing with my goal of once-a- day milking has allowed us to analyse the business and continue to modify the things we do to ensure we have a pleasant workplace and home for us and our employees.

125 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Janette Hinze Northern Territory2006 winner

I am a pioneer of the Northern during my trip to the Singapore Territory cut fl ower industry, having symposium extremely useful. I have been one of the original group of expanded our production into a growers selected to trial heliconias and completely new variety of gingers gingers as a commercial cut fl ower and am delighted with the result. Th e some 20 years ago. I was instrumental discussions I had about this ginger were in establishing the Northern Territory reinforced during my market visits, Horticultural Association’s Cut Flower when I realised that very few of these Group, which I became president of in fl owers were in the market but they 1999, and I have been its spokesperson were highly sought after. Another new for a good many years. variety, which I imported from Hawaii, has established well and we are bulking it up for increased production.

What you do will come back to you threefold. Th e Australian Institute of Company Directors Course has been of great value to me, helping me understand more about the responsibilities of Th e Northern Territory cut ﬂ ower working on committees. In this industry is still relatively new, having context, I have just been re-elected been introduced as a commercial president of the Northern Territory proposition by the Department of Horticultural Association. Primary Industry in the mid-1980s. Th e industry is dominated by two species, the heliconias, which originated in Central America, and the gingers, from South East Asia.

My Rural Women’s Award Project involved a study tour to the 4th International Symposium on the Zingiberaceae Family, held in Singapore, to meet with experts in the fi eld and commercial growers from around the world, to learn of the latest advances in breeding and production, and to identify new varieties for importation into the Northern Territory. Th e conference proved extremely valuable: I met numerous delegates involved in the collection and cultivation of gingers; I also discovered a new variety of ginger fl ower, a Costus spicatus fl ower of yellow colour, called the Indian head ginger, that had not previously been available in Australia and that I subsequently imported and planted out. As part of my project I also visited fl ower markets along Australia’s eastern seabord.

Our ﬂ ower farm is progressing well, and I have found the contacts I made

126 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Pippa Krafft (Clarke) Northern Territory2006 runner up

With a strong belief that long-term such as Katherine School of the Air success of rural businesses lies in Special Needs area, 65 Roses and Dr strong economic management closely Helen Phillips cottages). I am currently affi liated with environmental and social completing further postgraduate responsibility, I recently opened my study, but my most important recent own agribusiness consultancy, Northern achievement is the arrival of our baby Pastoral Operations, specialising in daughter, now 9 months old. I have a national livestock identifi cation scheme new-found respect for mothers. (NLIS) support and training for the cattle industry, business administration My experience in the Northern services, and natural resource Territory pastoral industry over the management planning for pastoral past 10 years, encompassing both the businesses. economic and environmental aspects of production has further strengthened my belief that the long-term success of rural businesses lies in strong economic Yet all experience is an arch wherethrough management closely affi liated with Gleams that untravelled world, whose margin environmental and social responsibility. fades My personal vision is for vibrant, Forever and forever when I move successful rural communities in regional —Ulysses—Alfred Lord Tennyson Australia, particularly in the Northern Territory.

My Rural Women’s Award ambition was to study business and change management and further investigate the successes of businesses in other industries. Th is included potentially participating in the Macquarie University Graduate School of Management’s Leading Change Program and travelling to Alice Springs and East Gippsland to study the environmental management systems adopted by those regions’ beef groups.

I was able to attend the Australian Institute of Company Directors course courtesy of RIRDC, and have found that experience to be a great asset in my business administration work, our oﬀ -farm investment strategy (which is currently on hold due to global inﬂ uences!) and my involvement with the Future Farmers Network as member and Northern Territory Director.

Over the last couple of years I have also been the Katherine Show Cattle Section Coordinator and Treasurer for Campdrafting for Kids (a not-for-proﬁ t organisation raising money for charities

127 128 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award 2007 Participating in the award ...

Eleanor Cook Fiona Kliendeinst Deborah Bain Vera Fleming Sonya Maley Linda Jaques Abi Spehr Natasha Mooney Pam Lincoln Pia Boschetti Rachael Treasure Gail Menegon Tracey Leo Tina MacFarlane

129 2007 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Eleanor Cook New South Wales2007 winner

• Australian Rural I am a partner with my husband in Th e Award gave me numerous Leadership Program an organic beef cattle operation and opportunities to be a guest speaker participant Course 15 a strong community advocate for the encouraging others to turn their 2008 - 2009 Coolah district in north western NSW ideas into reality. I have grown in and for regional communities. many ways especially in improved confi dence. I have been accepted into the ARLP (Australian Rural Leadership Program Course 15). Th e program Aim high, and if you fall short you still end up will contribute further to my personal development, to my competence and in front. to my maturity as a leader... Th e ARLP networking and strong connections between other leaders will I believe We were successful in securing become a valuable resource. $1.5 million worth of community development funds which has contributed towards community developments such as the main street beautifi cation, a gallery, and fi tness centre. I believe that rural towns and agriculture are intrinsically connected, with towns providing vital services and infrastructure to rural industries along with fl ow on employment opportunities, and at the same time nurturing a social environment for the community.

My Award ambition was to embark on the discovery of community trusts. I wanted to seek out a model for community managed trust so small rural communities can receive bequeaths and tax free donated funds from individuals, families and businesses given to their community of choice. Th ese funds would alleviate the enormous pressure of fundraising eﬀ orts for a community’s diverse range of needs. Th e trust would contribute to the long term survival of some rural communities and boost agricultural districts.

Trust models used elsewhere have provided communities with a successful investment strategy and an opportunity to attract investment from outside the region, into rural industries and their communities.

130 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Fiona Kliendeinst New South Wales2007 runner up

My passion for the wool industry goes My Rural Women’s Award ambition is back to my childhood growing up on a to grow my business, to expand into merino farm at Emmaville, near Glen larger premises and to employ more Innes, on the Northern Tablelands of rural women. Within fi ve years I plan New South Wales. I am now a wool to have a fully operational studio, producer, and I work full time with my with fi ve full-time seamstresses, two husband, Paul, and three children on cutting and fi nishing staff , and a public the family’s superfi ne wool property at showroom full of beautiful wool and nearby Uralla. Th e quality of our sheep’s wool-blend materials and garments. wool has attracted national recognition. My longer term ambition is to have a fully vertically integrated operation, I hold a Bachelor of Agricultural complete with scouring and processing Economics degree from the University mill, dyeing, spinning, weaving and of New England, and I have had fi nishing facilities, and a full-time staff corporate experience at Solutions of over 150 women designing, sewing Marketing and Research Group, the and promoting Australian wool to the Biological Wool Harvesting Company world. and ABRI Breed Plan. My frustration at the lack of availability of wool garments and woollen materials resulted in my becoming involved in the Australian Wool Fashion Awards and working with the Sheep Cooperative Research Centre and CSIRO, trialling wools for quality performance.

I have started up a small business selling made-to-measure woollen garments created from 100 per cent Australian wool and produced by local women, who themselves produce the wool. My latest project is a woollen clothing fashion line, Luv2wearwool. Recently I travelled to Italy to attend Milan’s Fashion and Apparel Show, where all the international mills showcase their runs. I also took the opportunity to visit a number of wool-processing mills and fashion houses. Th e trip was an amazing opportunity to meet the best in the wool-processing business and to learn about their demands of us as wool producers.

131 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Deborah Bain Victorian and Australian2007 winner

FarmDay erupted into my life in 2006. Th e bursary and the Australian Institute I was a wool and lamb producer from of Company Directors course were western Victoria, a mother of three and instrumental in enabling me to manage a recently retired pharmacist, and the the complex task of setting up the new idea of renewing links between urban business and taking it national. and rural families was truly a new direction for my family. Th e FarmDay Winning the Australian Rural Women’s pilot project in Victoria had been such Award was exciting and enormously a success that I was urged to make the valuable. It gave me a new platform project a national one. from which to speak about FarmDay and allowed me to engage with networks that had previously been Whatever you can do, or dream you can do, unknown or unavailable to me. Th e skills I acquired during the year were begin it. put to good use: I met and discussed ideas with local communities, state and Boldness has genius, power and magic in it. federal politicians, corporate business Begin it now. people, rural women’s groups, the —Goethe media, farming groups and farmers around Australia. Th e results of having won the two awards were visible in Th e vision behind FarmDay is to foster the overwhelming success of the fi rst among urban Australians a greater National FarmDay, in May 2007, and understanding of farming through a the event’s even greater success in 2008. farming family sharing their life with a city family for a day of fun, friendship I have kept my local community and understanding. In this way the city informed about my experiences family would gain an insight into how through regular engagements at the modern farmer operates and how community groups such as Lions, farming aff ects our daily lives. Probus, Rotary and Zonta; I have also been a guest speaker at many events I lacked the money, skills and networks around the country—exhilarating, to take FarmDay national, but then educational and exhausting! someone told me about the Rural Women’s Award. With my mind Th rough these experiences I have focused on the fi nancial benefi t of the seen myself grow in knowledge, bursary, I applied for the award. (Little confi dence and self-fulfi lment. Th e did I envisage the learning curve I was fi nancial reward is important, of about to experience!) course, but it is insignifi cant alongside the opportunity for personal growth Winning the Victorian Rural Women’s and the opportunity to give back to Award was a wonderful honour and a one’s local community and, in the case key to the success of FarmDay. On the of FarmDay, the larger agricultural last weekend of May 2007 FarmDay community. went national. More than 1000 families registered to take part in the event, and 600 families connected up for what was for many their fi rst time on a farm. My original ambition of taking the simple FarmDay idea and turning it into a national, well-recognised, not-for-profi t business had been achieved.

132 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Vera Fleming Victorian runner2007 up

• Bronze medal, apricot My husband and I are fruit growers sounding board. Her knowledge and wine, 2005 and 2006 in Victoria’s Goulburn Valley, where support have been very valuable, and • Gold medal, white- we grow a variety of fruits, such as I know that if I just give her a call she fleshed nectarine wine, cherries, apricots, apples and pears. will restore my confi dence in what I am 2006 Four years ago we decided we needed to doing. Living and working in a rural • Bronze medal, cherry do something more to stay viable and area can be isolating, and even more so liqueur, 2006 so looked into a number of options for when you are doing something diff erent • Victorian Government our business. We investigated buying such as value-adding. Leadership Bursary, more property and getting bigger, 2002 which we decided not to do because Th e business is slowly growing and we would still be competing for market I keep taking over more and more share with fellow fruit growers. We fl oor space in my husband’s shed. We contemplated setting up a pack house, have a registered kitchen and have all which again we decided not to do: the relevant licences. Th e business is this would involve a huge fi nancial attracting local groups as well as buses commitment. We thought about selling from metropolitan areas. up. And we looked at value-adding.

I am the manager–director of our company. I keep tabs on the operations manager, my husband. I consult the strategist and the corporate memory, my mother. And I am held accountable to my shareholders, my three girls.

We decided we would sub-contract the packing and marketing of our fruit and would explore value-adding. Th ere has been minimal value-adding in our region, and we saw huge potential to oﬀ er gourmet fruit products to both the locals and the tourist trade.

We now have a small cellar door from which we sell a variety of gourmet products, such as natural fruit juices, fruit wine, fruit liqueur, jams and the most delectable product—my caramel- and chocolate-coated apples. I have spent more than three years working to perfect these apples and have tried to take out a patent on the technique because I am keen to commercialise the process.

Being involved in the Rural Women’s Award gave me contacts and networks I can call on. I am fortunate to know a fellow award recipient who lives close to my region, and I have found her a great

133 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Sonia Maley Queensland winner2007

• Recipient, Regional My life as an alternative farmer Information from the study tour Achievement and growing Asian food crops and living allowed me to identify knowledge Community Awards— in Far North Queensland took a gaps and initiate a number of well- Bartercard Business major change in direction when I focused research projects, strategic Enterprise Award began to research the possibilities of alliances and commercial interests—for • Recipient, AusIndustry value-adding to the sugar cane crop example, a collaborative research Commercial Ready Plus through using alternative technologies. program with James Cook University Grant In 2005 I founded Resis Australia Pty on applied membrane technologies • Value-adding advisor, Ltd to commercialise a range of new and functional ﬁ bres; securing Far North Queensland functional health-food products from strategic investment and collaboration Sugar Industry Regional the sugar cane plant; this was made under a heads of agreement with the Advisory Group— possible through a unique milling Queensland Department of Primary ministerial appointment system called ‘cane separation’. Industries and Fisheries to underpin exploration of the functional health beneﬁ ts of natural sugar cane products; participating interest from some of Queensland’s largest food companies; Attitude is a little thing that makes a big and securing of government funding difference. for early commercialisation through the ——Winston Churchill AusIndustry Commercial Ready Plus Program.

Th e fi rst commercial factory is expected to be operational by the Cane separation diff ers from traditional 2009 sugar cane crushing season, with milling in that it allows access to clean, an integrated supply chain ensuring separated streams of fi bre, juice and fi nancial benefi ts fl ow across all sectors. waxes, all of which have signifi cant potential for the growing functional Th e award has been of tremendous foods industry. I used the Rural personal benefi t and has given me Women’s Award bursary to travel to the opportunity to communicate my the birthplace of this technology in the message to a far broader audience than United States and conduct a series of was previously possible. It has greatly interviews with the previous developers assisted in increasing my profi le in of the technology and associated the sugar cane industry as a woman food-processing companies that had leading innovation. I have also gained participated in overseas projects in the confi dence in myself through this past. Th e study tour also incorporated exposure and as a result have overcome a comprehensive assessment of some longstanding barriers in relation technical improvements, constraints to leadership. Finally, the networks to commercialisation and many other gained through my association with the aspects relevant to introducing and award and past award recipients have commercialising the technology in led to collaborative eff orts to improve Australia. the outlook for regional Queensland through value-adding for natural health and nutrition.

134 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Linda Jaques Queensland runner2007 up

• Business Enterprise Th irty years ago my husband and I Our new coff ee nursery now has Award for Queensland left Tanzania in East Africa, looking 50 000 coff ee seedlings ready for • Gold, silver and bronze to Australia as the last frontier. And planting out in 2009. Demand has medals it has taken as long as that for us to been outstripping supply and we need • Jaques Coffee Liqueur fi nally reap some rewards from our to expand. Our coff ee is sold in major Award business. We pioneered the Australian supermarkets in northern Queensland, coff ee industry in 1978, in Mareeba and our online shop is exceeding in northern Queensland. We planted expectations. We have also valued- 120 000 arabica coff ee trees, and after added by creating a tourist destination fi ve years the fi rst commercial harvest that includes a cafe set in beautiful was ready to be mechanically picked by tropical gardens (which I won fi rst prize the world’s fi rst coff ee harvester, which for as the best commercial garden in the my husband, Nat, designed. Th en along district in early 2008). came the ‘recession we had to have’ in 1986, with interest rates at 22 per cent, Part of the tour of the plantation and we were put into liquidation, losing involves a 12-minute fi lm in an air- everything—our house, our plantation conditioned theatre, showing the family and our factories. story and the coff ee process. Th en visitors place their pin on our world map: we had 60 000 visitors last year. After that there is a guided tour of the Never give up. It doesn’t matter what is coff ee harvester, a taste of the red coff ee cherry in season, and then a safari thrown up at you there is always a light at the around the plantation in Th e Bean end of the tunnel. Machine, taking in the wet and dry processing units. We have just installed $300 000 worth of state-of-the-art equipment custom built for us in Costa ‘Never give up’ sprang to mind. We Rica. borrowed more money, bought another block of land, cleared and contoured Th e Rural Industries Research and it, and planted 50 000 coff ee trees. Development Corporation was Th e fi fth year after planting, 1996, the impressed by my project of growing plantation was looking good. But the caff eine-free coff ee; this resulted in Queensland Department of Primary an off er of funding that enabled Industries and Fisheries insisted on me to travel to South America, do spraying for a papaya fruit fl y. No further research and meet numerous research had been done on the eff ects of contacts. Th ere is still work to be done the combination of chemicals used, and to increase the yields of the caff eine- the result was the destruction of 50 000 free trees, and to date there is no coff ee trees. Our entire livelihood was commercial plantation. But the coff ee gone again. tastes just like the real deal.

But we never give up. Another 25 000 Participating in the Rural Women’s coff ee trees, planted on new ground, are Award has encouraged me to achieve now producing wonderful multi–award and aff orded me recognition I would winning coff ee: in the past three years not otherwise have received. we have won 10 medals, gold, silver and bronze. Jaques Australian Coff ee is successfully trading online at: www. jaquescoff ee.com We even had an order from Davis Station in Antarctica.

135 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Abi Spehr South Australian winner and Australian 2007runner up

• Presenter, ‘Working her My move from the city to South research document that will facilitate out’ research paper, Australia’s Limestone Coast to marry understanding of the pressures facing Monash International was a journey that opened my eyes to family farms. Social Science the cultural, business and transitional Conference, Prato, Italy, hurdles involved with family farming With the support of the award I have 2008 and succession. Th e relationship developed wonderful networks and • Board member, South between mother and daughter-in-law friendships and honed my public Australian Rural particularly interested me. I have a very speaking and facilitation techniques. Financial Counselling good relationship with my mother-in- I also presented a paper at the 2008 Service law, but it was a work in progress back Monash Social Science Conference • Invited participant, then. in Prato, Italy, as a result of which an international project or paper was proposed, with representatives from India, New Zealand, Canada and Dance like nobody’s watching; love like you’ve Germany. My paper is also being used by Partners in Grain and others never been hurt. Sing like nobody’s listening; for workshop programs and policy live like it’s heaven on earth. development. —Mark Twain I hope the soon-to-be-published book will act as a catalyst for improving family farm dynamics and the viability Th e lack of quantitative and qualitative of farm businesses. research data on relationships between mothers and daughters-in-law became the inspiration for my Rural Women’s Award project—to write and publish a book on the subject, using the provisional title Working Her Out. My activity involved a fact- fi nding tour of rural and regional South Australia, interviewing women involved in family farm businesses about their relationships, preparing a book for publication, and developing and facilitating an education program based on my fi ndings. Rural industry in Australia will also benefi t from previously unavailable research results.

I believe that sustainable and prosperous agriculture is not just dependent on economic factors but is intrinsically tied to environmental and social factors. I also believe that family relationships, along with succession planning, are crucial to the long-term stability and sustainability of family farm businesses. My project has opened up the potential for conversations within the family farm unit and provided government departments and community groups with a

136 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Natasha Mooney South Australian2007 runner up

I have been involved in the South I now work for a number of clients Australian wine industry for the past in the Barossa, Adelaide Hills and 15 years and during that time have McLaren Vale regions. I am expanding seen the fortunes of the industry and its my business slowly and relishing the people dramatically change as a result process. At present I am looking for a of having to cope with severe water mentor, to help me keep up with the shortages, an oversupply of grapes and growth in my business. softer export markets.

Always remember that a hearse does not have a luggage rack.

My Rural Women’s Award ambition was about producing an alternative wine product in order to use the large amount of uncontracted grapes available in the Australian wine industry. Th e sparkling grape juice I envisaged would help turn around the fortunes of growers and the industry by off ering a new beverage and in eff ect creating a new market for our grapes. But the outlook has changed since 2007: with a very diff erent climate, I decided not to pursue the project, although I still have a shed full of the samples I made.

I have instead concentrated on my business, called Natasha Mooney Wine Architect, which I started in 2007. I oﬀ er winemaking and associated services to the wine industry, both in Australia and internationally. I really enjoy this work, and since 2007 I have consulted in South Africa, Chile and Portugal, an amazing but busy experience. I have embraced the chance to travel and work, but my children understandably have diﬀ erent ideas, so I am now concentrating more on work in Australia.

137 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Pam Lincoln Western Australian2007 winner

• Recipient, Churchill In 1993 my husband, Murray Gomm, of the farmers’ market phenomenon Fellowship, 2002 and I made what is now known as a to the smaller towns of the region. • Winner, Vin de sea-change, swapping our comfortable Th e strategy of establishing a series of Champagne Award, inner city life for the challenges of authentic farmers’ markets rotating 2004 living on the land near the beautiful through various towns under the • Best Table Wine town of Albany. Our venture into name ROSS—Regional, Organic or (Museum Class), the world of viticulture has brought Sustainable and Seasonal—was not only National Wine Show, us many rewards, most of them not a way of helping more producers and Canberra, 2008 monetary. farmers benefi t from selling direct but also a way of promoting community A few years after establishing ourselves and agricultural sustainability. on the outskirts of Albany, we planted our 3.3-hectare vineyard with the ROSS was launched in January 2008, intention of becoming the region’s after months of planning and hard fi rst organic wine producer—a feat we work by a dedicated management have achieved despite the diffi culties committee that I led using skills and of growing grapes in a cool climate. knowledge I gained as a result of We also became very involved with participating in the Australian Institute the community and have thrived on of Company Directors course. With the sense of connection one gains in a the advent of winter, though, and the country town. eff ects of drought, the ROSS market was put into recess in June 2008, until the availability of seasonal fresh produce increased. Several keen producers who Tread lightly on the earth. were unaff ected by weather, seasonality and other factors decided, however, not to wait until the recess was over and established their own seafood-focused My passion for food—particularly market, which opened in July 2008 in locally grown fruit and vegetables— Albany. which stems from my work as the region’s community dietitian during Th e award has enabled me to ‘have a the 1990s, was the driving force behind good shot’ at replicating the success and my desire to establish a farmers’ market sharing the benefi ts of farmers’ markets in Albany. Along with a couple of with smaller communities in the region. other local women, who were also Th e fact that the ROSS project did not keen advocates for local food, and a come to fruition as envisaged has been swag of people involved with the then a great learning experience for me— recently formed Great Southern Region especially since it made me truly aware Marketing Association, I spent many of the realities of agriculture in a world months planning the development of in which climate change is having an the Albany Farmers’ Market before its eff ect. inauguration in April 2002. Since that time the market has gone from strength to strength under the management of the farmers and producers themselves. In early 2008 it was named Australia’s best farmers’ market by Vogue Entertaining & Travel magazine.

Receiving the Rural Women’s Award bursary allowed me to embark on a new series of markets, to bring the joy

138 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Pia Boschetti Western Australian2007 runner up

• Pearl Gallery in I manage a pearl farm at the Abrolhos the National Rural Women’s Summit Geraldton Islands, near Geraldton in Western in 2008 in Canberra and exhibiting • Master Class 4, Vessels Australia: this is believed to be the my pearls and jewellery to a national up to 80 metres in most southerly place in the world to audience. length commercially cultivate black pearls. • Fisheries Research We have now opened a gallery themed and Development Although my farm is dedicated to store in my town of Geraldton. Our Corporation Grant for the production of black pearls, we shop is called ‘Latitude Gallery’ and Research into Pearling have recently successfully trialled the we are primarily there to promote our at the Abrolhos Islands production of high quality larger-than- locally grown pearls from the Abrolhols average Akoya pearls. Th e Japanese Islands, but have now expanded our produced Akoya pearls is in serious product range to include pearls from decline as a consequence of pollution Broome, Australian Diamonds and and disease, so the implications for the Opals and a collection of artwork from Australian pearl industry are huge and renowned Western Australian artists. feedback from export markets is very Our jewellery is made up of a collection encouraging. of designs by jewellers who we encourage to have the freedom to create their own wonderful masterpieces. Th e key to our gallery’s success is employing people who have been in the Do a job you love and you will not work a day jewellery trade for over 20 years, but in your life. still off er a contemporary outlook and honest personal customer service, this leaves me to concentrate on the task of growing my pearls and developing My RIRDC Rural Women’s Award other markets. ambition was to produce Akoya pearls of a grade that has not been seen in the Some of our unique marketing lines Japanese market for several years. I want include: ‘have you got your girl a pearl’ to further explore the techniques used and ‘see Pia-the girl who grows the for Akoya production in Japan and the pearl’. opportunities for both Akoya and black pearls in the Japanese and European One particular goal of mine was to markets. provide an original creative prodict with an aff ordable price to cover a In 2007 our company along with wide range of budgets, thereby using a another pearling company received a variety of metals from silver to gold to grant from the Fisheries Research and platinum. I now stock my product in Development Corporation to assist in fi ve other outlets throughout Western our Akoya program, focusing on the Australia. impact of environmental conditions on pearls production. Th e results from our research will be available in a publication and will assist many aquaculture projects in our region.

I have met many fabulous women as a result of participating in the award and it has given me greater conﬁ dence in myself and greater enthusiasm to take on new opportunities. One of the award outcomes for me was attending

139 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Rachael Treasure Tasmanian winner2007

• Author, Jillaroo, The I am a southern Tasmanian sheep Th e book has become a reality: Stockman, Rouseabout farmer, a breeder and trainer of working the e-book Wise Women and Hot and Wise Women and dogs, a published author, and the Dogs was offi cially launched at Hot Dogs mother of two children. For the past Agfest—-Tasmania’s premier fi eld day • Facilitator, working dog eight years I have facilitated working event—and downloadable dog training education dog education schools in Tasmania, and video clips are in the fi nal stages of • Handler, truffle sniffer during the winter months I work part preparation. dogs time as a handler of truffl e sniff er dogs. One exciting piece of news is that my My novels, Jillaroo, Th e Stockman lifelong dream has become a reality: at and Th e Rouseabout deal with last I have a fl ash ute, a Holden V8— topics pertinent to contemporary not exactly environmentally friendly agriculture—such as succession but you’ve got to keep working hard, planning, rural youth, and life on the playing hard and reaching for your land generally—and to date have sold dreams. Speaking of working hard, I’m over 100 000 copies. Th rough my on another tight publication deadline writing I aim to inspire young people of October for my next book, Th e to choose a career in agriculture and Cattleman’s Daughter. to educate city-based readers about modern life in farming families.

My vision is to improve the way women and men, livestock and working dogs interact, so that stockwork is more effi cient, economical and enjoyable for people in agriculture. My Rural Women’s Award ambition was to create a book and DVD on working dogs and women who work them, to be titled Wise Women and Hot Dogs—natural dogmanship. Th e project was to be based on my own journey with my husband, John, to fi nding a happy working relationship with livestock and dogs. Th e aim was to empower and educate people—particularly women in the livestock industry—to improve their dog- and livestock-handling skills for the benefi t of their farm businesses and families.

140 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Gail Menegon Tasmanian runner2007 up

My husband, Lyndon, and I have bred to Tasmania, Jr Mint, collecting his and raced standardbred horses for 20 semen for use at stud and for transport years. Th e increase in prize money for elsewhere in Australia. We have 100 all forms of racing in Tasmania, and mares on our property to be artifi cially the strong support of government inseminated to stallions standing in and Tote Tasmania, saw us buy more Australia and New Zealand. We also mares to increase the number of our off er ‘foaling down’ services. standardbred brood mares to eight. Our aim is to produce yearlings for the sale Participating in the award has opened held in Launceston each January. many doors for me and gave me the opportunity to encourage others to at least consider a career in agriculture and to always follow their dreams. It The best sermons are lived, not preached. also gave me the confi dence to expand our standardbred enterprise—it is now the largest standardbred stud in Tasmania—and to share my experience and knowledge with others involved in My Rural Women’s Award ambition harness racing. was born out of a desire to gain skills and obtain valuable information about the nutrition and presentation of yearlings for sale and the harness-racing industry in general. We sold two colts at the inaugural sale in 2007, and this year we sold four colts for an average of $9000 each.

Sadly, our stud master and dear friend lost his battle with leukaemia in December 2007. It was during his illness that Lyndon and I discussed our future in relation to the standardbred breeding industry and the breeding of our own mares. In December 2008 I did a course in artiﬁ cial insemination of horses and stallion handling at Glenormiston College, with the initial intention of inseminating our own mares.

Th e loss of the biggest standardbred stud service in Tasmania and the added concern of several breeders prompted Lyndon and me to decide to further our involvement and register as a stud. Th is breeding season we are standing from the United States the fastest standardbred stallion to come

141 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Tracey Leo Northern Territory2007 winner

• Immediate past Chief I have lived and worked in Darwin Winning the award has brought Executive Officer Northern River, 70 kilometres south-west of with it many opportunities to be a Territory Horticultural Darwin, for more than 20 years, and guest speaker and to speak of our Association Winner, NT I have seen many changes in regional industry’s challenges. It has also given Work Safe Innovative Safety Australia. Urban encroachment and me the confi dence to talk publicly on Strategies Award, 2007 the mining boom have changed the sensitive topics such as Indigenous • Project Manager Developing dynamics of our rural communities, employment and the diffi culties faced Sustainable Landuse and the subsequent changes in by marginalised minority groups Guidelines for the Northern community expectations have been one in our region—for example, many Territory” 2005 – 2008 of the biggest challenges faced by many immigrants from non–English speaking • Author and Presenter of rural businesses. backgrounds, who are now such an Report “the Untapped Pool important part of our rural economy. of Indigenous Workers- Among the consequences of change Imploding the Myth”, Lowry has been the decline in the number At present I am concentrating on Institute 2008 of workers available to horticultural ways of helping the people of non– • Project Manager “Introducing industries in our region. Th e problem English speaking background in our a Culture of Learning and of labour shortages has been something community gain access to help and Sustainability Amongst close to my heart, and my Rural support, so that they can adapt to the Growers from Non English Women’s Award project focused on it. changes in government and community Speaking Backgrounds” 2008 Years ago, local rural people would look expectations. Th e award has given me – 2009 forward to participating in the annual the confi dence to stick at hard and • Winner Australian Landcare crop harvest, but those days are gone. sometimes sensitive issues. Th ese days, Sustainable Garden Plan for when I am told something is too hard For my project, I looked at capturing all Berry Springs Primary School, or too complex to deal with, I just smile the reasons for this, as well as profi ling 2008 and stick at it. rural industries’ labour needs. We have been able to develop strategies to redress labour shortages and contribute comprehensive data to the development of the Pacifi c Seasonal Labour Scheme.

When I am told that something can’t be done or something is too hard or complex, my instant response is to find a way. This is a personality trait I have built on in a positive way, and the [Rural Women’s] Award has supported my personal development and given me the confidence to keep working on things that are considered too hard.

Th e award bursary allowed me to work closely with industry people in remote regions, ﬁ nd out about their industry’s labour needs and contribute to building practical solutions. Getting important data out of rural people is like extracting a tooth—it’s painful but necessary—and the bursary supported me in doing this.

142 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Tina MacFarlane Northern Territory2007 runner up

I have been involved in the pastoral I travelled to the United States in 2005 industry in the Northern Territory for to investigate the Brahman genetics on most of my professional life—from off er there. Th e trip was amazing—all being a jillaroo mustering cattle the more so because it was my fi rst and mending fences to now being venture outside Australia. equal partner in a commercial cattle operation. In 2006 we joined Breedplan, which gave us an extra tool to help us achieve My husband and I are partners in Stylo our breeding objectives. In May 2006 Station, a Brahman cattle operation we exhibited a bull and a heifer at the consisting of both stud and commercial Beef 2006 Expo in Rockhampton, cattle outside Mataranka. Th e station travelling 6000 kilometres. We wanted covers 100 square kilometres, and we to see if our cattle could hold their own have committed about 1000 hectares to against the best in the country, and we improved pastures and small paddocks, came home with a third-place ribbon, to provide for regular rotation, much to the delight of my daughter single-sire mating and more effi cient Skye, who, now aged 14, does all the management of the stud. showing. In 2007 we also held our fi rst multi-vendor bull sale in the Kimberley Our ambition is to run large numbers in northern Western Australia. of cattle naturally and to promote our stud cattle as capable of working in a Cattle aside, I have been heavily commercial situation while maintaining involved in outback education and their fertility. We are taking a holistic have been president of the Katherine approach: we rotate the cattle at branch of the Isolated Children and a high stocking rate through the Parents Association. With Skye now smaller, improved paddocks, which at boarding school in Toowoomba, also reduced weeds, improves the soil though, my days of home schooling structure, naturally fertilises the soil, through the Katherine School of the and improves the strength and natural Air are over. self-seeding capacity of the pasture. We are pushing on towards our goal of being entirely holistic and at the same time commercially viable, despite the fact that our large land area and the extremely porous nature of our soils make this very challenging.

We have been running artiﬁ cial insemination programs on the property since 2004, concentrating on genetics that achieve maximum weight gain for our northern conditions while maintaining optimal structural soundness and temperament. Th e joining and AI programs happen during the wet season, which has posed some diﬃ culties. Nevertheless, thanks to our holistic management practices, we are achieving markedly increased conception rates.

143 144 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award 2008 Participating in the award ...

Ros Smerdon Tracey Knowland Louisa Kiely Lisa Mahon Lucy Mayes Ros Smerdon Georgie Somerset Domenica Latorre Yvonne Smith Maggie Edmonds Audrey Bird Jeanette Fisher Amabel Fulton Norma Higgins

145 2008 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Tracey Knowland New South Wales2008 winner

• Managing Partner, Our entry into primary production production nurseries in Victoria, Bangalow Wholesale began in 2004, when my husband, including our main contract clients, Nursery Stuart, and I realised a long-held dream to investigate tree growing methods, • Coordinator, Bangalow and began construction of a wholesale trellising, water treatment and much Business Women’s production nursery on our farm in the more—a great learning experience and a Group Byron Bay hinterland. With two large fi ne opportunity to market our product • Executive committee contract orders to grow advanced trees, and exchange knowledge with industry member, Nursery I worked on the farm and in the nursery members. Public speaking opportunities & Garden Industry for two years while Stuart continued to have allowed me to share my passion for Association NSW/ACT work off the farm, managing a nearby my industry, promote the environmental • Certificate of nursery. Weekends were devoted to and aesthetic benefi ts of appropriate tree Achievement 2008 potting thousands of trees with the help planting in our urban landscape and Commonwealth of our three children, our low-tech set- affi rm the important role greenlife plays Bank Landcare & up consisting of a bench in the shade in the future of society. Environment Awards of some old avocado trees. At the same • Who’s Who of time I took on the role of secretary As a coordinator of Bangalow Business Australian Women of the local branch of the New South Women’s group I enjoy being part of a 2008 Wales Nursery and Garden Industry small team committed to bringing local Association to gain a better knowledge of women together: to overcome isolation the industry. To help fund the building and build capacity through social and of the nursery beds, I began another business networking, public speaking small business, an online store importing and sharing skills and knowledge, in and selling antique maps and prints. a friendly encouraging and nurturing social environment. And I in turn have In 2007 drought caused us to fast-track gained skills and made friendships. the completion of a substantial water- recycling dam in order to secure our I continue to lobby for broader support Good fortune is nursery’s water supply. I was successful in of primary producers confronted with what happens when applying for a Community Water Grant, the impacts of climate change, believing opportunity meets which helped defray the cost of the 15- there should be a focus on mitigation month project. to lessen these impacts and assistance with planning. for diversifying farm-based activities. ——Thomas Alva Edison In 2008 the nursery expanded with new Th e consequences of climate change beds, staff facilities and a potting shed. hit home in October 2008, when our we added more growing beds. With the own nursery was struck by a severe hail support of the award bursary I applied storm and the locality was subsequently for plant breeders’ rights for our fi rst two declared a natural disaster area. Even tree selections: both gained ‘accepted’ more heartbreaking was the devastation status with Intellectual Property for neighbouring fruit growers prompted Australia, and marketing rights were sold my submission to the Senate Enquiry to two separate promoters of Australian into the Role of Government in fl ora with potential ongoing royalty Assisting Australian Farmers Adapt to income. Th ese were the fi rst in our class- the Impacts of Climate Change. Australian Civic Tree Selections (ACTS) range launched in 2009: the realization Winning the award has boosted my of our vision to produce beautiful and confi dence, broadened my horizons and sustainable compact Australian tree provided inspiration and hope for the alternatives for the landscape industry. future, helping me to help my business survive and grow through challenging My Bursary allowed me to attend the times. Meeting other award recipients National Nursery and Garden Industry has been a joy. It is a privilege to live Conference in Adelaide, where I was in a country where the value and role introduced to major players in the of women in society are so positively industry. Th e bursary also supported supported. a study tour of major advanced tree 146 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Louisa Kiely New South Wales2008 runner up

• Co-founder, Carbon All-consuming for me in the past three in which to act. Th e only solution that Coalition against Global years have been climate change and can reach critical mass in time lies with Warming sustainable farming. When I entered our agricultural soils. • World’s First Carbon agriculture as a woolgrower 10 years Farming Conference ago, I studied sustainable farming In 2006 I co-founded the Carbon and Expo, 2008 practices as part of the Advanced Coalition against Global Warming, • UN Food and Diploma of Farm Management at the to lobby government for Australian Agriculture Organization University of Sydney (Orange), and my landholders’ right to trade on the communique, husband and son joined me in learning emissions oﬀ set market the credits 2008—‘International the holistic management approach to they can earn by sequestering carbon recognition of soil grazing. I experimented with various in their soils. Coalition members have carbon’ ways of rebuilding the depleted soils since travelled widely to speak on the on our ‘renovator’s dream’ property, subject and have brought it into the Uamby, which had been farmed hard national arena. We have staged two very for 182 years. successful Carbon Farming Conferences and have had a number of meetings with policy makers and inﬂ uential overseas experts.

If not now, when? If not us, who? Our aim is to bring scientists, farmers and the city together on this important journey. We are all in the climate change boat, and we all need to fi nd My breakthrough came through the solutions together. Central West Catchment Management I recently returned from the United Authority when they chose us as one of States, where we addressed a UN the 10 most innovative farm families Food and Agriculture Organization in the catchment, and I received Soil Carbon Consultation Meeting, 20 days’ training in a range of skills to resulting in a communique that calls do with innovative farm planning. We for soil carbon to be included as an realised that soil carbon could be the offi cial Kyoto off set. We can help to primary indicator of progress towards change Kyoto, and there is now an soil health, reduced salinisation, water international soil carbon movement to management, biodiversity, reduced eff ect the change. erosion and climate change mitigation. Th e best win–win solution available.

Th e United Nations, NASA and the Australian Greenhouse Oﬃ ce agree: there is already enough carbon dioxide in the atmosphere to push the globe through the 2°C increase in temperature that will cause large-scale climate instability. Th e only known way to remove the CO2 is photosynthesis by trees and plants. No other current solution can do it. Clean coal, nuclear power, solar and wind power, these can only limit future emissions. And forests—even if we planted enough today—cannot reach ‘critical mass’ in less than 15 to 20 years. Th e Stern Report stated that we have just 10 years

147 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Lisa Mahon Victorian winner2008

• Recipient, Southern My partner and I began Bromley with other farmers and an expanded Light Herbs Most Organics in 1998. We specialise in network. At two recent fi eld days we Outstanding Dedication growing certifi ed organic herbs, and had a very positive response to the new and Innovation our aim is to produce the best quality equipment, and other growers are now in Production available. Bromley Organics produces looking at buying it. Management Award, six dried herb crops and is one of the 2006 largest producers of dried, processed Th e years of drought have made it • Member, Women in stinging nettle in Australia. In 2006 our harder for primary industries and Primary Industries enterprise won the Most Outstanding rural communities and I have recently (Victoria) Advisory Dedication and Innovation in become involved in FRRR-Foundation Panel, 2007 Production Management Grower for Rural and Regional Renewal. • Chairperson, Dunolly Award from Southern Light Herbs, Th is organisation is making a positive Skate park, 2004 to against a fi eld of 80 other commercial contribution to assist communities completion 2009 certifi ed organic herb farmers. achieve their goals. • The Foundation for Since receiving the award I have grown Rural and Regional Our original business model was low in many respects, most importantly in Renewal Grants capital investment and labour-intensive confi dence and knowing I can take on Assessment Officer production methods, which suited our farm when we started. As we anything and have a go. I understand have continued to grow and develop, business risk better, and this has though, we have had to innovate and opened my eyes to potential business mechanise our processes. opportunities. Th e added confi dence combined with public speaking training and opportunities have allowed me to get my message across better and share information with other Australian herb We are faced with great opportunities growers. brilliantly disguised as problems to be solved.

Th e Rural Women’s Award bursary allowed me to travel to New Zealand and within Australia to investigate herb harvesting equipment for the small to media sized operations. As a result of our research we identiﬁ ed the best machine for an enterprise the size of ours. Th e new harvester stressed the plants less, allowing quicker regeneration times; it produced a cleaner cut with less contamination; and it reduced our harvesting time enormously. With the new machine we were able to double our volumes, so we had to expand our drying capacity to match our new harvesting method.

I am passionate about my industry and feel privileged to have been able to help others through the bursary. Th e publicity has resulted in contacts

148 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Lucy Mayes Victorian runner2008 up

A move to rural Victoria in 2003, a been completely left off the agenda, an community leadership program, and a important oversight given the diffi culty career change to economic development of retaining young people in rural in local government opened my eyes to communities. Th ere are many short- something that has always been close term, often industry-specifi c, leadership to my heart—young people developing programs for young people, but I to their full potential and its relevance felt there was a need for an initiative in the rural context. In particular, the designed and led by young people and problem that seemed to be facing rural a high-level networking opportunity communities and economies was the such as that provided by the Australian diffi culty engaging young people in Rural Leadership Foundation. I put a careers in agribusiness and supporting proposal to this eff ect to the foundation industries—indeed, keeping them and was nominated for the Rural in the bush full stop. Young people’s Women’s Award. perspective has always been of deep interest to me, and it seemed that the I was delighted to receive the runner- answer lay not in incentive schemes up award for Victoria, to meet the or trying somehow to convince or other award recipients, and to receive lock young people into staying in such fabulous training to augment rural communities but in inspiring, my leadership potential through the motivating, developing and harnessing Australian Institute of Company their energies, skills and passions, Directors course. So far, I have not including their love of the bush. been in a position to pursue my idea of developing a youth leadership program and ideas-sharing web forum, but I have had the opportunity to contribute to a RIRDC audit of leadership Things turn out the best for those who make programs for young people. I have also the best out of the way things turn out. been invited to share my story and my ——Anon thoughts on living out one’s ambitions and purpose at various leadership forums.

I have been very active in my A move to Queensland lies ahead as community and have produced my family explores further possibilities two DVDs in the past 18 months, for living with purpose and passion documenting community projects from a wellness, community, economic, in which I have participated, one youth and sustainable development involving a unique community perspective. engagement process and the other remediation of a contaminated site. I have also been a member of an advisory working group for a broad- based community initiative, Th e Food Project, aimed at education, advocacy and consumer awareness of the origins of their food.

At a recent Victorian conference of combined rural community leadership programs, sponsored by the Australian Rural Leadership Foundation, I found that the subject of young people had

149 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Ros Smerdon Queensland and Australian winner 2008

• Chair, Nature’s Fruit In 2002, after the birth of our second there with that in Australia. Of particular Company child, I began working on the farm interest was the value-adding operation • President, Jadefruit while my husband was away working on of Westfalia Estates, a recognised leader Custard Apple the orchard-pruning business. By 2004 in value-added products in the avocado Marketing Group farm-gate returns were at an all-time industry. Th is experience gave me • Vice President low for both pineapples and avocados. valuable insights into the opportunities Australian Custard As part-owner of our grower-owned and pitfalls associated with avocado Apple Growers cooperative, Nature’s Fruit Company, processing and also allowed me to Association I started asking questions about the develop business relationships that could • Participant, Pathways organisation’s strategic direction; by be helpful in the future. to Rural Leadership September 2004 I had been asked to Th e trial work continues, and we expect Program, 2007 become a director of the company, and in 2005 I became chairperson. to release fresh-cut product in mid to late • Award recipient, Young At this time I was also a member of 2009. Th is release is timed to coincide Leaders in Horticulture, the management committee for the with an oversupply of avocados on the 2007 Australian Custard Apple Growers domestic market in the May–August • Participant, Rabobank Association and President of the period. Th ere has been much interest, Executive Development Jadefruit Custard Apple Marketing both domestically and internationally, Program, 2007 and Group. in the range of products we have been 2008 developing. Production of avocados has increased rapidly in the last few years, to the If Australian avocado producers are The future depends extent that supply is now outstripping to remain profi table we must obtain on what we do in the domestic demand in some production maximum returns from every avocado. windows. It became apparent that in Instead of fl ooding the market with present. order to maximise returns to growers low-grade fruit, we must develop a we must not only develop the export suite of products, including oil, pulp and domestic markets for whole fresh and fresh-cut avocado, using second- avocado but also create value-adding grade and ‘reject’ fruit: this will assist opportunities for this healthy and in maintaining sustainable returns for nutritious fruit. Many value-added premium fruit. It is a win–win situation products can be made from avocado— for the consumer and the producer. among them salad oil, bulk food-grade Th e award presented me with a huge oil, cosmetic oil and pet food additives. personal development opportunity. It In order to capitalise on this big has also given our value-adding venture opportunity in the food service sector we credibility and exposure to business needed a new product to revolutionise partners that might not otherwise have the market. In 2007 we began trials been available. But the most valuable experience for me has been the growth Although I grew up in a rural using various technologies with the in my confi dence in my abilities, my community, my goal on graduating aim of developing a fresh-cut product knowledge, and the experience I have from university was to move to the with a refrigerated shelf life of 10 to 14 to off er. Th e people I have met and city and escape the country lifestyle. days and a shelf life after opening of the friends I have made as a result of After I graduated, my husband, two to three days. In conjunction with participating in the award process have Kerry, and I moved to the Glasshouse the trials, we used existing oil-pressing been invaluable, not only as a part of Mountains, where he rejoined his technologies to begin a commercial my business but also for my personal family’s horticultural enterprise growing avocado value-adding product line. We started our Nature’s Fruit Company growth. Th e value of a strong network pineapples and avocados. I worked off of like-minded, positive, creative the farm for the next eight years, in value-added product line with the release in November 2007 of our cold-pressed and ambitious people should not be various marketing and management underestimated. roles in both the private and the public Nature’s Reserve avocado oil. sectors. We expanded our farming Receiving the Rural Women’s Award operation to include custard apples and bursary allowed me to travel to South a contract mechanical orchard-pruning Africa to compare the avocado industry business.

150 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Georgie Somerset Queensland runner2008 up

• Queensland Young I am a beef producer from Kingaroy I know we need to communicate to Achiever of the Year— in southern Queensland, and I have children clear messages about the food, Regional Development, extensive networks and involvement fi bre, foliage and shelter we produce. 1993 with rural women and agricultural Industry, the community and plenty of • Founding Vice- portfolios. I was a founding member rural women are constantly working to President, Queensland of the Queensland Rural Women’s convey accurate messages about rural Rural Women’s Network; I have held the agricultural and regional Australia to the wider Network, 1993 portfolio on the National Council of community. I liken these to a library • ABC Radio Wide Women in Queensland and Australia; and the published books therein. Bay – Burnett Rural and I am at present a board member on My project is about having a library Woman of the Year the National Rural Advisory Council that arranges the information in an and Queensland Rural and the National Foundation for accessible and cohesive manner. Woman of the Year Australian Women. Runner Up, 1997 So, if you wanted to know how your • Participant, 2020 My life has been characterised by meat, potatoes and carrots were Summit, 2008 a series of roles that have involved produced, you could fi nd out through • Board member, marketing rural and regional Bush Links; similarly, if you are visiting National Rural Advisory Australia—from my fi rst career move a region you could see where regional Council, 2005 - present out of school, which involved operating produce is available, what events are on • Board member, the farm tourism enterprise for my in the area, and what opportunities are National Foundation family, to regional development and a available to you. Although I have not for Australian Women, marketing consultancy promoting rural yet developed the portal, I still ‘have 2007 – present Australia. We also had a cooperatively the dream’; in the meantime I continue • Australian Rural marketed branded beef product that I to produce beef with my family and to Leadership Program managed, and I have held a variety of contribute to a range of organisations participant Course 16 voluntary positions, usually with the and boards. 2009 - 2010 aim of marketing ‘the bush’ and what it represents. Th e Rural Women’s Award represents a wonderful opportunity to link with others, develop your plans, and take time to improve your skills. Not only do we have a highly productive and Always look on the bright side of life. profi table sector: we are also amazingly innovative and very capable of adapting.

It seemed natural, then, that I would have as my Rural Women’s Award ambition a philanthropic project tying together the many facets of rural Australia. Bush Links is a portal that draws together information that is already available through many sources about agricultural industries and regional events and activities; it is designed to meet the needs of people wanting to invest in, move to or simply visit regional Australia.

I have a passion for our agricultural produce, and research shows that many ethical views are formed by the time a child is about 12 years old, so

151 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Domenica Latorre South Australian2008 winner

• Member, Regional I live in Berri, in the Riverland, and for My Rural Women’s Award ambition Advisory Board to the past 10 years have been a lecturer is to explore educational programs the South Australian with TAFE SA, coordinating, designing and practices that will benefi t rural Multicultural and Ethnic and delivering technology, management women—particularly those from Affairs Commission and business training programs tailored culturally and linguistically diverse and the National to the needs of the rural sector and backgrounds—their communities Association of Rural rural women. and agriculture generally. I plan to Counselling Services use the bursary to research successful • Member, Rural I have more than 18 years’ experience rural business training models, both Financial Counselling in horticultural and agribusiness in Australia and in Europe, to analyse Service SA and management and more than 14 years’ training systems, methodologies and Riverland Multicultural experience with community bodies resources and to identify the most Forum at the local, state and national levels, successful relationships between working with the rural counselling training and sustainable business program, TAFE SA and other practices. training bodies. I currently sit on the Regional Advisory Board to the South I hope my research will also be used to Australian Multicultural and Ethnic develop a training model that supports Aff airs Commission and the National women in training and passing on their Association of Rural Counselling knowledge to others in the community Services; I am also a member of the and results in training programs that Rural Financial Counselling Service SA best meet the needs of rural women and the Riverland Multicultural Forum. and in turn contributes to the future profi tability of their businesses and I specialise in working with the agriculture. culturally and linguistically diverse population in the Riverland, and I have undertaken a number of research projects aimed at raising awareness of workforce development factors and helping women join the workforce and gain positions on regional boards. I am acutely concerned by the shortage of people and skills gripping rural and regional communities, the culturally and linguistically diverse being the group most aff ected. Rural women continually demonstrate their resourcefulness and resilience in establishing small businesses and generating income that is crucial to the sustainability of families and farms.

152 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Yvonne Smith South Australian2008 runner up

• First female Chair, For the past 20 years I have been I am keen to examine the practicalities Onions Australia involved in horticulture in South of, and the problems with and barriers • Member, River Murray Australia, as an onion grower and to, the eff ective use of drip irrigation, Advisory Committee industry advocate. I was the fi rst female in the hope of introducing the practice chair of the Australian Onion Industry to large-scale broad-acre production of Association (now Onions Australia), onions in my region and beyond. An and I am a member of the industry assurance of the most effi cient water use advisory committee to Horticulture is not only crucial to my business and Australia. I am deeply committed to the our industry: it will also contribute to sustainability of agriculture and its soils certainty of water supply for businesses and water and have been involved in and communities along the Murray the South Australian Soil Conservation River. Council. At present I am a member of the River Murray Advisory Committee.

My Rural Women’s Award ambition was to go on a study tour of onion- growing enterprises that use drip irrigation in the San Joaquin Valley of California. In my view, the benefi ts of drip irrigation compared with fl ood irrigation are enormous, with anywhere between a 30 and 70 per cent water saving through effi ciencies from direct application, reduced evaporation and wind eff ects.

153 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Maggie Edmonds Western Australian2008 winner and Australian runner up

• Opening Maggie’s I have been involved in a range of Part of my pledge on receiving the Place farming activities for the past 25 Rural Women’s Award was to set up • Board Member, years—from export ﬂ ower and a retail outlet championing small Heartlands Country horticulture to farming olives and producers. Th is I have done: Maggie’s • President, Moore River passionfruit, as my husband and I do Place @ Edgecombe Bros was set up in Olive Association at present. All aspects of our farming October 2008. I completed a Curtin • Secretary, Gingin ventures have oﬀ ered potential ways University of Technology Growth Chamber of Commerce of moving the business forward, not Program in 2008, also as a result of • Marketing a new only for us but also for others. In the award, and in 2009 I visited Cape product—Get Stuffed addition to the day-to-day farm work, Province in South Africa to study Ginger Spread my contribution has often involved farmstalls, the tradition of promoting • Holding my life together bringing like-minded people together small producers, and the farmstalls’ into various groups and networks. diverse contributions to the local food tapestry.

2008, the year of my award, was busy. Not only have I continued with my Keep on keeping on. In other words, farm work and marketing our value- consistency of effort is the single most added products: I have also been lucky important attribute to cultivate in a small enough to talk to many groups across the country, from Port Hedland to business environment. Esperance and across to Melbourne.

I set up the ﬁ rst local protea growers association in Western Australia with a group of growers and went on to become president of the International Protea Association, responsible for bringing the 6th Biennial Protea Association Conference to Perth. I also established GROGs, the Gingin Regional Olive Growers Association, and organised Western Australia’s ﬁ rst three olive festivals, and I have recently completed a term on the board of the Australian Olive Association. Additionally, I have been involved in the establishment of farmers’ markets— the Wanneroo farmers’ markets and more recently the Gingin ones.

Our small farm enterprise has taken us into—and now through—many hard times. It is the initiative I developed during these diﬃ culties that has encouraged me to oﬀ er assistance to other small producers.

154 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Audrey Bird Western Australian2008 runner up

• President, Facey Group My Rural Women’s Award ambition I enjoy talking with like-minded • Committee member, focused on exploring the possibilities of people—people who are motivated Western Australian giving members of our grower group, and positive about the future of our No-Tillage Farming the Facey Group, more value for their industry. Although I am physically Association and Avon membership. I wanted to explore what involved in our farming business I Catchment Council values were important for our members do have the need to extend myself Sustainable Agriculture over and above fi nancial rewards. beyond that for professional and social Advisory Group Although I have not specifi cally fulfi lment. As a result, I am involved continued with this project, I am still with several not-for-profi t organisations involved with the group. with an interest in broad-acre farming: the Sustainable Agriculture Advisory Group with the Avon Catchment Council, the Western Australian No- Better to have tried and failed than never to Tillage Farming Association, and have tried. the Facey Group. Th e skills I have gained through the Facey Group have been invaluable, including staff and personnel management, strategic Th e Facey Group is a broad-acre planning and implementation, group grower group managed and directed dynamics, project management, by growers. Our offi ce and members working with corporations through are situated in and around the small sponsorship agreements, public Wheat Belt town of Wickepin, which speaking (still working on this!) and is 250 kilometres south-east of Perth. fi ne-tuning the work–community– I have been involved since the group’s family balance. inception in 2001, being the inaugural secretary and moving up through the Th anks to participation in the award, I ranks to the position of president. can now add to my learning experiences Many rewards spring from the the Australian Institute of Company collective sharing of ideas and putting Directors course. It has given me them into action through strategic an insight into good organisational planning. Th e personal satisfaction of management and structure, as well as working as a member of a team towards the skills for appropriate and proactive the common goal of strengthening one’s governance. Th ese skills will lead to me local rural community is something enjoying even more my involvement I value highly—especially when it with relevant industry bodies and involves primary industries. ensure that I have a positive infl uence on an industry I love. Th e primary industries environment is an exciting but challenging sector in which to work and derive an income. Th e rewards seem just enough to keep us hanging in there from year to year. Our farm business consists of over 3500 hectares, of which half is leased land mostly used for cropping; we also have a merino sheep enterprise. Th e leased land gives us economies of scale but also added risk should the season go against us. We now have our eldest son working with us, and I am keen to stay up to date with farming information and techniques.

155 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Jeanette Fisher Tasmanian winner2008

• Recipient, Jack Green In 1997, after many years working Th e move to Tasmania gave me the Churchill Fellowship, with sheep, beef cattle and goats, my opportunity to draw together my skills 2002 husband and I bought our own farm. and establish an on-farm consulting • President, Professional We decided that rearing calves would business, HEIFERMAX, designed Calf Rearers make good use of our combined to help dairy farmers with the care of Association of Australia skills in paediatric nursing and stock replacement heifers. Winning the Rural • Establishment of handling. Raising 1000 calves a year Women’s Award gave me the chance to HEIFERMAX, an was, however, not as simple as we had return to the United States, re-establish on-farm consulting imagined. Th e very high mortality the contacts I had made, and further business rate our calves suff ered in the fi rst 12 develop my heifer management and months spurred me to learn more about educational skills. calf rearing. Initially, local dairy farmers were a source of information, but I Th rough my business and the soon realised there was more up to date Professional Calf Rearers Association information overseas, particularly in the I will continue to encourage United States. dairy farmers to embrace modern management techniques and up-to-date information based on sound research. Th is will help the dairy industry adapt Life doesn’t come with a guarantee. to external forces such as changing market demands, economic and social pressures, and altered animal Winning a Rural Women’s Bursary welfare expectations. Th e majority of in 2001 enabled me to take a public calf rearers are rural women and, by speaking course, a negotiating course improving the industry, I hope to in and a leadership and management turn increase the skills and confi dence course at the Australian Institute of of these women. Management. Th ese courses helped me overcome my shyness, increased my self-esteem and improved my ability to communicate. Th is gave me the confi dence to join with a friend and convene a group of calf rearers, which ultimately became the Professional Calf Rearers Association of Australia. I was elected President of the association, which aims to extend skills and knowledge by providing educational opportunities to dairy farmers and calf rearers in the form of regional fi eld days and an annual conference.

I won the coveted Jack Green Churchill Fellowship in 2002; this allowed me to travel to six countries to examine alternative methods of raising calves. I subsequently extended my knowledge of cattle by working as manager of the intensive grazing systems at Struan Research Centre in South Australia and as a stockyard designer before we sold our farm and moved to Tasmania.

156 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Amabel Fulton Tasmanian runner2008 up

• Member, Regional I am co-founder of and senior partner Cooperative Venture for Capacity Women’s Advisory in Rural Development Services. My Building project, identifi ed the Council and Women in interest lies in understanding people potential for using grass-roots networks Horticulture Advisory and the organisational aspects of the to highlight producers’ needs for Group rural sector and in working with people funding and training and to then • Co-founder and and organisations to foster sustainable match customised training and funding senior partner, Rural industry development throughout opportunities to meet the needs of Development Services regional Australia. I was the fi rst specifi c producers. student of rural sociology in the School of Agricultural Science at the University A pilot project using women as of Tasmania, and this paved the way training brokers is now being rolled out for the creation of a dedicated focus on through a joint venture involving Rural rural social research, which in turn led Development Services with sponsorship to the development of the Rural Social from Horticulture Australia, and it Research Group at the university. will be exciting to track the project’s progress and outcomes. Rural Development Services has been in operation for eight years; it provides services such as industry research and development, rural social research, sustainable business development and people development to the dairy, grains, meat, horticulture, aquaculture, wild fi sheries and wool sectors, both in Tasmania and nationally. I also sit on the Federal Government’s Regional Women’s Advisory Council, a national council that off ers to the Deputy Prime Minister advice on concerns in rural and regional Australia. Additionally, I am a member of the national Women in Horticultural Advisory Group.

My personal vision for agriculture is the creation of an exciting, innovative, productive and rewarding rural sector that combines prosperity with caring for its people and its environment. My Rural Women’s Award ambition involved the development of a successful business case for forming a national network of female training brokers. Th e network would provide to local family farm businesses opportunities to obtain personal support and assistance to help them achieve their goals; it would also oﬀ er a mechanism for funding providers and trainers to channel their products and services directly to their target audience.

Th e training brokerage concept, developed as part of a RIRDC

157 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Norma Higgins Northern Territory2008 winner

• Deputy chair, Primary In 2006 a diagnosis of poor health National television appearances have Industries Training meant I could take a year off work on allowed me to raise the profi le of the Advisory Council full pay. I had thought I would take the mango industry and the problems faced opportunity to give up full-time work by mango growers. Th e Australian altogether, but the price of mangoes Institute of Company Directors course and the increasing costs of production gave me essential knowledge, which meant I was unable to, so I now work I use as deputy chair of the Primary part time off the farm. Industries Training Advisory Council and on the boards operating the kitchen Time. It is amazing what one can do and market projects. Th e award has It’s time to give back. when one has a bit of ‘spare time’. brought publicity and credibility for With assistance from FarmBiz funding, these projects, something vital for their a group of local women got together success. with the idea of doing some training. Because I had the time and the skills, I All my non-saleable mangoes are now wrote an application to the Department in the freezer waiting for the market of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry to begin, so that in the commercial for funding under the Food Processing kitchen I can create a range of products in Rural Areas Program. Th e to sell to you when you visit Katherine. application was successful, and we set about establishing a commercial kitchen that everyone can use to add value to their non-saleable produce. I was the driving force and one of the main cooks. Th e committee raised thousands of dollars and has created a range of products that are sold in local outlets and at community events.

Th e Rural Women’s Award bursary enabled me to set up a weekly ‘farmers- style’ market that provides an outlet for the products made in the kitchen and for local produce. I am concerned about the increasing number of abandoned orchards in the district, the declining returns for the remaining orchardists, and the amount of waste product that is dumped. Th e kitchen and the market oﬀ er to local producers an alternative that could improve their proﬁ tability.

My project is not yet complete: being obliged to undergo the full development consent process in order to use a local park and the lack of infrastructure have created a major delay and obstacle.

On a more positive note, though, the award has created many opportunities for me to be a guest speaker throughout the Northern Territory and to participate in some national forums.

158 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award 2009 Participating in the award ...

Kim Currie Gillian Hogendyk Roma Britnell Kate Wilson Barb Madden Wendy Agar Susi Tegen Ulli Spranz Kirsten Skraha Doris Parker Jane Lovell Jane Huntingon Mischelle Hill Moira Lanzarin

159 2009 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Kim Currie New South Wales2009 winner

• Farmer, restaurateur, I have spent the past 25 years working Th e farmers’ markets have returned food and wine with regional producers to develop a number of benefi ts, among them a consultant, caterer, innovative ways of promoting, linking valuable income stream for hundreds shop proprietor and supporting the rural sector of farm families, bringing farmers into • Executive officer, Brand through food and wine tourism. My direct contact with consumers, helping Orange career has included being a farmer and develop new products and niche • Inaugural winner, Vogue restaurateur, 10 years as a regional food markets, and developing relationships Entertaining & Travel and wine consultant, being the Food within farming communities. Audi Maggie Beer and Wine Development Offi cer for Award for Outstanding Central Ranges, catering for numerous My vision is to assist in achieving Contribution to festivals—including the Huntington dynamic regional communities by Australian Food Music Festival—being proprietor of the successfully integrating local produce, Rylstone Food Store and, more recently people and experiences, profi tably and being executive offi cer for the Brand sustainably. I want to take the farmers’ Orange project, which was established market experience as a connector for to promote the Orange region, in the farmers and rural communities to the Central West of New South Wales. next level. Th e markets have confi rmed that there is huge consumer support for In 2005 I was awarded the inaugural farmers and for quality fresh produce. Vogue Entertaining & Travel Audi Th e thousands of markets in Europe, Maggie Beer Award for Outstanding many of them in the town centres, Contribution to Australian Food. enrich communities and provide Under Brand Orange, I have facilitated important social interaction while the establishment of Slow Food reinforcing the role and importance Orange; this includes the Glenroi of farmers. I would like to travel to Community Kitchen project, which Europe to gain a greater knowledge of provides weekly meals and cooking how farm produce is sold, distributed, lessons for people in Orange’s public consumed and celebrated. Such a study housing estate area, and Slow Summer, tour would extend my knowledge a new 10-day festival celebrating the and allow me to further develop Orange region. my professional skills and frame of reference for sustainable long-term agri- I am deeply committed to primary tourism systems, for my region and as producers and rural communities, an example to others. and during the past 25 years I have devoted much eff ort to the belief that communities can build on a layering of relationships between farmers and consumers. Th e farmers’ markets I established in the Central West are a prime example of this. Th ere is now a circuit of four farmers’ markets—at Cowra, Mudgee, Bathurst and Orange—with a template of co- management with community groups and the adoption of a national farmers’ market charter. I was also instrumental in establishing the Australian Farmers’ Market Network, hosted the fi rst national conference of network members, and was the New South Wales representative on the network.

160 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Gillian Hogendyk New South Wales2009 runner up

• Co-recipient, Jim Beale I live on a corporately owned irrigation water purchasing is needed in order Memorial Award, 2008 and dryland cropping property outside to redress over-allocation in some • Principal, Macquarie Warren in the Macquarie Valley of New river systems, but there has been too Marshes Environmental South Wales. Th e property is owned much emphasis on this as the only Trust by Auscott Ltd, is managed by my solution. In my view, over time this husband, Chris, as general manager of approach will negatively aff ect the rural Auscott’s Macquarie Valley operations, communities that depend on irrigated and grows predominantly cotton and agriculture, without producing any real wheat. I am a qualifi ed veterinarian, environmental benefi ts. and these days my commitment to primary industries and their Having bought Burrima, my group, sustainability is refl ected mainly in my the Macquarie Marshes Environmental voluntary work. Trust, removed cattle from the land and set about revegetating it. Th e I have represented the Macquarie Valley response has been spectacular: reed beds on the National Parks and Wildlife are regenerating rapidly, native plants Community Advisory Committee, are choking out invasive weeds, and having served on this committee for biodiversity is increasing. Our work 11 years. Th rough the committee I has shown what environmental gains have developed a strong interest in the can be achieved through improved Macquarie Marshes and in how the land and water management. I would irrigation community could be involved like to see a larger proportion of the in conserving the marshes. With 30 funds currently earmarked for water other local landholders, I helped form purchasing being used to fund on- a unit trust to buy Burrima, a small ground projects such as ours. In this property in the marshes, and to manage way rural communities can be sustained it for conservation outcomes. Burrima and can be part of the solution. is now regularly visited by school, university, research and natural resource My ideas arose from my membership management groups for educational of and support for Australian Wildlife purposes. I am also a wildlife carer for Conservancy and Bush Heritage WIRES and a member of the WIRES Australia. Th ese two companies buy Raptor Team, Birds Australia, and New and manage land of high conservation South Wales Bird Atlassers. signifi cance. A third group, the Nature Conservation Trust, uses its own I have become very interested in, funds to buy properties, place binding and something of an authority on, covenants on them, and then resell the sustainability of the Macquarie them at a reduced price. Marshes. In 2007 I published a book, Th e Macquarie Marshes—an ecological My Rural Women’s Award ambition is history, which was the culmination of to a tour a number of wetlands in the three years of careful research. I have Murray–Darling Basin, focusing on also written a piece about the problem those that are managed for conservation of invasive native species in western by non-government or community New South Wales; this was published organisations and exploring the costs, in Birds Australia’s Wingspan magazine benefi ts, problems and solutions that in 2008. have been encountered with a view to applying what I learn to the Macquarie I am deeply concerned about the Marshes and more widely in the basin. national water situation and the current enthusiasm for buying water as the sole means of achieving environmental outcomes. Some

161 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Roma Britnell Victorian and Australian2009 winner

• Chair of WestVic Dairy I have been dairy farming for the past My Rural Women’s Award ambition • United Dairyfarmers of 10 years, during which time I have been is to fi nd the best way into the future Victoria District Council active in the industry at both the farm- for the Australian dairy industry, so President & Deputy gate level and in leadership and decision that it can secure profi ts from the milk Central Councillor making. Ten years ago my husband and the farmers produce. Traditionally, I began share-farming; we bought our this has occurred through cooperatives fi rst small dairy farm three years after and companies but, with only one that; and today we own three dairy cooperative remaining in Australia, farms, employing managers on two and the industry is moving into uncharted running the third ourselves. waters. I want to expand my knowledge, explore future marketing We both became active in our local options—cooperatives and beyond— branch of United Dairyfarmers of and develop an awareness campaign Victoria. I went on to become President that highlights to farmers the changed of the district council and a Deputy environment and starts them asking Central Councillor, and I now represent questions and taking control of their my industry as Chair of WestVic future. Dairy, the western Victorian industry development body that aims to advance the dairy industry in the region. I am committed to improving the setting for dairy farmers and the image of the dairy industry. Th is commitment has evolved from my discovery of a great industry that has given me opportunities I was unable to fi nd elsewhere.

Despite contributing enormously to the economy, the dairy industry suﬀ ers from a poor self-image. Th e complexity of the businesses dairy farmers operate and the many pressing concerns they confront—from drought to genetically modiﬁ ed food to climate change and carbon trading—mean farmers must always keep abreast of the changing environment and its impact on the sustainability of their industry. In many cases it would seem this has not happened.

162 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Kate Wilson Victorian runner2009 up

• Birchip Cropping Group For the past 15 years I have been a My Rural Women’s Award ambition Advisory Committee broad-acre agronomist at the forefront is to embark on a study tour of the • Australian rural of advising growers on sustainable United States and Canada, to gain a Leadership Program agricultural practices. During that time greater understanding of soil biology. I I have moved from being a commercial am particularly interested in the work sales agronomist to a fully independent of Dr Dwayne Beck at the Dakota consultant. I am also a partner with my Lakes Research Farm. I hope to use husband in a 5000-hectare broad-acre the knowledge and ideas I gain as a cropping operation. result for the benefi t of my clients, the Birchip Cropping Group, and the My main roles as a consultant are region’s growers. developing farm plans based on Live the life you love. profi tability and sustainability, providing to clients advice on crop rotation and variety selection, assisting with fertiliser and nutrition decisions, and providing crop nutrition and herbicide advice, disease and pest identifi cation services, and gross margin analysis. In the wider agricultural community, I am now a member of the Birchip Cropping Group’s advisory committee and have done consultancy work for and delivered group training workshops to the group.

My vision is for growers to consistently achieve good yields through better understanding the interaction between soil, water and the crops they grow, so that broad-acre farming becomes more proﬁ table, viable and sustainable. I believe that by increasing the soil biota and microbes we can increase the health of the soil, increase organic carbon, and so improve the general health of the soil. Despite rainfall being the main limiting factor, through better understanding their crops’ nutritional requirements and water use eﬃ ciency and tailoring their inputs to particular soil types, growers are continuing to produce remarkable crops.

163 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Barb Madden Queensland winner2009 and Australian runner-up

• Graduate, Australian I am co-owner and Chief Finance abattoir to the supermarket to gain an Rural Leadership Offi cer of Smithfi eld Feedlot, a understanding of the complete supply Program 20 000 head intensive beef-production chain • Wide Bay Burnett enterprise located in south-east Young Women’s Queensland. I am also Chief Finance Th e Beef Industry Indigenous Alliance Leadership Mentoring Offi cer for Cherbourg Aboriginal Shire I believe will deliver a number of Program Council, and a recent graduate of the benefi ts. Among the benefi ts to the Australian Rural Leadership Program. beef industry will be development of appropriate beef production systems Committed to primary industries, to better suit supply chain sectors, my community and the role of rural improved biosecurity and livestock women, I have established a number of traceability through better management community groups and activities with of Indigenous people’s cattle and the aim of improving the liveability land, and an improvement to the of my region, as well as enhancing the beef industry’s social image. Among dynamic of the community in which I the benefi ts to the Indigenous beef choose to live. Th ese include: producers will be building the capacity of the people through imparting skills • “Submission Sisters”, a group of and fostering a culture of ownership women dedicated to obtaining and purpose, a greater appreciation funding for community projects. of indigenous resources by the beef industry and the building relationships • Th e Proston Peace Festival and sharing knowledge and resources – promoting a peace code with mainstream primary industries. throughout the entire community. If the pilot is successful, I hope it will • A range of activities to bring be adopted and extended throughout cosmopolitan fl air to small rural the beef industry, linking Indigenous communities such as the Mirko beef producers across northern Australia Grillini Italian cooking classes, with all aspects of the beef industry, silversmithing and photography from breeding and backgrounding to workshops. feedlotting, abattoirs, supermarkets, My project - Th e Beef Industry and the live export trade. Indigenous Alliance (BIIA) will create national partnerships between Indigenous beef producers and key supply-chain sectors through the development of a commercially sustainable cattle-feeding and training business model. I plan to conduct a pilot program between the Cherbourg Aboriginal Shire Council and my own business, Smithfi eld Feedlot, forming industry partnerships and providing on- site training throughout the beef supply chain.

Cherbourg cattle will be brought to Smithﬁ eld Feedlot for fattening. Indigenous workers will observe the feedlot processes and undergo on–site training. Th ey will then follow the progression of the cattle through the

164 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Wendy Agar Queensland runner2009 up

• Myendetta Station My family own and operate Myendetta from strength to strength. Principal Station, an18,000 hectare property • Myendetta Homestead thirty kilometres south west of My vision for the grazing industry Tourism, Director Charleville. Myendetta Station is a is one of knowledgeable, resourceful • 2003 – 2006 Boozy sheep and cattle property that has been and passionate families running Fruits Dessert Sauces, in my husband Richard’s family since their businesses in a proﬁ table and Partner 1890, and is now run as a productive sustainable manner. Th ey will be active • Winner, SWQ Mulga rural enterprise that incorporates sheep community members and involved Awards, Business and cattle breeding in conjunction with in networks that support their social, innovations & a rural tourism emotional and educational needs. I Alternative Enterprises, believe on going education is the key to 2006 I am an active participant in a number achieving this. • Graduate, RCS holistic of rural organizations including Agforce My Award project’s aim was to develop management courses and the Queensland Rural Women’s a series of educational webinars and • Qld Rural Women’s Network. I was also a delegate to teleconferences for other women on the symposium delegate the Queensland government’s Rural land who have experienced the harsh 2008 Women’s Symposium in Roma last year. realities of our changing climate. Th e webinars will not only provide valuable information and discussion with Have a clear vision, take action, and the informed speakers, but will also provide pathway to achieving it will appear. a network for women coping with climate change and isolation to share their experiences. Th e webinars will cover topics such as communication, I am passionate about learning and depression, succession planning and life education, and promoting and planning, will be facilitated by myself marketing the bush. I have undergone but will feature expert speakers, and will a steep learning curve in the last seven aim to reach more than 200 women years, including training in holistic over the series. management, business management and personal development to build my Since completing the award process I business skills and decision making. have been able to establish a strategic I have also completed a number of partnership with KLR Marketing short tourism courses, and in 2003 and will commence my ﬁ rst series of in response to drought, Myendetta webinars in April, 2009. I have also Station, through the Outback become a director of a rural training Queensland Tourism Association, business, Toolbox Training. Both commenced a tourism operation. With directors have teaching backgrounds a focus on providing a unique, quality and we believe we have developed an outback experience, the tour business innovative and sustainable model for was recognised in 2006, when it was the delivery of information and skills to the winner of the business innovations rural people. Th ese new developments and alternative enterprises Mulga are very exciting, and they have all Award. happened because I have gone through the RIRDC awards process. In 2003 I developed a startup gourmet food business in partnership with a friend. Boozy Fruits, a range of quality dessert sauces with a dash of alcohol, were produced and marketed from the outback. While I am no longer part of this business, I watch proudly as it goes

165 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Susi Tegen South Australian2009 winner

• Managing Director, My partner and I are livestock and crop FREE Eyre was the outcome of several FREE Eyre farmers from the Limestone Coast, on years of drought, unreliable prices for • Director, Adelaide South Australia’s Eyre Peninsula. I am commodities, widespread fi res, and Western General Managing Director of FREE Eyre, a was born out of a belief that the time Practice Network primary producer–owned company that was right for the region’s farmers to • Member, South identifi es, incubates and commercialises take control of their future by having Australia Sheep new business opportunities for the a stronger infl uence over the supply Advisory Committee peninsula. I have been committed to chain, by building alliances and • Former Deputy Chair, sustainable thriving rural communities partnerships, and by being proactive Farmsafe SA and and primary industries for the past 20 in adding value to the region’s primary FarmBiz SA years. produce. • Fellow, Australian Rural Leadership Program My interest in growing rural I believe that groups of farmers and • Fellow, Australian communities was brought to the fore doctors alike are able to achieve Institute of Company in my role as Chief Executive Offi cer the economies of scale that bring Directors of the Limestone Coast Division of bargaining power, better research and • Masters of Business General Practice which I held for 8 development and innovation, there Administration, years. Th e organisation focused on are opportunities through FREE Eyre Melbourne Business the sustainability of medical services for farmers to work together more School in rural communities which included effi ciently and eff ectively. I believe those • Bachelor of Arts, recruitment, retention and training farmer groups than can not only work Adelaide University of doctors and community medical together towards a given goal, but those • Diploma in Education, projects which addressed health issues. I that can ensure consistency of supply University of New am currently a Director on the Adelaide and quality along with food safety will England Western General Practice Network. be the ones that are able to not only change to meed demand but also drive change. Read every day, something no one else is My Rural Women’s Award ambition reading is to research and speak with Think every day, something no one less is representatives of ventures similar to thinking FREE Eyre in Europe, the United States and Canada which have proven Do every day, something no one else would be successful and have also experienced silly enough to do setbacks in developing their business It is bad for the mind to always be one of the ventures. In addition research will crowd include partnerships built in setting the foundation and managing relationships Do the things you think you cannot do in such a way that they are able to grow —Eleanor Roosevelt and succeed.

My vision for primary industries is I am keen to investigate a number of one of vibrancy and growth. I believe disciplines including the structure and with several developing countries as foundation of agricultural and other our neighbours and with the growing companies, trusts and co-operatives; demand for food, it will become their governance principles; their increasingly important for Australia to linkages with government, business and be competitive and to look at structures the community; and the role of women that meet either scale or niche in cooperative models. commodity markets. I believe the research will not only beneﬁ t the Eyre Peninsula but greater rural Australia.

166 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Ulli Spranz South Australian2009 runner up

• Chair, Biodynamic I am a pioneer of biological and organic My Rural Women’s Award ambition Agriculture Australia Ltd farming in South Australia. I have is to continue to expand the work • Founding member, lived and worked at Paris Creek in the I am involved in, educating others Biodynamic and Adelaide Hills for the past 20 years, and through regular meetings to promote Organic Agricultural my husband and I are the principals of biodynamic and organic farming Bureau B-d Farm Paris Creek and Paris Creek principles and making the courses and Cheese Pty Ltd. workshops available not only to farmers but also to a variety of interested people We bought our original dairy farm in at low cost and in various geographic 1986; it consisted of 67 hectares and 40 locations. cows. Today the Paris Creek businesses support a biodynamic dairy-farming I plan to travel to Europe to exchange property, a milk processing plant and information with rural women’s groups cheese manufacturing. We have 38 there and to discuss environmental employees, process 2.9 million litres considerations. of milk a year, and sold more than $5 million of product in 2008.

I was one of the founding members of the Biodynamic and Organic Agricultural Bureau, a farmer organisation established to facilitate networking and the exchange of ideas and experiences, and I am currently chair of Biodynamic Agriculture Australia Ltd, a 1400-member not- for-proﬁ t organisation recognised as the most successful biodynamic organisation in the world. My passion is to educate others in biodynamic and organic farming principles. I hold monthly meetings with farmers to study biodynamic farming and open my property for farm tours by primary, high school and university students.

167 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Kirsten Skraha Western Australian2009 winner

• Coordinator, BestFarms I have worked in natural resource My vision is to see better environmental Environmental management for the past seven years, practices and management fostered Management Systems having graduated with a Bachelor of and adopted in viticulture as • Secretary, Blackwood Science degree in natural resource common practice in order to ensure Valley Wine Industry management from the University of future environmental and economic Association Western Australia. A member of the sustainability. Although best-practice Boyup Brook community for the past guidelines, production eﬃ ciencies ﬁ ve years, I live with my husband and recommended environmental on his family’s farm, which produces practices have been developed and in merino wool, prime lambs, wine grapes part adopted, many smaller producers and boutique wines under the label do not have the resources to implement Wild Orchid Wines. broad-scale changes, and a more targeted and realistic approach to environmental management is needed.

If producers adopt better environmental It’s not just the opportunities that get thrown management practices—including improved water and energy use and at you in life, it’s what you do with them that input eﬃ ciencies—they will be better counts. equipped to promote and sell their produce in this time of surplus. I plan to visit producers and companies who are successfully implementing environmental practices and see how At present I coordinate the BestFarms the changes they have made can be Environmental Management Systems translated to others. I also plan to project, which is run by the Blackwood attend conferences and workshops Basin Group, a not-for-proﬁ t that focus on the latest research and community landcare organisation. Th e technology, to update my knowledge, project has won a number of national and subsequently to attend regional awards and has expanded from south- industry meetings and workshops so west Western Australia into northern I can share my knowledge with the New South Wales and southern broader industry. Queensland.

I am also active in my community and in the viticulture industry at Boyup Brook. For the past three years I have been secretary of the Blackwood Valley Wine Industry Association and in that role have helped run a series of environmental workshops for producers and developed environmental goals the association is working towards.

168 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Doris Parker Western Australian2009 runner up

Along with my husband and family, My Rural Women’s Award ambition I have been managing Peedamulla is to write a book (with the support Station in the Pilbara for the past 10 of a biographer) documenting my life years. Th e station was bought for my story and in doing so exposing the community back in 1975; at its peak next generation to the wisdom of their it ran 15 000 sheep and 1500 cattle. elders and providing leadership and But drought, lack of money and the encouragement, to steer them on a path fall in wool prices brought trouble to of higher expectations. I am keen to the community; my husband and I receive training in leadership, to help took over the running of the station me engage the young people in culture in 1981 and began the huge task and to voice the wisdom of Aboriginal of the community’s debts, building women in teaching the younger women up the cattle herd and restoring the to believe in themselves and their station to being a viable concern. I also future. work as a customer service oﬃ cer for the Department of Child Protection at Onslow, fostering children and providing a safe haven for many out on Peedamulla Station.

My life story is one of how an Aboriginal woman can quietly have an impact on the sustainability of the Pilbara pastoral industry by combining cultural heritage and wisdom, organisational ability and maternal instinct to become a role model for future generations of Aboriginal pastoralists. My vision is to move the next generation on from their dependence on the welfare system, alcohol and drugs, to instil in them a passion for the land and the stock, and to help them gain the skills to run a top-performing cattle station.

169 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Jane Lovell Tasmanian winner2009

• Graduated from Melbourne University I am managing director In 2005 I developed FarmSAT, a farm with first class Honours degree, of Tasmanian Quality self-assessment tool, for the Tasmanian majoring in Plant Pathology. Assured Inc., a not-for-profi t Farmers and Graziers Association, as • Awarded Australian Organisation for association established to part of the Department of Agriculture, Quality Tasmanian Quality Award – 1998 help primary producers Fisheries and Forestry Industry (Young Achiever) and 2000. come to terms with the Pathways to EMS (environmental • Organiser of five national food safety, requirements of quality management systems) program. quality and environmental assurance assurance. Th e association FarmSAT is designed to raise producers’ conferences. aims to provide information awareness of environmental concerns • Recipient of Tsuneihi Fujii Fellowship and services related to and well as recognising the sound Trust Study Tour of Japan March 2000. quality assurance and environmental practices already in use. • Member of Federal Minister’s Working to develop a marketing It has now been delivered to almost 600 Group on Safety and Quality System advantage for quality- Tasmanian primary producers. Equivalence. assured products. In my • Development and launch (September position as managing My vision for primary industries 2000) of TQA Quality Mark. director I have worked with involves sustainable, united, proactive • Member Senator Troeth’s EMS Steering many producers, industry and resilient enterprises embracing Committee – overseeing and promoting organisations, state and the opportunities and challenges uptake of EMS on farm. federal government agencies of changing market requirements • Finalist in Telstra Business Women’s and regulators in delivering and environmental conditions. My Awards, 2002. training, developing systems, Rural Women’s Award ambition is to • Member of DAFF GlobalGAP Working auditing, public relations, develop an environmental assurance Group. team management and framework that promotes the uptake of • Member of HAL Horticulture for communication. environmentally sustainable practices Tomorrow Technical Steering but respects the commercial realities of Committee. In my view, I have played primary production and takes account • Chief Editor and National Coordinator of an important part in of the inevitability of climate change. Guidelines for Environmental Assurance advancing the debate on Primary producers are becoming in Australian Horticulture. quality and environmental increasingly irritated by the multitude • Member of Technical Reference Group assurance and food safety of quality assurance systems they for Food Safety Auditor Competency systems throughout the must comply with, and producers and Standards. supply chain. I initiated retailers are united in their call for a • Recipient of “Outstanding individual or the fi rst On Farm Food single environmental assurance system. organisation working in a non-industry Safety and Quality Th e success of one environmental institution” HACCP award 2008. Assurance Conference assurance framework will depend on • Selected to participate in Australian in 1997. Th e conference the major national retailers delivering Rural Leadership Foundation Course 16 rapidly developed into the a market advantage for producers who (commencing 2009). premier event for food participate in environmental assurance • Current President of Tasmanian Arabian safety and quality assurance programs. Riders and Breeders. for primary production, I plan to put the award bursary funds • Owner, trainer and rider of Australian particularly horticulture; the towards developing my leadership, National Champion Arabian Stallion fi fth conference was held facilitation and negotiation skills, so (exhibited by an amateur owner) 2009. in August 2007. I have also made many presentations, that I can eff ectively communicate published widely on the themes of and unite industry behind a single quality assurance and food safety for environmental assurance framework. primary industries, and contributed Th e framework I envisage would be to or been responsible for the developed through a series of meetings development of a number of food safety and workshops with primary producers, and environmental codes and industry retailers, producer representative quality systems. organisations, and state agency representatives.

170 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Jane Huntington Tasmanian runner2009 up

My husband and I are the principals My Rural Women’s Award ambition in the family farm business Th e Two is to travel to England to research the Metre Tall Company. Th e business well-established malt barley industry is based at our property Charlemont there. I want to study relationships as in the Derwent Valley in southern they already exist between contracted Tasmania. We came to farming via the grain growers and the specialist fl oor wine industry and have successfully malting companies. I also want to tap transferred our knowledge and expertise into their experience in connection in the winery to a grain-growing and with the relationship between grain brewery business. We value-add to our variety and beer quality. grains by making naturally fermented and handmade real ale on the farm. Th e next production project for my business is the development of a Real ale is made from grain and hops traditional fl oor malting plant, thus grown on the farm, plus ingredients we closing the gap on external processing obtain directly from other Tasmanian of the agricultural input and adding to producers. Th e diversifi cation into real my business’s sustainability. ales has signifi cantly drought-proofed our farm and made our business much I believe my study tour—resulting in more robust than it would have been bringing back new knowledge from the had we been relying on commodity established malt barley industry—will markets for the sale of grain alone. be extremely valuable, not only for the expansion of my business but also for My vision is to see beer manufacturing the future development of this niche using much larger proportions of industry nationally. Australian-grown and -processed malt, as well as a greater selection of grain varieties for an increased fl avour spectrum. At present, specialty malted grain is largely imported for use in the boutique brewing industry because malting has virtually ceased to exist. Th e micro-brewing industry in this country needs Australian-grown specialty malts. And, with micro- breweries and premium beers being the only beer industry sectors showing growth, I believe the time is ripe to expand and improve our malted grain industry.

171 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Mischelle Hill Northern Territory2009 winner

My husband and I have been involved My Rural Women’s Award ambition in the family mango plantation for a is to gain essential knowledge of and number of years and in 2002 eff ectively contacts in the main food-producing took over the farm’s ownership and regions in Australia, to promote management on a leasing basis. Fully Australian-grown and -made branding, involved in the working of the farm, I and to establish an Australian-made and have managed the packing shed for the -grown direct-from-farm food outlet past seven seasons, taken responsibility to ensure higher returns for producers. for all quality food safety management Th rough this, I hope to raise public programs, developed a detailed awareness of and a desire for Australian- training program for seasonal staff , made and -grown products, improve and streamlined the packing process the sustainability of rural communities, to achieve a 15 per cent increase in and create from the profi ts a fund productivity. I am currently studying for research into a sustainable rural for a Master’s degree in environmental Australia. and business management at Newcastle University. Our business is a member of the Northern Territory Horticultural Association, the Northern Territory Food Group and the Northern Territory Mango Industry Association.

I am acutely concerned about the increasing pressure on primary industries’ continued sustainability and viability—urban development, globalisation, population growth, the impact of larger corporations on smaller producers, the demands of shareholders for record profi ts, and so on. Since taking the reins at the family plantation I have witnessed at fi rst hand the increasing pressure of mounting costs, seasonal staff shortages, and the diffi culty of remaining profi table in primary industry today.

172 RIRDC Rural Women’s Award Moira Lanzarin Northern Territory2009 runner up

• Northern Australia I come from modern pioneering stock Holistic management is a decision- representative, and am currently a director of family- making framework that provides real Inaugural Regional run Coodardie Brahmans. We operate tools to help individuals make better Women’s Advisory two cattle properties, Coodardie and decisions, ones that will simultaneously Council Numul Station in the Mataranka region lead to a more environmentally, • Northern Territory of the Northern Territory. We run economically and socially sustainable representative, World approsimately 3,000 head of brahman land, business and community. Congress of Young cattle and I co-direct the business, Farmers, Paris, 2003 selling and promoting Coodardie stud My Rural Women’s Award ambition • Member, Federal cattle across the north. is to become a certifi ed educator in Council of Young holistic management for northern Farmers, 2006 I strive to educate the people on the Australia. I hope to be accepted into the land as well as those in urban centres Holistic Management International’s about land management practices that Certifi ed Educator Program, to receive are economically and environmentally training, to travel to the International sustainable. Holistic Management Institute in Albuquerque in the United States to An active member of Australian meet with practitioners of holistic Women in Agriculture, I was a management, and to return to Australia keynote speaker at the 2000 National with greater knowledge and exposure, Conference in Darwin. I have also and to share my new learning through represented Northern Australia the local learning community with on the Deputy Prime Minister’s northern Australia. Inaugural Regional Women’s Advisory Council. Additionally, I represented the Northern Territory at the World Congress of Young Farmers in Paris in 2003 and was appointed to the fi rst Federal Council of Young Farmers in 2006.

My vision is for a strong, resilient Australia that embraces our diﬀ erences and draws strength and unity from these; an Australia where both rural and urban, Indigenous and non-Indigenous walk and work together in creating a truly environmentally, economically and socially sustainable society. Rural Australia is facing increasingly diﬃ cult times, and this requires new skills and greater adaptability to handle change.

173 174 175 n’s A me wa o rd W l 2 a 0 r 0 u 9

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r o a i t l Celebrating a I r n o d p u r s t 10 years o r C ie t s en Re m sea lop r ch & Deve

Australia’s Rural Women Revealed, recognised and respected Edited by Edwina Clowes and Chris Pirie

Pub. No. 09/068

Th is publication celebrates 10 years of the RIRDC Rural Women’s Award. It captures the professional and personal journeys of award recipients since 2000, when the award began.

For many recipients, the path of time and endeavour has led to great success in business and leadership in their industries and communities and beyond. For others, the vagaries of the economy and climate have led to the loss of dreams, thwarted ambitions, business closures.However, through all the recipients’ journeys some enduring traits shine through—tenacity and a ‘give it a go’ attitude, a passion and an uncompromising belief in primary industries and rural communities, ingenuity, and a fearlessness about embracing change to ensure a more prosperous future for rural Australia and the coming generations.

Th e Rural Industries Research and Development Corporation applauds these women and is proud to recognise them as recipients of the Rural Women’s Award.

Th e 10th anniversary of the award is a milestone that reﬂ ects RIRDC’s commitment to leadership and capacity building for rural industries and communities. RIRDC instigated the award in order to recognise women’s contribution to primary industries and, importantly, to further develop women’s capacity to contribute by providing the support and resources needed to augment their skills and abilities.

Th e award is an initiative of RIRDC in partnership with the state and territory agencies responsible for agriculture, primary industries and natural resource management, which manage the award at the state and territory level.