Social Justice and Change Archives - Page 33 of 45 - Clover Hill Diaries

Identity crisis and stereotypes – farmers with akubras and bandy legs

cool urban dude with surfboard

The Art4Agriculture team have created a complementary program model to The Archibull Prize that will allow us to roll the program out nationally. The students participating in the program will be investigating and reflecting on the theme

Feeding, Clothing and Powering a Hungry Nation is a shared responsibility

with the word ‘power’ referring to farmers potential to provide the community with renewable energy sources

FarmerAnnimation_Man

So of course we needed a logo and I briefed the graphic designer who happens to be male and he comes back with

13306_FarmerIllustration_Page_1

Okay so this was James stereotype of a farmer – love the bandy legs

Okay James farmers can be women too

So James sends me this

13306_FarmerIllustration_Page_2

So girl farmers have bandy legs too !!!!!!

So then I said OK lets make it a partnership and James comes back with this

Archibull Connections

then we thought about it some more and we thought lets have the farmers on one side of the plug and people from the city on the other

So how should I brief James?

What does a stereotypical urbanite look like. Does he/she evoke images of super cool people with 9 to 5 corporate careers who surf after work and party on the weekends ??????

Update

The sage minds on twitter have delivered me a solution – farmer Gus Whyte has proposed a salute to the middle man. I will ask James to replace the farmers with a tradie wearing hi viz. But still have the problem of sex and ethnicity

Tradie wearing hi viz

Further reading

Miranda column: The glamorous face of farming

Some serious food for thought – Identify crisis – the default setting

What my readers are saying

Everyman need a canoe

Everyman needs a canoe ht JK

Active wear

According to TE our cities are full of people who look like this

The time for mutual collaboration and respect is now – are our farmer organisations ready?

Today in The Land newspaper journalist Alex Druce asks the question is Ag’s image in danger

As my readers are aware from numerous posts I have written this year I believe so and I recently also asked who will bear the moral responsibility for this

Farmers currently sit at No 8 in the most trusted profession list. This is because we are trusted to supply to supply Australian families with safe, affordable and nutritious food. Despite the obviously ill informed assurance of NSW Farmers natural resource committee chairman the 2016 Archibull Prize entry and exit survey results show it is a very different matter when it comes to animal welfare, the environment and water use. See footnote. The graph below also shows The Archibull Prize’s considerable ability to improve the image and perceptions of farmers in these three key areas Secondary students attitudes to farming A campaign that will see our best practice farmers image tarnished by the actions of the minority will make it very difficult for The Archibull Prize’s to make those considerable gains. Whilst I no longer farm my family still do and I put considerable personal funds into this program and I will not hesitate to ask those responsible for putting agriculture’s image at risk to be accountable

Josh Gilbert former chair of NSW Farmers Association Young Farming Council recently resigned his position as a result of personal threats from a senior non-staff member in NSW Farmers Association who threatened personal attacks if he spoke out against the NSW Native Vegetation Act proposed reforms. “I was told that if I was to come and speak out against (the reform), the people who already attack me would increase in number and increase (their efforts), including people in NSW Farmers. My interpretation was that it was a threat,” he said. Source

Josh is hopeful that partnerships between farmers, environmental groups, Indigenous Australians and consumers with a conscience can find a way through. I hope and pray our farmer organisations see the wisdom of this before it is too late

“Achieving sustainable land use for profitability and sustainability in the short and long term requires collaboration between farmers, environmental groups, Indigenous Australians and consumers with a conscience. Coming together through a shared love and appreciation of the value of land, the food and fibre it produces and our environment, we stand to create partnerships for the true long term prosperity of our nation. We can build on the 40,000 years of Traditional Indigenous Knowledge and mutual respect for our delicate landscape to form fair, equitable and long term policy, not one which sacrifices future prosperity for short term ‘gains’”……..

Josh asks

Are we ready to truly partner and ensure the equality of agricultural reporting for long-term equity, justice, fairness and profitability? I believe the time for mutual collaboration and respect is now.

Below is Josh Gilbert’s recent opinion piece that has attracted considerable attention in the main stream media.

Josh 2

Josh Gilbert

Farmers have a natural affinity with their land. The farm is the home of their family’s dreams and aspirations; the page upon which they write their stories of passion and love; their life; their livelihood; their heart.

From outside the farm gate the view is different. Consumers place large amounts of trust in the farmer to produce what they need and when they need it. However, as societal views shift around the governance and sustainability of corporations, so too does the interest in food production and animal welfare. Farmers are increasingly held accountable for their actions and asked not only to provide, but also to protect and care for the environment and animals that support the production of food.

Corporations and businesses paved the way for triple bottom line accounting practices, considering social, economic and environmental factors. Now, agricultural corporations and family farmers find themselves at a crossroads, pondering what practical accounting and social metrics should be developed specifically for the agricultural industries. This discussion is brought further to life over the proposed changes to the Native Vegetation Act in NSW, policy which intends to provide farmers with less red tape by allowing self-assessment regarding the flora and fauna on their property. Without full appreciation of the value of native vegetation, this policy risks not only the repetition of past errors, but also of trading long term profitability for short-sighted practices.

This controversial policy highlights the need for all to reconsider the interaction between the three areas of triple bottom line reporting – not only finance, social and environmental, but also the corporate social responsibility to apply them in the unique field of farming.

Times are changing and in this new world our society needs to shift its thoughts on this matter. Do we as society value pursuit of money over the longevity of social cohesion, the natural environment and our accountability to the public?

Kinship for the land is not just felt by farmers, but also by my Indigenous brothers and sisters and the broader environmental movement. With the desire to create fair, just and equitable policy regarding the natural environment, it is negligent that these voices have been hushed and ignored, often trumped in the public and political discussion by large farming organisations.

Other changes taking place are the partnerships that are being built where once there was nervousness and mistrust. Recent disputes over mining activity have seen farmers and environmental groups stand hand in hand, united in their desire to protect the land. This relationship though, is at risk as legitimate concerns from the environmental movement regarding native vegetation fall on deaf ears within farmer associations. Comparable policies within Australia have seen over 300,000 hectares of native vegetation ripped from the landscape in Queensland, despite industry best practice. Australia has also become number three for the worst land clearing rates amongst developed nations. And still, some industries continue to lobby for self-regulation in order to provide the opportunity for them to destroy our native landscapes.

We are at risk of losing prominent native vegetation in Australia. This also increases the risk of negative public perceptions increasing towards farmers. Recent experience demonstrates to us the cost of these negative perceptions. The live export debate questioned every farmer’s right to farm, and cost beef producers dearly in the short and long term, forcing some farmers to leave the industry. Similarly, the proposed ‘native vegetation policy’ lacks foresight and vision and further risks the brand of “Australian agriculture” and the livelihoods of our farming families and rural communities. The drive for farmers to increase their land value and productivity seems to focus only on a single ‘bottom line’ factor, and negates any public accountability and social and environmental responsibility farmer otherwise aspire to achieve.

There is hope though.

Achieving sustainable land use for profitability and sustainability in the short and long term requires collaboration between farmers, environmental groups, Indigenous Australians and consumers with a conscience. Coming together through a shared love and appreciation of the value of land, the food and fibre it produces and our environment, we stand to create partnerships for the true long term prosperity of our nation. We can build on the 40,000 years of Traditional Indigenous Knowledge and mutual respect for our delicate landscape to form fair, equitable and long term policy, not one which sacrifices future prosperity for short term ‘gains’.

We each have a personal responsibility for not only our future, but also for the future of our descendants. Each day, we have the ability to encourage change, create hope and create equality. Our views on the environment, agriculture and our way of life should be treated no differently.

The challenge for us all is to lift our gaze beyond our current horizon. Money should not be the sole imperative. We need to focus on the long- term outlook and understand where our interests and connection to the broader society should lie. We must equally value the three pillars of triple bottom line accounting, while creating agricultural metrics showing mutual respect for the views of farmers, consumers and the environment.

Are we ready to truly partner and ensure the equality of agricultural reporting for long-term equity, justice, fairness and profitability? I believe the time for mutual collaboration and respect is now.

Footnote

Flabbergasted that some farmers organisations continue to self assess consumer attitudes. After all this is not the first time consumer attitudes to farming have been surveyed. The Archibull Prize program 2015 survey reinforces Parberry and Wilkinson’s findings on Victorian’s attitudes to farming from 2013. Dairy Australia also find similar results in the survey they conduct

Why are Aussie farmers out of love?

Did you catch -Gregor Heard, Fairfax Media grains writer recent opinion piece reprinted below? Why are Aussie farmers out of love?

I like to throw this idea out there. Its us not them – we don’t get out enough – people DO love us. And whats even better I have the hard data to prove it

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Why are Aussie farmers out of love?
Jan. 27, 2016, 9 a.m.Opinion
JUST what have Australian farmers done to be so disconnected from the broader community?

In other nations across the globe, people involved in the most fundamental industry of all, food production, are respected as the primary plank of a functioning society.

Yet here in Australia, broadacre farmers cop a bum steer in terms of community perception.

They are variously described as whinging farmers being propped up by hard working city folk or mercenaries ruthlessly jeopardising the health of a nation in search of additional profits through the administration of veritable witches’ brews of toxic chemicals.

As those living in rural communities know, nothing could be further from the truth, but these ill-informed ideas have a damaging effect on the Australian agriculture industry across a range of issues.

But why does the Australian urban public seem to have so little time for farmers?

You look at the US, a similar culture to our own, and the nation celebrates the importance of those who produce its food. Here, however, the disconnect between country and city means the majority of urban dwellers have no idea of the work and financial risk required to put food on the national table. Kaniva, Victoria, farmer Wal Meyer has an interesting theory on how farmers have lost the public relations battle. He believes that the very phenomenon that theoretically should have improved relations between mainstream farmers and the metro public has worked against it. The resurgence in interest in where food comes from, driven in part by Australia’s seemingly insatiable appetite for reality cooking shows, should have seen the public thanking the Australian farming community some of the safest food in the world.

Partially, we did see increased appreciation of the role of the farmer, but only a certain segment. The public latched onto key phrases such as ‘organic’ and ‘rare-breed’ raising small scale, niche market growers to the level of minor celebrities.

Well done to these guys and they are certainly making a go of their enterprises and producing some fantastic food in the process. But as Mr Meyer lamented, this success often comes at the expense of other farmers. “People keep talking about organic this and that, and saying how bad for you conventionally farmed food is, when the facts are, that all Australian food products pass through a rigorous screening process before it is declared safe to eat.”

Another issue for those interested in environmental issues is whether organic farming is more sustainable than systems using herbicides. Certainly, it is a nice warm and fuzzy feeling to know no chemicals have been used, but the situation is not so cut and dried. Organic grain production systems rely heavily on tillage, which in turn creates problems with erosion and salinity.

As the crop protection lobby argues (of course with its own interests to the fore) it is likely that judicious use of herbicides and synthetic fertilisers may be better for the planet as a whole. But perception is all, and at present conventional farmers and livestock producers are often pigeon holed as ‘factory farmers’ without a proper analysis of their methodology.

Farmers cop a similar bad rap when it comes to the processed foods that land on consumers’ tables. There is no doubt artificial preservatives and colourings are best to be avoided, as any parent of a child who has partaken in too much red cordial will attest, but nutritional issues with food on the supermarket shelves owe more to the manufacturing process than to the raw food the food processing sector is provided with.

Advocacy groups are out there arguing agriculture’s case, you see the Grains Legume Nutrition Council promoting healthy grain products and agriculture as a whole must continue to invest in these initiatives that bridge the gap between producer and consumer. Only then will we see a similar level of respect afforded to our primary producers as in other nations.

Source -Gregor Heard, Fairfax Media grains writer

Its time to listen to the stats and get off the couch and get some sunshine, avoid the selective hearing trap and talk to people and actually listen- its amazing what we might find and I can assure you it will be good for the soul

The danger behind the hypnotic trance of leadership stereotypes

I watched the announcement of the pairing of Sarah Pallin and Donald Trump on TV last night and I will be polite and say it didn’t exactly make my day.

As an earlier post this week from me indicated I have predicted that 2016 is the year that our leaders in Australian agriculture will be required to step up to the plate in a way they have never been tested before and if we can’t find this decade’s Rick Farley Australian agriculture is looking at irreparable brand damage

‘When did we last see a peak representative body deliberately and strategically reach out to its perceived opponents, seek to understand their position fully, and commit to work together to find a way through? ‘ Professor Andrew Campbell Source

Let’s have a look at how Leadership Experts in the US are reflecting on leadership selection after yesterday’s “political marriage” in hell. In this case Will Marre

The Most Common Reason We Select Lousy Leaders

Lousy Leaders

Source

About this time in most political campaigns a majority of voters begin to look at who is running and say, “Is this the best we can do?” Seriously, out of 335 million citizens, are the people up on stage really the most qualified candidates to lead the most powerful nation in the world? Are you kidding me?

There are many reasons why the most qualified people don’t ever end up running for President or even leading major business organizations. But I believe the root cause is our collective judgment falling under the hypnotic trance of leadership stereotypes.

Harvard Research reported that the book Compelling People confirms that our “fast brains” prefer leaders who are assertive, competitive, decisive and tough. Our superficial thinking is that these leaders will protect us. The problem is our “fast brains” are quite stupid. Our quick judgments are primarily ruled by primitive emotions and ingrained prejudices that lead us to foolish opinions. Our smart brain needs to take time to analyze facts, test claims and exercise wisdom. However, using our smart brain takes a lot of time and energy that we mostly exhaust getting through our daily lives leaving us vulnerable to bad judgment and emotional bias when it comes to choosing leaders. This is a problem. A big one.

Our bias for mistaking confidence and competitiveness for leadership starts at a very early age. A brand new research report from Harvard graduate school of education, “Leaning Out,” confirms that by high school 40% of boys and even 23% of girls believe that male political leaders are more effective than females. Both male and female teenagers prefer males on the student council. Even a majority of moms of teenage girls believe that boys are more effective student body officers. What?

The root of our problem is that most of us don’t understand the science of leadership. In fact most people may not know that effective leadership has become testable science. It has. For instance if we agree that excellent business leaders should be able to:

create and produce profitable products and services that improve the quality of life of customers;
inspire and motivate employees to consistently perform their jobs extraordinarily well;
consistently produce profits (once the company is beyond the startup phase) and;
conduct business in a socially responsible manner that produces benefits to communities and minimizes or eliminates harm to the environment;

then we can identify leadership factors that actually produce those results. And we have.

Our problem is that neither our business schools nor Wall Street fully agree that these four worthwhile goals of business leadership really matter. Instead they focus on things like competitive dominance and financial results. This leads companies like Volkswagen to pay their engineers to fool regulators instead of coming up with brilliant technology. It’s what led GE’s Jack Welch to spend two decades paying fines to the EPA rather than cleaning their toxic waste out of the Hudson River. It’s what enables the financial pirates known as investment bankers, who caused the needless suffering of the last recession, to pay fines but escape jail.

Likewise in politics, too many of us seem to like puffed-up roosters bellowing about going to war, building walls and solving complex problems through the shear force of their will. It is natural for us to wish the world be simpler than it is. But this wish makes it easy for really strong sounding leaders to promise to deliver what we emotionally wish were true. It’s simple. When we feel overwhelmed we are easily suckered.

Strong but stupid leadership has created the world we currently live in. In the 1990s we thought all war was over and perpetual prosperity could be engineered by Alan Greenspan. Instead we have begun to recycle the geopolitical problems of the last thousand years and the ugliness of the unrestrained self-interest of the Gilded Age of 100 years ago. And we will continue to recycle our problems at even more extreme levels unless we understand the leadership qualities that will produce a world that works for everyone.

The actual science of leadership is based on a meta-analysis of what creates sustainable abundance confirms this:

Hard power, which is characterized by competitiveness, aggressiveness, decisiveness, single-mindedness and self-interest, is primarily effective at achieving short-term, easy-to-measure goals. This isn’t to say it’s useless, only to say it is an inadequate way to run a complex organization or the most powerful country on earth.
Soft power, which is characterized by collaboration, teamwork, empathy and systems thinking, works well in complex environments where knowledge and information is widely distributed. However, organizations led only by soft power tend to be indecisive, slow and uncompetitive.

The answer of course is the synthesis between hard and soft power. It is the third way. It capitalizes on the goal-focus of hard power and social intelligence of soft power. Is the basis for something I called gender synergy. It’s no secret that most males favor hard power and most females exhibit soft power strengths. We need both.

The challenge we face is that we need to raise the new generation of SMART Power leaders pronto. The world economy continues to shake, new kinds of wars and medieval violence assault our peace, and businesses exhaust their employees, exploit the environment and fail all too quickly in the face of agile competitors.

Of course both men and women can learn the skills of SMART Power. I am focusing on developing women leaders because women are listening. Brand-new research reported in the book Broad Influence confirms that when any leadership group, whether it’s top executives, Boards of Directors or the U.S. Senate, reaches a critical mass of between 20% and 30% women, the group becomes much more effective in achieving its goals. This phenomenon is being repeated all over the world. I believe more women in leadership is the most powerful trend that will revolutionize our future and get us out of the spin cycle created by the leaders who are currently in charge.

We need to celebrate it and accelerate it. You can help by calling out bad leadership. You can put the name “hard power” on shortsighted, blindly aggressive leaders. You can support socially intelligent, soft power leaders by helping them become SMART using the tools of goal setting and accountability. You can change the future right now, right where you are.

Will

Sadly Brand Agriculture’s Day of Reckoning is fast approaching – will we need the ark

There has been a lot of talk about leadership in our sector as we head into 2016 and The Year of the Pulses

My sources tell me 2016 will be the year our industry leaders will be tested like we have never seen before

Agriculture will feel the wrath of failing to keep pace with changing environment in which we operate opinion and we will find ourselves asking. Why oh why did we learn nothing from the Rick Farley success stories?

We will find ourselves asking the questions over and over and over again. How did we stuff this up so badly ?. Why have we not got trusted, confident supported grass roots spokespeople with the capacity to handle the big issues in a way that resonates with our key audience? Where did it all go so wrong?

The successes of the past leave a great legacy, being blind to them is a criminal act for which we all need to be held accountable.

Maybe just maybe we needed the big kick up the bum that is coming. What long term effect it is going to have on Brand Agriculture only time will tell

Don’t expect to see positive change if you surround yourself with negativity

As soon as you pass through the magnificent avenue of trees at Gundowringa at Crookwell you realise you have arrived at a farm steeped in heritage

Charlie Prell inspired by the visionaries who came before him

On your left is the 160-year-old woolshed that in its heyday accommodated 16,000 sheep and the stone shearer’s quarters built in 1916

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Today it sleeps up to 18 to supplement the farm’s income through fly fishing and farmstay opportunities

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On your right is a stone cottage of the same era and to the right of the stone cottage stands the pavilion that once overlooked the cricket oval

But the pièce de résistance is the homestead. Everything else is a reminder of when the country rode on the sheep’s back. The homestead underpins why the family is so committed to making farming work for them and the generations to come in the 21^st Century

Gundowringa Homestead was built by Chas E Prell in 1905 out of basalt and granite and roof tiles that were used as ballast on ships doing the round trip from UK to Australia

Chas E Prell – the first of 5 generations of the Prell family on Gundowringa

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The gardens were laid out while the house was being built. There are some very impressive large trees, some now over 100 years old. Including what is believed to be the oldest and largest Linden grown in this country. Other breathtaking species include an evergreen example of the liquid amber family the Liquidamber festerii

It was the rose garden and the horizontal elm, with the flattened canopy designed to allow you to walk under that caught my eye.

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The house has maid’s quarters and when first built visitors were greeted at the door by a butler. At the height of the wool boom the property supported thirty jobs

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The homestead was adapted to use as farmstay accommodation in 2000 by Charlie’s parents Jeff and Jess Prell until Jess death in 2008

Jeff Prell – a man with every right to be proud of what his family has achieved and the perfect host to share his family heritage past

Jeff has found love again and married local artist Margaret Shepherd whose studio and artworks bring a new vibrancy to the homestead

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The current generation have a lot to inspire them and inspired they are. Inspired to adapt and move with the times. Inspired to respect the landscape and work in partnership with it

Jeff and Charlie Prell marching into the future

Like his great grandfather and his namesake Charlie Prell knows that pioneers who advocate and help drive change are often initially perceived as being radical in the extreme particularly by people entrenched in the past

Charlie Prell – a bright future relies on innovation and making the most of the ssets you have

What we often forget is what traditionally sets people like Charlie and his great grandfather apart is their commitment to the greater good. Charlie Prell has leased part of Gundowringa to a company who will install a wind farm. He is also helping farmers across Australia find alternate fresh income streams from renewable energy technology.

The site of the future Gundowringa Windfarm

Charlie is using part of his new stream of passive income to reinvigorate and drought proof the farm and embrace the opportunities that the combination of the diverse income streams of renewable energy, tourism and food and fibre production offer to sustaining generations of Prell family members as long as they wish to remain there.

Nobody will ever be able to say that Charlie Prell is a victim of the disconnect between reality of the vargaries of farming and the idealism of the view that food and fibre production alone will keep Australian farming families in business for the long haul in the 21^st Century

Today it’s hard to believe that the now acknowledged visionary Chas E Prell the man who epitomised the “producing more with less’ ethos and pioneered pasture improvement utilising superphosphate fertiliser was in his time considered a maverick who didn’t follow convention. Its a reminder that its important not to forget the past. What’s even more important is to learn from it.

Change is the law of life

I recently heard some-one say the jobs available in ten years’ time to young people currently in primary school wont have been heard of today. My greatest hope is that agriculture becomes a visionary in learning from its past and embracing the opportunities a partnership between farmers and nature offers

How many ways can you tell inspiring tales from the farm

I have had a very inspiring 3 week road trip which started with an invitation to judge the Spirit of the Land Farm Art Sculpture’s competition. You can see my photos of this amazing event here

Following the Lockhart Festival I joined The Archibull Prize artwork judge architect Wendy Taylor on her yearly whirlwind tour searching for the WOW Archie. Poor Wendy this year proved to be very stressful – the wow factor was off the scale as you can see here.

For me as a farmer the highlight of this trip is talking to the teachers and students and listening to their journey and finding out the impact the program has had on them, their school and the wider community.

Did the students and teachers and farmers have the courageous conversations we all need to have to ensure Australian farmers can continue to feed and clothe Australian families in the highly challenging environment we find ourselves in on so many levels?

The big threats to reliable access to safe, affordable and healthy food in this country like increasing and prolonged extreme weather events, declining access to land, water and non renewable energy sources, food waste, biosecurity risks and and increasing consumer concerns about modern farming practices.

The students looked at all these big ticket issues and many more. They created artworks, they blogged and they animated and wow did they have courageous conversations, They have thought boldly . They have shown they have the courage to drive change and find new and better ways of doing things . Mega kudos to them and their outstanding example to the rest of us

These little cuties from Lockhart had such a great time making pom pom sheep

The Archibull Prize is a very costly program to run as you can imagine. Australia is a big country and transporting life size fibreglass cows doesn’t come cheap. Many people donate their time and expertise to ensure the program is delivered on behalf of farmers everywhere to the level of significance our wonderful Australian produce deserves

In fact the Young Farming Champions – some of Australian agriculture’s most inspirational young people donate thousands of hours between them to gain the skills and knowledge to go into schools participating in The Archibull Prize to tell agriculture’s story and share their values, hopes and dreams for a bright future for agriculture in this country

Interestingly enough it was Cotton Australia who was the first industry to put their hands up to participate in The Archibull Prize. Always an industry that thinks outside the box they could see the potential of using a blank fibreglass cow to tell the story of cotton. Although I must admit it did take me a while to convince them the award shouldn’t be the called The Archiboll Prize. Just to show you what I knew about cotton at that time I had to ask what a ‘boll’ was

Let me show you how inspiring an innovative vehicle, a blank fibreglass cow, an exciting young farming champion and some great classroom resources can be to tell Cotton Tales in a way that resonate with the people that matter – the people who buy what farmers produce and I am not even going to show you the artwork yet

The Many Faces of Cotton

Investigating the Australian Cotton Industry

and this

Did you know Australian Cotton is the best in the World?

How to make a Cotton Calf

And we haven’t even talked about cows telling sheep tales yet

Well check this out

Where there’s Wool There’s a Runway

Weaving the Woollen Dream

And this is just a sample – so glad I am not judging these

BTW Check out the Learn about Wool school resources here

The farmers’ case for leaving coal and coalseam gas in the ground

These days when some-one asks me to speak at, or judge something they usually request a photo and a bio

The photo part is easy but the bio gets more and more difficult. Yes I can always tailor it for the audience I am presenting to or will be meeting but I don’t even know what to call myself any more.

At the moment as I collaborate with a diverse group of people who are helping to send Young Farming Champion’s Josh Gilbert and Anika Molesworth to Paris for COP21, I am finding myself being referred to as a global campaigner for equity for farmers as we lobby the Australian government for action on climate change.

Australian Young Farmer of the Year Anika Molesworth

What does being a campaigner for equity for farmers mean for me?

It means creating awareness and getting government to ‘embrace the future’ by recognising agriculture does so much more that produce food and fibre. It creates jobs, grows wealth and vibrant, healthy and resilient rural and regional communities. This is the bright future all Australians want and deserve

It means getting our government to understand climate change is happening and it is a real threat to reliable access to safe, affordable and healthy food not only in 20 years’ time but now.

It means I fully support these comments that agriculture can play a big role in helping deliver the solution

Australia’s food production sector can make a substantial contribution to reducing greenhouse gas emissions and moving our communities, environment and economy to a more sustainable basis. ….

Farming systems that produce their own renewable energy, and are based on sustainable agricultural practices that increase carbon storage in vegetation and soils, reduce the need for expensive nitrogen-based fertilizer, reduce soil degradation, save water, and protect our natural resource base will have win-win impacts – helping reduce the prospects of climate change to which we cannot adapt, as well as increasing the reliability, profitability and quality of our food supply.

“Feeding a Hungry Nation: Climate change, Food and Farming in Australia 2015” by Professor Lesley Hughes, Dr. Martin Rice, Professor Will Steffen

Farmers are perfectly placed to contribute to the solutions to Climate Change. Not only are they on the frontline of Climate Change already, they are innovative, resourceful and determined.

Our Australian farmers are part of a global farming community. They know they have to learn from each other’s successes and failures in order to help us all move forward. Farmers have always been focused on feeding and clothing us, and now they also in a position to POWER us as well using renewable energy technologies.

Its means that I am dedicating every spare minute I have to ensure our farmers are provided with the knowledge, the skills, the support and incentives necessary to help them feed and clothe and power us profitably

With a 2am start this morning catching up on all the things I don’t know that I need to know to be effective at what I do – bloody hell yes did I relate to this story Coal Seam Gas and Country Women #gogirlfriends

Women are very passionate and if you threaten our homes, families and livelihoods we swing into action. Clean water, air and soil are a right for every man woman and child in this beautiful country. We have a right to know how and under what conditions our food and fibre are grown. We owe that to ourselves and our children and grandchildren. The methane is still in the coal seams under the ground so the fight is not over. Sustainable energy is the way of the future. “You can’t eat coal and you can’t drink gas”. Australian agriculture has a huge job ahead feeding the world with only 6% prime agricultural land. If our precious agricultural lands are left unmined, future generations of Australian farmers will still be feeding the world in the centuries to come.

Watch some of these magnificent women here

Where does this leave all the wonderful people who work in the coal industry?

As some-one who has friends with friends who work in the coal industry its is also very important to me that there will be great jobs in clean energy technologies to keep them in work. Here is a great story about Mark Wiggins who after 20 years working in coal and hydro is a coal miner who has successfully made that transition

A career in power generation moves from coal to wind

With the mining boom now at an end, Australia is grappling with a sharp jobs contraction in the coal, gas and resources sectors. As thousands of workers contemplate their futures, many of those in regional Australia will increasingly look to jobs in clean energy technologies to keep them in work.

Wind farms are a logical next step for workers experienced in fossil fuel power generation and that neatly describes the trajectory of AWA member, Mark Wiggins. After 20 years working in coal and hydro, Mark is now Operations Manager at Boco Rock Wind Farm, standing on the Monaro plains, 150 km south of Canberra

Never underestimate our farmers – not only can they feed the world they can also power the world

We all know farmers feed, clothe and house the world the question that is the key focus of my lobbying activities going forward will answer is – can they also power the world through renewables?

Working alongside me are the dedicated Young Farming Champions team at Picture You in Agriculture who also believe our farmers can help power the world. They are not alone and they have joined forces with a very powerful group (both in size and capacity) of people who vehemently share this belief

There is no denying that an poltical environment in Australia that facilitiates and encourages our farmers and their equity partners to invest in reneawble enery will provide a watershed opportunity for our farmers to not only leave a phenomenal legacy for the planet, it will also provides a new, exciting and pivtoal opportunity for farmers to significant reduce the market and prodcution inputs volitiltyand business risk that a reliable source of dual income from farmers putting energy back into the grid offers

I look forward to sharing our journey to get the Abbott government to share our vision and make it their mission to deliver the necessary incentives and policy to turn “Farmers feed and powers us” from possible into reality

This week as I attended face to face meetings and participated in conference calls from unique locations I was constantly reminded of another often unrecognized service our farmers provide

Last Wednesday saw me travel down the south coast of NSW to meet with farmers and bright minds who share my vision and I documented my journey through the following photographs

Enjoy this pictorial reminder our farmers are the unpaid park keepers of Australia.

Sunrise on my front verandah greeted me like this…….

Salute to Michael and Nicholas Strong who wake up every day committed to growing the best pasture ( and they do) the magnificent rain fed soil the landscape at Clover Hill rarely fails to deliver

Salute to the magnificent and adorable herd of record breaking “girls” our family has selected and bred over the past 40 years

On my journey I took this picture of contented bliss on the Burke family farm

My meeting with Mike Logan ( Dairy Connect) and Rob McIntosh ( Chair NSW Farmers Dairy Committee) took place in front of these scenes at the McIntosh Family farm

and then it was back home as the sun set on our gorgeous girls

Yes our farmers and Australia’s landscape are definitely worth my time. I look forward to sharing our journey to ensure Australian farmers get a fair return on their significant investment in the health, wealth and happiness of all Australians

Innovators and first followers are a special breed we should all celebrate

Being a dairy farmer can be extraordinarily rewarding but there is no denying its 24/7 and you just can’t turn the cows off and shut up shop and go on holiday whenever you want to.

So just imagine if a technology came along that milked the cows for you.

Well it has – bring on the robots courtesy of the highly innovative team at Future Dairy at Sydney University

Cows that milk themselves voluntarily with the help of robots is only one example of the many technologies that are available to our dairy farmers. At the moment there are 34 robotic milking farms in Australia (with at least another 8 being installed).

Robotic Rotary Dairy

This represents a total of 135 robots milking around 9,100 cows, producing almost 50 million litres of milk per year. A small proportion of the Australian dairy industry (9.2 billion litres), but definitely growing in interest and adoption.

The average Automatic Milking System (AMS) farm has 268 cows milked through 4 robots (range of 110 and 2 robots to 550 and 8 robots).

These AMS installations cover every commercially available type in Australia (two brands offering single box robots, two brands offering multi box robots and one brand offering the robotic rotary).

The AMS operate across a range of farming system types from grazing with some supplementary grain feeding (82% of farms) to farms where all the cows are housed (12% of farms).

Cows live the luxury life with access to supplementary feed under shelter

Every dairy state in Australia has farmers that are currently operating with AMS and farmer discussion groups where they can share their trials and tribulations and success stories have been established in Victoria and Tasmania as well as the NSW Dairy Innovation Group which discusses all things technology and innovation.

There is no denying the gutsy early adopter farmers should be applauded as new technology invariably comes at a large capital cost with a high new technology frustration cost and a small group of vocal detractors sitting in the wings waiting with glee for you to go broke.

Different farmers adopt technologies for different reasons. So it’s imperative that farmers achieve the expectations behind the technology adoption and there is no denying expectations need to be the right ones too!! Check out the Future Dairy’s Case Studies.

Imagine how excited our industry is to hear the Future Dairy team is in the running for Australia’s most prestigious science accolade The Eureka Prize

Innovators and first followers are a special breed we should all celebrate – the bright minds who wake up every day with big ideas to change the way we live, work and play and the brave people who the test the waters and help the innovators get it right for the rest of us.

Change is hard

I must admit when I played a big role in the management decisions at Clover Hill there were so many times we were tempted to get on board with some of these new technology breakthroughs that were thwarted by lack of funds, lack of room, lack of IT knowledge ad infinitum but never a lack of desire to get the best outcomes for our cows, our team,our business and the land we have stewardship of

Innovators and Early Adopters, both work hand-in-hand to bring new technology into use. Innovators are the great thinkers in the realm of technology; they create the latest and greatest, cutting edge technology, while Early Adopters can see what the Innovators have created, and find the practical application of the new technology and begin using the Innovators’ creations and applying their ideas.

I sit in the stands and watch with fascination and loudly cheer on all the early technology adopter farmers in our dairy industry.

You are a gutsy bunch of people and you deserve every success and you couldn’t have a better support network than the team at Future Dairy

Also hearty congratulations to Professor Snow Barlow another legend in agriculture for his selection as a Eureka Prize finalist

Thanks to Dr Nico Lyons for his assistance with the data in this article

Interesting article How Robotics is Transforming 21st Century Farming