This week’s top stories from Young Farming Champions across the country.

In the Field

Another busy week in the bush! Art4Agriculture media and communications advisor Mandy McKeesick called into Wool YFC Bessie Thomas’s sheep station in outback NSW. Mandy and Bessie have worked with each other over the phone and email for many years but never had the opportunity to meet face to face. It was a wonderful chance to catch up as “old friends!”

Out of the Field

Thanks to generous sponsorship from Hunter Local Land Services, this week Art4Agriculture brought together its Young Farming Champions (YFC) and teachers involved in the Archibull Prize, for an informative and insightful series of workshops held at Tocal College.

YFC assisted teachers in developing strategies to implement the new Science and Technology K-6 and Technology Mandatory Years 7-8 syllabuses in 2019.

This professional learning day helped develop syllabus knowledge in ‘Agriculture’ and ‘food and fibre production’, quality PBL pedagogies, using the successful ‘Solution Fluency’ framework and strategies and resources developed by the presenters.

Workshop presentations from the YFC included Dairy YFC Jo Newton, Wool YFC Peta Bradley, Cotton and Rice YFC Anika Molesworth, Wool YFC Dione Howard, Cotton YFC Casey Onus, and Wool YFC Sam Wan.

Eleven teachers who are currently guiding their students through The Archibull Prize attended the workshops, which were tailored from teacher feedback from the Archibull Prize last year. The first session included the YFC speaking for 10 minutes on sustainable agriculture in their industry. The second session consisted of digital media training including photography, interviewing and video skills. On the second day the teachers put their new skills into practice on the Tocal farms to see and report on, agriculture in action.

On Saturday evening Art4Agriculture hosted a dinner with the YFC, teachers, presenters and representatives from the Hunter Local Land Services and Tocal College. The dinner included a presentation from dinner speaker, YFC Anika Molesworth of her ‘seven lessons of life’

Lindy Hyam, Chair of the Hunter LLS also spoke at the dinner on the importance of having goals and plans, as well as the importance of working in groups, the sharing of knowledge and to have a personal Five Year Plan.

The workshops were supported by Australian Rural Business Consultant of the Year Greg Mills, photographer Linda Faiers, marketing professional Gaye Steel and science communicator and journalist  Jenni Metcalfe.

Special shoutout to Tocal College for the use of their great venue and to farm manager Mike Ison for sharing his wealth of knowledge with us on the farm tour on Sunday

Tocal Farm Manager Mike Ison was a great sport providing knowledge and talent 

In other news, congratulations to YFC Emma Longworth and team who pulled together the Rural Science Undergraduate Society Ball on Saturday – straight after last week’s Farming Futures events at the University of New England (UNE).  Two guest speakers presented on the night, from Costa Tomatoes and NSW Farmers. The event was a great networking opportunity for UNE students as well as another chance to hear from industry professionals and UNE alumni.

Shoutout to  YFC’s  Sharna Holman who is visiting Dakabin State High School, Meg Rice who is visiting McIntyre High School and Deanna Johnston who is visiting Beaudesert State High School this week for the Archibull Prize. We hope you and the students have a fantastic time together!

Well done to all the YFC who attended the Australian Cotton Conference, LambEx and Sheepvention last week, across the Gold Coast, Perth and Hamilton.  Read more about it here.

Prime Cuts

Finalists for the 2018 Wool Broker of the Year Awards have been announced and two out of three are YFC! Huge congrats to Wool YFC Cassie Baile, from Australian Wool Network, and Wool YFC Samantha Wan, from Elders.

Read Cassie’s story in the Stock and Land here 

The National Council of Wool Selling Brokers of Australia’s Annual Wool Broker Award recognises excellence in wool broking, client servicing, auctioneering and/or innovation by a wool broker staff member who has been in the wool broking industry for 10 years or less. The winner will be announced the Wool Week Dinner in Melbourne on August 23^rd.

Read Sam’s story in the Stock and Land here 

To make this achievement even more special, the Wool Broker of the Year award have never been won by a woman, and last year the first time a female made the finals. Good luck to Cassie and Sam. You are both superstars!

A mega special mention and congratulations goes to Wool YFC Danila Marini who won the LambEx Young Guns Competition! Danila took out the title in Perth on Monday after developing a poster on a key opportunity in the lamb industry and presenting a four-minute speech and question time in front of judges. She was up against eight other up and coming lamb industry advocates from across Australia. Incredible work, Danila!

Read More about Danila’s win in the Stock and Land here 

 

This week’s top stories from Young Farming Champions (YFC) around the country (and globe!)

In the Field

The picking has started! Cotton YFC Alexander Stephens is picking Western Australia’s first wet season commerical cotton crop in nearly 50 years and this week he’s reporting live from the paddock on our Picture You in Agriculture Facebook page. If you don’t follow us on Facebook, jump on over and like our page so you can follow along as Alexander shares all about picking cotton in Kununurra. It’s going to be an exciting week and we can’t wait to hear more about it, Zander!

In Outback NSW, Wool and Dairy YFC Jo Newton and Wool YFC Bessie Thomas, had an exciting reunion. Jo and Bessie both joined the YFC and Archibull Prize programs thanks to Australian Wool Innovation in 2013, and as members of the Youth Voices Leadership Team (YVLT) they see each other via web conference for YVLT committee meetings every fortnight but hadn’t caught up face to face in years. Jo dropped in to help feed sheep for a morning on her drive across the state this week as she made her way to Armidale for the UNE Farming Futures events (more on that later.)

Big things are happening for Women in Ag (WAG) this month and next in the NSW North West, with YFC Naomi Hobson kicking goals through her role with the Local Land Services. Noami is part of an all female ag advisory team running five WAG workshops across the North West region which focus on technical up-skilling and social networking in a relaxed, supportive, safe and child-friendly environment. Topics so far have included ruminant nutrition and feeding, a practical stock handling and working dog workshop, welding and NLIS database training. Upcoming workshops will cover farm safety, being fire prepared, quad bike safety and basic mechanics (cars, large and small machinery). What a fantastic initiative, Naomi!

Menawhile in the Riverina, using Skype, a laptop and an interactive whiteboard YFC  Emma Ayliffe, standing in a paddock of cotton stubble, was able to beam directly to Sydney school students sitting in a classroom.  Read the full story here 
Out of the Field

YFC Anika Molesworth has been representing Australia in Argentina and Uruguay this week as part of a parallel program of Agricultural Ministers gathering in Buenos Aires for the G20. Anika met with some incredible agricultural youth groups who she said had a great energy and enthusiasm for farming in South America. “They were so eager to learn about the YFC program – how it helps to upskill and empowering young people in ag and connect urban audiences to food and fibre production,” she said.

“They were in awe of the program and what it achieves. It was also a great opportunity to tour farms with Australia’s Agricultural Minister David Littleproud, who stated his great support for young people as the future of our industry.”

Now back home, Anika is championing behind farmers currently affected by drought. Take a listen to her chat with Fran Kelly on RN Breakfast this week: Young Farmers are choosing a life on the land despite hardships

Congratulations to YFC Sam Coggins who has just returned from the Thought For Food (TFF) Summit  in Brazil. Sam, with two friends, is further developing RiseHarvest, a smartphone app designed to help rice farmers in Myanmar use fertiliser more effectively. This project was one of ten selected from 800 teams from 160 countries in the Thought for Food Challenge, which aims to find solutions to feeding the world’s estimated population of more than 9 billion people by 2050.

Sam said it was the, “Equal best conference [to Bayer Youth Ag Summit] I’ve ever been to from a networking perspective, mixing with a community of 200 like-minded young people from across the globe – entrepreneurs dedicated to ensuring food security for everyone.” Well done, Sam!

Check out the 10 Thought for Food finalists, including the RiseHarvest team, HERE

Back on Aussie soil, it has been a big weekend of networking for University of New England students and members of the agricultural industry with the annual Farming Futures careers fair and industry dinner. YFC and Farming Futures chairperson Meg Rice helped co-ordinate this year’s event which hosted 38 agricultural companies and industry bodies, 100 secondary school students and and over 500 university students.

Poultry YFC Georgia Clark attended through her role with the Royal Agricultural Society, Cotton YFC Martin Murray was there with AMPS Agricultural, and Grains YFC Rebecca Thistlethwaite attended with the Ag Institute Australia – recruiting 104 new members!

YFCs Jasmine Whitten and Lucy Collingride presented at the UNE Agribusiness Mixer on Friday night, talking about their experience with the IFAMA world conference and agribusiness case study competition where Jasmine’s team placed third in the undergraduate section and Lucy’s team won the intermediate section.

It’s networking season for natural fibres too, with LambEx, Sheepvention and the Australian Cotton Conference all happening this week!

Wool YFCs Adele Smith, Chloe Dutschke, Peta Bradley and Danila Marini have all flown to Perth, WA, for LambEx 2018. And  it sounds like an action packed weekend!

Adele and Chloe will be attending the Sheep Producers Australia Leadersheep Forum featuring CEO of The Center for Food Integrity and friend of the YFC program, Charlie Arnot. Adele said she’s looking forward to engaging with a fantastic line-up of speakers, including Clayton South on the practical on farm reality, Nathan Scott talking about the traceability with EID and the Australian Wool Innovation GrandsLand Dinner,  to name a few.

“I’ll also be heading off on a tour which includes visiting the University of WA Farm focusing on the Merino Lifetime Productivity Project and a visit to Genstock for a tour of the feed mill, AI Centre, Feedlot. I will also be attending the AWI Research & Development Update in Wagin.” Have fun, Adele!

Make sure you say G’day if you see Adele, Chloe, Peta or Danila out and about at LambEx!

In Hamilton, Victoria, Samantha Wan is hitting up Sheepvention. Sam is presenting the Elders Southern Clip of the Year Awards and will then be enjoying the sights and sounds of being surrounded by wool still on the sheep’s back – rather than in the bale – for once!

Well done on last week’s talk at the Elders South Australia Clip of the Year Awards, on your trip to Hong Kong for the International Wool Textile Organisation congress, too Sam.

To the Gold Coast, where cotton growers are converging this week for the Australian Cotton Conference. If you’re headed that way, keep your eyes peeled for Cotton YFCs Emma Ayliffe, Casey Onus, Anika Molesworth,  Jess Lehmann, James Kanaley, Martin Murray, Sharna Holman, Alex Galea and Sally Poole.

On Tuesday afternoon YFC, agronomist and farmer Emma Ayliffe will be part of a panel giving a short presentation on area wide management for the control of Silver Leaf Whitefly. On the Wednesday you can catch her MC-ing the Next Gen breakfast, which includes a workshop on social media and social licence and featurs guest speaker National Farmers Federation President Fiona Simson.

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Good luck to Anika Molesworth who will be presenting on soil respiration in cotton fields with different fertilisers.

And look out for YFC Jess Lehmann who’ll be a panelist at the Next Gen Workshop on “Farming in the Age of Twitter.”

Break a leg, Em, Anika and Jess!

And it’s a big week at the Cotton Conference for YFC Sharna Holman who will be busy promoting her new cotton biosecurity campaign:

This is hugely exciting news for Sharna, who developed this concept at a 2017 Young Farming Champions workshop “Enabling Change – Developing your project for change” facilitated by guru changeologist Les Robinson, followed by a “How to Pitch a Project” workshop with 2017 Rural Consultant of the Year Greg Mills and strategic marketing consultant Gaye Steele. Major kudos to you Sharna and goodluck with the rollout of your campaign!

Prime Cuts

Huge congratulations to Wool YFC Danila Marini who is in Perth today competeing as a finalist in the LambEx Young Guns Competition Today Danila was one of nine finalists to give an four minute presentation in front of judges at Lamb Ex, answering the statement:

“The Australian lamb and sheepmeat industry has a bright future, it is currently worth an estimated $4.38 billion to the national economy and has grown significantly in the past decade. Identify and discuss a key opportunity within the Australian lamb industry and how it will influence the future of the sheep and lamb sector.”

At the time of publishing Danila had completed her talk and was awaiting news from the juding panel. Fingers crossed for you Danila, we are watching this space.

BREAKING NEWS

YFC Dr Danila Marini has won the 2018 Lambex Young Guns Competition in the Career Professionals section. Well done Danila

Congratulations to Grains YFC Keiley O’Brien who has just been named winner of the 2018 Narromine Showgirl Competition! Well done Keiley and goodluck with this year’s Narromine Show on the 31st of August and 1st of September.

Lifetime Highlights

Mega congrats to YFC Prue McCormack and her husband Shannon who have just welcomed beautiful baby, Jock, into the world. Sending you all well wishes to enjoy this special time together as family of three.

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