Anne Ruston (SA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Tonight it gives me great pleasure to speak on the Rural Industries Research and Development Corporation's Rural Women's Award. While we are in the chamber tonight the annual award dinner is being held in the Great Hall. It is a fantastic initiative that RIRDC undertakes to encourage rural women in Australia to achieve their potential. There is no doubt that it is the pre-eminent award for Australian rural women. It aims to identify and support emerging women leaders who have proven their desire, their commitment and their leadership potential to make a greater contribution to primary industries and our rural communities.

The award acknowledges the leadership capacity of these women. It strives to effect change and to influence outcomes through connecting women, collaborating and creating opportunities for women to be able to reach their full potential in their particular areas of activity. It also encourages the primary industries themselves and their communities to embrace diversity and leadership. It also seeks to embrace future challenges through the increased involvement of women in the decision-making process in rural and regional Australia.

The award sponsors these women both professionally and financially. Each territory and state has a winner. Tonight there are seven state finalists who are eagerly awaiting the announcement of who will be the national winner. Each of the seven women who has been chosen as the person from their state is already a winner in their own right. They will receive a $10,000 bursary, which they can use in the way that they like—on a project or a plan—so that they can develop their passion or the idea that they want to do for their business or community. They will also be put through the Australian Institute of Company Directors course so that they can have the opportunity to learn more about the senior management roles, which our rural women so often miss out on. So it is an amazing opportunity for our rural women to further their leadership development.

One of the other things that this award does very successfully is gather together the alumni—the winners from previous years. These women, who have been successful and have had their year as a winner, mentor and assist the next round of winners. I would like to acknowledge Mary Retallack, who was the South Australian winner in 2012. Mary continues to come back, even at her own expense, because she believes that having once won this award that she has a responsibility and an obligation to mentor the women who follow her. She is here tonight. She is mentoring women in the wine industry, which is Mary's background, but she is also here to support our South Australian finalist.

The award is open to all women who are involved in primary industries or rural Australia. It does not require any formal qualifications whatsoever. All the applicants have to do is express their interest through an expression of interest process and fill in their application form. The application process alone provides a leadership development opportunity, because the organisation, the RIRDC, requires the applicants to go through a very detailed process in order to assess their applications.

The bursary that I mentioned earlier can go towards developing a plan, a project or an initiative that the applicant believes is going to contribute to Australia. It could be in the area of innovation, creativity, community sustainability, education, productivity, agribusiness or regional development. Any of these areas are acceptable. The award can be used for formal training in business management, leadership, overseas study, establishing business plans or pilot programs, developing educational promotional campaigns, networking, forums, conferences, increasing knowledge in industries and markets or developing training programs. It is a very, very broad range of things in which the winners are able to use their money to invest in their own future.

As I said, tonight there are seven winners sitting in the Great Hall at the moment, waiting for the Minister for Agriculture, on behalf of RIRDC, to announce the winners. I would certainly like to acknowledge those winners. From South Australia, Sarah Powell is the finalist. Sarah is part of a family-run mixed-farming business at Wharminda, on the Eyre Peninsula. Sarah's great belief is that community groups are an important vehicle for young people and women to gain access to the essential skills and confidence that will ultimately increase their community participation. She also believes that the culture of mentoring in sporting clubs empowers young ambassadors and gives them confidence and motivation to step up in their clubs and communities. She is intending to use her $10,000 bursary to establish and manage a pilot program called the Champions Academy to foster personal development through sport and mentoring and teaching aspiring leaders how to lead by example, act with integrity and think selflessly.

Sherrill Stivano is the winner from Queensland. She is a partner in her family's cattle feedlot operation and hay growing business near Roma, in Queensland. Sherrill was the founding member of the Ask An Aussie Farmer social media campaign, which came to light at the time of the live export bans. She believes in bringing together consumers and farmers through the use of social media and that building a mutual understanding of what goes into producing Australian food and fibre is something that needs to be addressed and also bringing the consumer in touch with the farmer.

The Tasmanian finalist this year is Carol Bracken. Carol is a hazelnut grower from Glengarry. She established Tamar Valley Hazelnuts with her family five years ago. She is a passionate supporter of emerging industries, particularly in Tasmania. She believes that boosting local jobs and the diversity of industries in her state is an absolute priority.

The 2015 Victorian winner is Katie Finlay. Katie is a third-generation orchardist who owns and operates the Mt Alexander Fruit Gardens, which grows more than 90 different varieties of organic fruit. Katie believes that creating strong and sustainable local food systems is important. She also wants to encourage better connections between consumers and farmers and hopes to raise awareness of the food that is grown in our community and provide better opportunities for farmers to sell directly to consumers. To achieve this, she would like to support farmers to take greater control over their supply chains by taking part in farmers' markets, using social media to share stories and develop communities around farms.

The Western Australia 2015 winner is Tress Walmsley. Tress is the chief executive officer of Intergrain. She has built a successful career in the grains industry. Her passion is about involving women in the grains industry. Her previous work in the TopCrop Families program facilitated young female growers to undertake study tours of the east coast of Australia to see how things were done on the other side of the country.

The New South Wales winner is Cindy Cassidy. Cindy comes from the Riverina region. She settled there on a family farm with her young daughter to take up the role of chief executive of FarmLink Research, a non-profit farming system group based in Temora servicing farmers and agribusinesses across that region. Cindy's ambition is to improve the relevance and effectiveness of local agriculture extensions in order to support farmers in the adoption of innovations and to maximise returns from investments in agricultural research and development.

Finally, the Northern Territory winner is Dr Sally lsberg. Sally runs her own company, the Centre for Crocodile Research, which conducts research and development programs to increase the efficiency and productivity of the Australian crocodile industry. Sally's ambition is to encourage more women scientists to diversify into primary industries and research.

You can see the seven women who have been successful in becoming winners for their state or territory have two main areas of endeavour. One is to further the opportunities that research and development give the agricultural industry in Australia. The other is to create greater connections between consumers and farmers so that people understand far better where their food comes from.

One of the very important thing that has come out of this whole particular program is an understanding of the lack of understanding of consumers in metropolitan areas about where their food comes from, how it is grown and how important it is that we as a country continue to foster and nurture our agricultural industry. One thing is for sure: in the future, Australia will have a huge opportunity to be a world leader in food growing. But, most importantly, we need to pick up the opportunities that we have for innovation and technology in food manufacturing. This group of young women who have been successful winners are going to further those opportunities for all Australians.

Senate adjourned at 19:56