Beyond Soil Sustainability
Options to hear from a renowned regenerative farmer and inspire community members
Capacity building - LEP23_013_LLC_NC
The issue
Internationally renowned regenerative farmer Gabe Brown from North Dakota was scheduled to visit Australia in March.
The solution
Upper Mooki Landcare committee requested Gabe Brown to join Colin Seis and Walter Jehne, to give a workshop in March 2025 in Quirindi NSW. These three well known close friends had last shared the stage for UMLC in 2016. This was an extraordinary opportunity for community to hear in person from three “legends” of the regenerative agriculture movement. The event was M.C’d by well known farmer, Stuart Austin, who provided a commanding and thoughtful presence on stage. Walhallow Lands Council CEO Jason Allan provided an informative welcome, accompanied by a digital presentation of "Yurrandaali Dreamtime Animation - Creator of the Liverpool Plains."
The impact
UMLC determined that the purpose of the event was to
- Inspire and support attendees to change mindset and make the change from conventional agricultural techniques, and to
- provide information around “why” and “how” these changes can be done.
- Provide an opportunity for attendees to continue communications “beyond” the workshop.
There was a massive response to attend this workshop, with 260 attending (from SA, Victoria, NSW & Qland) and a waitlist. A Chat group was set up on the day for questions and is ongoing.
Podcasts of the day were made by Nviro Media.
Learnings
Feedback provided on line using SurveyMonkey revealed the wide demographics of the audience in age, location and amount of country managed, and overwhelmingly positive responses to the information presented by the speakers.
The Chat Group for the day was useful in conveying questions directly to the MC to manage the panel session. It has also become a Community of Practice site, with discussions on improving soil health; multispecies seed varieties and planting equipment; results of on farm trials; product appraisals; short vids of some of the speaker content; control of buffalo fly and paralysis ticks; and setting up a micro abattoir on the mid north coast.