Support for verifying environmental and animal welfare performance
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Australian Landcare Management Group wins SA Farmbis training award23-Jun-2008
The ALM Group received the Merit Award for training excellence in the category of Natural Resources Management. The ALM Group is a farmer-led organisation that runs Australia’s only externally audited, whole-of-farm, catchment-linked environmental management system. The award was accepted by Bruce Munday, South Australian landholder and ALM Group board director. Bruce says that the award recognises the achievements of many people including landholders in South Australia, Victoria, New South Wales and Queensland who have been responsible for developing and implementing the innovative ALM system. In South Australia landholders participated in ALM training workshops at Birdwood in the Adelaide Hills and at Peterborough in the Rangelands. “All of these farmers operate in the SA Murray-Darling Basin and are acutely aware of their environmental responsibilities,” said Bruce. The workshops introduced farmers to the internationally recognised environmental management system or provided a refresher for those who had been part of earlier training. “The key achievement is that we have taken an internationally recognised environmental management system and made it practical and cost effective for Australian farmers without losing the important credibility and recognition factors. “For all of us the ALM system provides a credible and practical tool for improving our natural resource management, and the training course was a great way in. “Because our performance is audited, we can demonstrate with confidence that we are meeting our property and catchment responsibilities on a path of continuous improvement. “Markets and the community more broadly are quite rightly looking for evidence that food and fibre have been produced in an environmentally responsible way. All of the landholders in these courses are proud that they can demonstrate these credentials,” Bruce said. The ALM Group acknowledged the critical support provided to it by Elders through the Elders Landcare Farming Program where the company has taken a key leadership role in promoting a national approach to the adoption of an internationally recognised environmental management system. Hosted by ABC Country Hour’s Annabelle Homer at the Sebel Playford in Adelaide, the awards celebrated South Australia’s training excellence. Laura Fell, FarmBis State Planning Group Chair, said with the FarmBis program coming to an end on the 30 June, the night was a fantastic opportunity to celebrate the success of the program and its trainers. “FarmBis has supported training for primary producers in South Australia since 1998, recording more than 28,000 training occasions, but this wouldn’t have been achievable without the dedication of our training providers,” Ms Fell said. Comment |
