Community resilience

BY DAN GALLIGAN, CEO, CANEGROWERS

The shackles of a frustrating 2024 season are going to take some time to recover from for many in our industry.

The sense of frustration, exhaustion and annoyance is palpable in many districts. In my discussions with many growers you can feel the bow wave effect of issues that are affecting the industry at all levels is somewhat all consuming.

Whether it be declining business profitability, reduced farm productivity, loss of harvesting capacity, inability for the mills to crush the crop, or the uncertainty around the sugar market and the potential winners and losers in a new world of biofuels diversification.

Our district network at CANEGROWERS ensure we have a direct line to the paddock so we see, hear and feel these issues, because it is the growers who lead our organisation who are at the coal face of these challenges.

A problem shared is a problem halved. And there is no greater truism that should be relied upon when we think of the many wicked problems we may face as an industry. They are wicked because the dynamics of these issues are ever changing with multiple forces and impacting many, many people.

The solutions are neither simple nor obvious in all circumstances. However progress can be made if we come together to not only share the challenges but to collaborate on the solutions and to share in the benefits.

We are a resilient industry, you don’t survive and thrive in agriculture for over 100 years without working through some challenges and bouncing back from setbacks.

We can take these skills and apply them now if we are committed to it. CANEGROWERS is opening the door to the opportunities for growers to deliver on a successful future for the industry.

The first is about service to our community. Nominations are now open for CANEGROWERS leadership positions. It’s a call-to-action opportunity for all members who not only have an opinion but want to action on it. Districts across the industry are looking for talent and committed growers to step forward and contribute in any way they wish.

It’s also a privilege to see how farm leaders reflect at the end of their representative careers and learn from them, what they gained from the experience. While they often will tell ‘war stories’ of the difficult issues or hard meetings, they mostly reflect on how much they learned, how many friends they made, how rewarding the experience of industry participation really was. Indeed, for many of our retiring representative leaders they appear to have gained almost as much as they have given.

The second opportunity is more community then leadership focus. Our Sugar Cubed 2025 forum being held from 27-29 April will be a fantastic event to come together as an industry to work these challenges into real solutions.

We have put together an engaging agenda full of new information and with plenty of space to work together on delivering a shared approach that will deliver growth for our industry. Our work on Sugar Cubed has been enhanced this year by partnering with the ASSCT Conference to allow growers who wish to stay on and meet and discuss our latest effort in research and extension from both within our industry and around the world.

So whether you have ideas that you want to come into reality by putting your name forward in the CANEGROWERS elections, or you want to come together as a community at Sugar Cubed 2025, there are actions that we can all take right now to turn the page on 2024, and shine a light on the bright future many of us do see for this industry.