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Local OAM awarded environmentalist and Manager at TIDE (Taree Indigenous Development and Employment Services) Chris Sheed speaks with Gemma Bellanto about his passion for the environment, travel, education and the Manning Valley.
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Sheed. eing a 16 year old in London during the Summer of Love of 1968 has had a lasting impact on Chris Sheed; most of his major life decisions have been predicated by love, including his arrival in Australia and eventually the Manning Valley. Arriving in Elands in 1981 after years traversing the globe, Chris discovered terrain that was magical and under siege. Tell us a bit about your formative influences and how you came to emigrate from England to Australia? I had an English public school education thanks to a scholarship to study at Dulwich College in London. Living through the sixties, the hippy stuff rubbed off, and I was far more interested in Rolling Stones concerts and the liberal arts than attending school – so I dropped out at age 17 and worked odd jobs for a period. As a 20 year old, my then girlfriend, her brother and friend decided to take the overland trip across India to Australia, so I decided to join them. I bought an Austin 1100 for 37 pounds, and we drove across Europe and Asia, through Turkey, Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan and India through to Kathmandu, where I sold it for $400. We were in South East Asia when we discovered that the Australian Immigration policy was due to become much more stringent on British arrivals from January 1, 1975 , so we literally booked the last berth in the last boat out of Singapore to arrive on December 28, 1974. We anticipated travelling further to South America, but we loved Australia so much we all decided to stay – and are still here. I loved the wide open spaces and the rugged landscapes so far removed from inner city London. We were initially in Fremantle, and 58 manning-great lakes focus.
I spent some time working in the Pilbara before becoming a permanent resident. In 1978 I left Australia to do some further travel through Asia and spent a year or so in India. While in Goa, I met my now ex-wife and followed her back to the Manning Valley – where she owned a property at Elands. You received an OAM in 2000 for services to the Environment. Tell us more about this. When I first moved to Elands, I got involved with setting up 2BOB radio through the Manning Media Co-operative from 1982. Our first studio was the old SES shack next to Wingham Town Hall. 2BOB went from strength to strength. I became very interested in environmental issues and started doing a show in 1988 focusing on the environment. A friend invited me to come and witness the old growth logging operations happening up at Doyle’s River, and I was appalled at the destruction ... the waste. We formed Wingham Forest Action to stop old growth forest logging and reduce the wood chipping. We were involved in a number of campaigns; the North East Forest Alliance was an affiliate that orchestrated protest activities. We held a number of blockades in places like Mummel Gulf and Chaelundi and at Elands. Hundreds of us were arrested – including me. I appealed it, the arrest was upheld, but they quashed the conviction. That time of my life was serious but fun; we did lots of media work, publicity, promotion in addition to our protest activities. In 1995 Bob Carr came into power; he promised to protect the ‘old growth’ forests, and subsequently did a reasonable job. In the late eighties, as the president of the
Oxygen Farm Association, I was involved in the establishment of the Hundreds of 900 acre Oxygen w us ere arrestedI Farm Conservation – including me. st Reserve on arre appealed it, the but escarpment at , ld he up was Elands. We didn’t ey quashed the th Aboriginal Land Council in an have the funds to conviction. eco-tourism role. I then moved purchase outright, into working for the Community so I conceived of Development Employment Program the idea to buy the (CDEP), where I remained until I took up a land, subdivide nine small position at TIDE several years ago. In that building blocks, sell them off and use the time I have worked closely with John Clark profits to fund the project and establish the OAM, who has been a tremendous boss, conservation reserve. There were fifteen mentor and friend to me. of us who contributed $5,000 to initially What are your priorities in the near fund it, who later got our money back with future? interest. This was only the second Voluntary My immediate priorities are to get TIDE on Conservation Agreement in NSW. a solid footing. As an indigenous controlled I was also the environmental entity, TIDE is well supported by funding representative on the first Manning from a range of government departments Catchment Management Committee and has built a good reputation in the chaired by the late Mick Tuck, and I worked community as a competent and trustworthy for a while as the Manning Landcare Coprovider of indigenous services. ordinator. I am also keen to see the local business In 2000 I was awarded an Order of community take a greater interest in Australia for services to Conservation. indigenous employment, and TIDE is in the What is your focus these days? process of partnering with the Manning I currently work as the Manager at TIDE Valley Business Chamber to improve Services, providing employment, training indigenous employment opportunities. and other services to the Aboriginal What advice do you have for budding community. The pathway into this role was environmentalists? rather circuitous. In the ‘90s, I studied ecoThink globally and act locally. If I can tourism and natural resource management borrow from the cultural anthropologist and through CSU via distance education. This writer Margaret Mead (1901–78): “Never led to spending part of my Honours year in doubt that a small group of thoughtful, Vietnam interviewing ethnic minorities living committed citizens can change the world; in the recently declared Ba Be National Park, indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.” where I studied the impacts of tourism. Thanks Chris. Not long after I had completed my Story by Gemma Bellanto. studies in 2001, I was employed by the local