CHAIRWOMAN’S UPDATE Welcome to the June 2020 WA Angus News. Who would have predicted back in January, when our Committee had its AGM, that a global pandemic was about to impact how we interact as a society or the drastic measures that Government would need to take to protect our health and our economy? I think both federal and state governments, have done incredibly well to protect Australians. Key to this has been requiring people coming from overseas to be contained in hotels. Australians have responded over and above what may have been anticipated, and as a result, healthwise, we’ve escaped largely unphased. The challenge will be the economic recovery, but the early signs seem quite positive. For those who weren’t in attendance, there were some major newsworthy items at our January AGM which I would like to summarise here. •
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Firstly, on behalf of the committee, I would like to thank Mark Hattingh for his chairmanship over the last two years. This was a busy period which culminated in the very successful centenary celebration in September last year. Sincere and warm congratulations to John Young for being awarded Life Membership to Angus Australia at the meeting. Federal President Brad Gilmour was in attendance to make the presentation and we managed to organise John’s wife Lesley to attend the meeting, through some sneaky collaboration. John’s contribution to the Angus industry both in WA and federally has been highly significant, over his life. I worked with John on the centenary committee and I was in awe of the enthusiasm he possessed and the way he rallied us all along! At the AGM, we received a resignation letter from Mr Lew Smit AO, who indicated it was time to step back from his contribution to the WA state committee. On behalf of the present committee and past Chairmen and committees, I wish to extend a warm thank you to Lew for his outstanding years of service, too numerous for anyone to precisely recall! Elsewhere in this publication, you will find a copy of the letter that was sent to him. Sincere congratulations to Shezanne Gibbs-Hooper who was awarded the Strathtay Trophy for 2019. This annual award is selected by the Chairman, so in this case Mark, and announced at the AGM. Shezanne, who has had the responsibility of putting the WA Angus News together for many years, decided two years ago, it was time for a bit of a newsletter facelift – and I’m sure you’ll agree our ‘new-look’ magazine is a huge step-up. However, not content with that, together with Pam McGregor, Shezanne decided a special Centenary Publication documenting the history of Angus and Angus businesses in WA would be in order. This was distributed at the Centenary Day and is a wonderful historical record. We are incredibly lucky to have Shezanne work so hard for our committee.
We held another very successful heifer competition this year. Thank you to the 36 studs and businesses who contributed to the advertising campaign in the Farm Weekly during the lead-up and main bull selling period. Special thanks to the Neville family: Steve, Irene, Megan and Leigh, from Old Bambun Grazing who supplied this year’s quality heifers and to AFGRI and Farm Weekly for the opportunity to collaborate. Congratulations to Dale Gowland from Midland who won the heifers and AFGRI mower, and to Peter Hill from Laverton who won the other ride-on mower. The 2020 bull selling season is difficult to summarise, with some mixed results. Uncertain times including fires, the drought breaking in the Eastern states, continued dry conditions in parts of WA and then the beginning of covid, had an impact on clearances and averages. Congratulations to Coonamble and the Davis family on their outstanding result, selling 81 bulls to a top of $27,500 and an average of $9,407. As I write this, the rain is gently falling and we’ve received a very handy 14 mls. This is on top of 39 mls for May, which is an excellent start to our winter season here in Northampton. Winter has been marred only by a horrific dust storm which lasted 10 hours and relocated much of our top soil into and around my house! Wherever you live in WA, I wish you good rains and a successful season.
Liz Sudlow WA ANGUS NEWS June 2020
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