Meet Your Finalists
Charlie Arnott, NSW
Charlie is a biodynamic farmer and grazier, who practices; regenerative farming, organic, biodynamic and holistic grazing principles on his 5000 acre mixed farming property, Hanaminno, at Boorowa, NSW. Charlie has won several agricultural industry awards for leadership, resource management and conservation. He has been an active Landcarer since the inception of the Landcare movement in 1989, with previous roles in all levels of Landcare, from district groups to the Sustainable Farming ambassador for Landcare Australia. He is passionate about growing clean healthy meat, which he sells direct to customers and butchers under his brand Charlie Arnott Natural Grass Fed Meat.
Simon Falkiner, VIC
Simon’s 600-acre mixed-enterprise family farm at Freshwater Creek produces meat merinos, cereals and oilseed crops, while prioritising farming techniques that preserve the land’s biodiversity.
Simon’s focus on maintaining soil health and his integrated pest and grazing management has made him a leading advocate for best-practice Landcare. His farm has hosted long-term trials, testing everything from soil acidification and biology, to pasture cover and cropping. He’s also undertaken extensive riparian restoration along Thompsons Creek to protect remnant vegetation, and assisted in monitoring the threatened Yarra pygmy perch and growling grass frog.
Dr Graeme Stevenson, TAS
Dr Graeme Stevenson, from Somerset Tasmania has 55 years of agricultural experience running his family farm as a farm labourer and manager, through his tertiary agricultural education, dairy extension and research, as an agricultural consultant and rural journalist. He has worked with Tasmanian dung beetles and agricultural earthworms in soil management since 1988. Graeme is a volunteer with the Elliott and Wynyard Landcare groups since 1993, as well as Somerset and Camdale Coastcare, Burnie Farmers Market and Tasmanian Organic groups. He has initiated and managed 27 Landcare/organic farming projects attracting $1.4m in grants majoring in on-ground works. Under the pseudonym of Dr Spluttergrunt, Graeme has acted out his ‘soil care’ presentation to over 60 schools. He has 20 years of applied research into organic and biological agriculture as sustainable farming.
“I am very pleased to maintain an association with Landcare through this award, named in my honour. The Decade of Landcare initiative I declared in 1989 has now spanned well over two decades. This in itself highlights the need and willingness by community volunteers to continually raise awareness and participation in activities directed at protecting the environment and giving their continued support to ensure that the practice of sustainable farming remains paramount.”
The Hon. RJL Hawke ACThe Bob Hawke Landcare Award acknowledges an individual who has demonstrated a remarkable commitment to caring for the land; champions better practices; and gives their time to share knowledge with others so that they too can prosper.
Esteemed Queensland conservationist and farmer, Stephen Burgess, won the coveted Bob Hawke Landcare Award in 2016. Stephen has run Wurraglen Nature Refuge in Dagun, Queensland for nearly 20 years, developing the property which combines sustainable market farming and light grazing.
In 2014 the Bob Hawke Landcare Awards was presented to Colin Seis, who is known as the pioneer of ‘Pasture Cropping’. Colin has fine–tuned and improved the technique on Winona, his 2000-acre property in the central tablelands of NSW.
In 2012 the first Bob Hawke Landcare Award was presented to Lynne Strong of Jamberoo, New South Wales who was recognised for her commitment, passion and leadership in sustainable agriculture through her award-winning dairy enterprise, Clover Hill Dairies.
The Bob Hawke Landcare Award is administered by Landcare Australia through support from the Australian Government’s National Landcare Program.