THE first rule of agriculture is you do talk about agriculture. Helping people to do that has scored Armidale man Greg Mills the title of 2017 Rural Consultant of the Year.
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The general manager of GoAhead Business Solutions said one of biggest contemporary challenges in agriculture was how people talked about it.
Mr Mills said he worked mainly in the intensive livestock sector and with young industry professionals to confront big issues such as animal welfare activism and social licence, or community approval, to operate.
He said he helped them with “how we message around agriculture”, building trust through values-based communication.
“We tend to deal with a lot of off-farm stuff: customer relations, social licence, countering activists’ comments, helping farmers and young people [with] how we message around agriculture,” Mr Mills said.
He said questions of animal welfare, environmental impact and worker conditions were among some of the issues the community wanted addressed.
“There’s a whole lot of industry issues where the bad actor reflects on the sector as a whole,” he said.
NOMINATOR BECOMES NOMINEE
Mr Mills has been operating his consultancy business for about four-and-a-half years.
He was nominated for the award by a client, after himself putting some of his clients forward in previous years.
“I must admit I’m a bit chuffed; it’s good to get recognised,” he said.
“I’ve nominated a few clients myself and a few of them have got up over the years.
“It’s good for the recognition in terms of those people [who also won awards] who work in agriculture who aren’t necessarily farmers, as well – and our business is even one step removed.”
NEW STRATEGIES NEEDED
Mr Mills said winning the award was “a fantastic opportunity”.
“[It] will help me highlight the important issues currently facing Australian agriculture, like how the implementation of new technologies and production practices in the future will require continued community support,” he said.
“The award also showcases how rural consultants are rising to the challenge of assisting farmers with the evolving issues of increasing complexity in the modern agricultural environment.”
Mr Mills said “farmers and industries need new strategies to maintain their social licence to operate”.
“That is, the privilege of operating a farming business with minimal formalised restrictions, based on maintaining public trust,” he said.
“When the public trusts farmers to do what’s right, they won’t feel the need to impose more controls through legislation, regulation or market requirements.”
Not just a rural consultant, though, Mr Mills said he had worked with businesses “from dress shops to duck farms, painters to piggeries, abattoirs to apiarists, electricians to egg farmers, cafes to cotton growers, restaurants to rabbit farms and dry cleaners to dairies”.
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