Department of Agriculture
The Australian Government Department of Agriculture is responsible for developing and implementing policies and programmes that contribute to strengthening Australia's primary industries, delivering better returns for primary producers at the farm gate, protecting Australia from animal and plant pests and diseases, and improving the health of Australia's rivers and freshwater ecosystems.
Smart Farming Partnership support for the Katanning Land Conservation District Committee
By creating a complete paddock to plate agricultural supply chain based on traditional Noongar saline bush foods, this project will revolutionise opportunities to improve degraded soils, restore native vegetation and increase agricultural productivity. The project brings together a Landcare Group, an Aboriginal Corporation and a farming enterprise in a unique partnership, with skilled sub-contractors, combining skills in farming, horticulture, monitoring, revegetation, marketing and traditional indigenous knowledge to create a cultivated supply of bush tucker for the fine food market. It'll pioneer shadehouse and paddock growing, harvesting equipment and a packing facility, and lead to on-country employment for indigenous people. The legacy of the project will be an opened global market for other farmers to sell saline bushfoods into, a training package to show them how, and an economically sustainable reason for landholders to restore the health of Australia's saline degraded soils.