Landcare Awards season kicks off!
The 2017 State & Territory Landcare Awards have kicked off with winners being announced in Victoria, Western Australia and South Australia. It’s wonderful to see the successes of Landcare being recognised across nine diverse national categories!
This year, 124 nominations were received from across Victoria, Western Australia and South Australia. Kicking off awards season, were the West Australian Landcare Awards, which took place in Perth on 30 August 2017.
A Landcare group working on the edge of the Nullarbor and a Wheatbelt flora expert were just two of the winners. Spinifex Land Management, based in the remote community of Tjuntjuntjara, were awarded the Indigenous Land Management Award for their collaborative work combining traditional and contemporary land management practices to keep Spinifex people, culture and land healthy.
Dowerin nursery owner Rob Boase was presented with the Individual Landcarer Award for his tireless work protecting unique and rare flora and vegetation across the Wheatbelt, and for his contribution to revegetation projects, cultivating a number of plant species through his nursery.
Landcarers from across Victoria gathered at Government House on 1 September, to honour the achievements of Landcarers, such as Ian Higgins, who won the Australian Government Individual Landcare Award. Ian has been involved in Landcare since the 1970s and has been a huge part of the success of the Friends of Campbells Creek Landcare, which began in 2000. Since then, Campbells Creek has been transformed from a degraded, weed infested dump to a site rich with native vegetation and great beauty.
On 12 September, Clare Golf Club played host to the South Australian Landcare Awards, with around 200 Landcarers in attendance. Governor Hieu Van Le was among the special guests at the dinner, which coincided with the three-day state Landcare conference. Winners came from across the state, including the Goolwa to Wellington Local Action Planning Association, who took out the Australian Government Partnerships for Landcare Award and Mount Compass Area School Swamp Ambassadors who won the Junior Landcare Team Award.
The Landcare Awards are held to acknowledge the achievements of the Landcare community who have been working to protect or improve their local environment, farms, coastlines, bushlands, wetlands, and schools.
To see if the Landcare Awards are still open for nominations in your state, click here.
