Food and Fibre Great South Coast acknowledges that our region is on the traditional lands, waterways and skies of the Peek Whurrong, Kirrae Whurrung, Gunditjmara, Eastern Maar Nations, Jardwadjali, Boandik, Djab Wurrun and Buandig people.
We recognise the important ongoing role that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people have in our community and pay our respects to their Elders, past, present and emerging.
The Great South Coast Food and Fibre Council is calling on the regional community to voice its opinions as it seeks to understand perceptions of agriculture.
Council Chair Georgina Gubbins said an online survey had been developed in a bid to capture current perceptions of agriculture in the Great South Coast.
The results would be used to help inform a major marketing campaign to re-cast the image of one of Victoria’s most important industries.
“Food and fibre, which underpins about 60 per cent of our regional economy, is brimming with opportunity,” Ms Gubbins said.
“The industry is expanding and offering up increasingly diverse career and business opportunities. But we acknowledge that it has an image problem.”
Ms Gubbins said some negative lingering perceptions about agriculture could be holding the industry back.
“We can make a lot of assumptions about how our regional community truly feels about agriculture, but there is currently no data to back up what is essentially a ‘gut feeling’ at this point,” Ms Gubbins said.
“Nor do we truly understand why more young people aren’t looking to agriculture as a long-term career choice.
“This survey, which will be distributed widely, will help us to get some genuine insights into current thinking, which we’ll be able to use to help us begin the long process of creating a new and far more accurate image for agriculture in our region.
Ms Gubbins said the survey could be accessed via the Great South Coast Food and Fibre Council Facebook page or by clicking here until the end of March.
