Doing Well by Doing Good in Queensland
As part of our Doing Well by Doing Good Campaign, each of our State Committees is holding a related forum in the first half of 2023. In Queensland, it will take the form of a Rural Press Club of Queensland breakfast event in Brisbane on Thursday, April 20 from 7-9am at the Tattersalls Club, Queen Street Brisbane.
A panel involving three leading Queensland agricultural researchers and thinkers will explore the mutual benefits of investment and partnerships in international agricultural research with a particular focus closer to home, given Queensland’s own strengths and challenges in agriculture.
Their presentations are backed by decades of experience and global impact, as well as two recent “Doing Well by Doing Good” reports by the Crawford Fund, highlighting real and lasting benefits. With a conservative ballpark benefit cost ratio of 10:1 backed by international analyses, and many less quantifiable social, environmental, and diplomatic benefits in-country, to Australia and to the researchers involved, the Fund argues it’s a no-brainer to grow the aid funding of agriculture for development from the current level of around 2.5% of the aid budget.
You can register for the event through the Rural Press Club portal – registration options are at the end of the page.
The breakfast will be chaired by The Hon John Anderson AC, chairman of The Crawford Fund, and former Deputy Prime Minister, Minister for Primary Industries and Leader of the National Party of Australia.
Our speakers are:
Dr Brian Keating received the prestigious Crawford Fund medal for an enduring significant contribution to international agricultural research through a career focused on the productivity and sustainability of agricultural systems in Australia and sub-Saharan Africa. He is an agricultural science graduate of the University of Queensland (UQ) and then joined CSIRO where he worked as a research scientist, Division Chief, Flagship Director and ultimately as Executive Director, Agriculture, Food and Health. He was then an Honorary Fellow at CSIRO from 2016 -2020 and is now an Adjunct Professor at the UQ in association with the Queensland Alliance for Agriculture and Food Innovation (QAAFI). Brian’s talk will focus on mutual benefit of work in Sub-Saharan Africa.
Dr Beth Woods OAM retired as Director-General of the Queensland Department of Agriculture and Fisheries in 2021. She currently chairs the Council of the Australian Institute of Marine Science and is a member of the Commission for International Agricultural Research. Beth has served on boards and committees including for the GRDC, CSIRO, the Gatton College Council, the Queensland Rural Adjustment Authority (now QRIDA), RIRDC (now AgriFutures), the International Rice Research Institute and WorldFish. Beth’s talk will focus on mutual benefit of work in the Asia-Pacific.
Prof Lee Hickey is a plant breeder within QAAFI and a member of the Crawford Fund Qld Committee, which has a focus in our near region (Pacific, PNG, Timor Leste & Indonesia) by supporting Queensland researchers to carry out training and students with awards and scholarships. He leads a diverse research team that specialises in plant breeding innovation for crops like wheat, barley, mungbean and chickpea. He has a strong interest in the integration of breeding technologies, such as ‘speed breeding,’ with genomic selection and genome editing. His advice for speed breeding crops is sought internationally and the technology is now adopted by plant breeding programs worldwide. Lee mentors many PhD students and his talk will focus on his experience of personal and professional impact for him and his students on involvement in research for food security.
We look forward to welcoming you to our Queensland Doing Well by Doing Good event!