The 2015 APEN Conference, held in Adelaide, delved into all things extension, from practical research to the theory behind information sharing.

The conference attracted attendees from across Australia and New Zealand, as well as parts of Asia and Europe, and although attendees had different home addresses and came from different agricultural industries, everyone’s roles in extension made them very relatable.

Common themes were how to have meaningful engagement with an increasingly time poor audience (producers) and dealing with the retraction of public funded extension – NZ provided some great insights into this.

Of greatest relevance to the GGA network were the following presentations (abstracts or full papers, where available, can be found by clicking on the link provided);

• Filling the innovation gap: Dairy industry response to the loss of government extension services – Neil Webster, Dairy Australia.
• Leveraging twitter to aid tactical fertiliser applications in WA Grainbelt – Liam Ryan, DAFWA.
• The effect of project initiators (farming group, scientist, shared) in participatory research partnerships – Marie McEntee, University of Auckland.
• The growing extension patchwork: Not dying but morphing – Jeff Coutes
• Using the Whole Farm Assessment process to improve New Zealand Dairy discussion groups – Simon Sankey, Dairy NZ

All presentations were recorded, and will be released by APEN following approval by speakers.

The GGA supported Alice Butler from SEPWA to attend APEN. She highlighted that the standout presentations for her were those which came from the Grain & Graze project; one by Cam Nicholson looking at the different farmer temperaments and how we in extension can understand those temperaments to better tailor our information, and another by Zoe Creelman exploring growers’ rules of thumb, the intuition behind decision making. She noted that they were very practical talks and that outlined the need to begin each project with relationship building (possibly a few more cups of tea) so there is a greater understanding of where both parties are coming from prior to the project beginning.

Alice said she would highly recommend this conference to all grower group staff, stating that the content was so well aligned with her day to day tasks.

Finally, GGA Project Leader Rebecca Wallis was awarded with a Highly Commended in the APEN Amabel Fulton Award for Excellence in Extension by a Young Professional, for her work in enhancing the capacity of grower groups to provide industry leadership.