The Weekly Grill

S4 Ep40: A glimpse into the future of artificial breeding, with Dr Gerard Davis and Nick Cameron

A glimpse into the future of artificial breeding in the cattle industry is provided in this week’s podcast, where Nbryo’s Nick Cameron and Gerard Davis talk through the company’s ambitious plans to ‘condense seven years into seven days’ using a suite of novel technologies that promise to re-imagine livestock systems for future food resilience.

By any reasonable measure, the broader scope of the Nbryo project is visionary, and potentially far reaching. The technology is designed to have equal application for a progressive beef producer in Australia looking to produce more efficient and environmentally friendly beef, as it is for a smallholder farmer in Bangladesh with two head of cattle, who could improve his or her productivity by as much as 50pc in a single generation.

For this reason the project has attracted some serious early financial backers, including the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

 

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S4 Ep39: Regular cattle market update, with Matt Dalgleish and Chris Howie

Today's Weekly Grill podcast continues our occasional markets series, with host Kerry Lonergan talking with regular markets commentators RMA's Chris Howie and Ep3's Matt Dalgleish.

Weather conditions over the next couple of months will have a strong bearing on slaughter and store cattle prices heading into 2025, regular markets contributors Chris Howie and Matt Dalgleish suggest in today's episode of the Weekly Grill podcast.

The pair also discuss the impact of the Trump victory in Wednesday's US elections on Australia trade, the prospects for more Australian beef into the US next years as US herd recovery kicks in, and where the bargains are likely to be found over the next six months in the store market.

This will be the last markets update in Beef Central's Weekly Grill podcast series for 2024.

 

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S4 Ep38: Environmental Social Governance, Catherine Marriott OAM

In this week's episode of the Weekly Grill podcast, host Kerry Lonergan sits down with respected leader for change and 2024 Nuffield Scholar, Catherine Marriott who was invited to present at the BeefEx feedlot convention in Brisbane recently.

Over the last 20 years, Catherine has worked as an executive, a non-executive director and consulting roles in the agricultural, reseach and regional development sectors in Australia and internationally. During this time, she has become a proven business leader, communicator and organisational renovator, focussed mostly on leadership development, advocacy and delivering innovative solutions for the industries in which she works.

In this episode the pair discuss Catherine's journey through the Nuffield program, ESG (Environmental Social Governance) and where it started, its impact across Europe, Asia and the United States, and how if impacts Australian agriculture.

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S4 Ep37: Charlie Arnot, CEO of Centre for Food Integrity

In this episode of the Weekly Grill podcast, host Kerry Lonergan sits down with Charlie Arnot, CEO of the Centre for Food Integrity, who spoke at the grainfed beef industry's BeefEx conference in Brisbane last week.

He spoke about how global expectations around animal welfare are shaping beef production practices in Australia, and how the industry can help protect its freedom to operate.

 

S4 Ep36: Energy and Agriculture, Professor Ralph Schoellhammer

This week Kerry Lonergan sat down with international economist and political theorist, Ralph Schoellhammer following his presentation at Beef Ex 2024.

Professor Schoellhammer specialises in the intersection of political philosophy and energy policies. His work explores how cultural convictions influence policy outcomes, particularly regarding energy, industry, and agriculture, addressing what he sees as a cultural self hate in the West.

As reported earlier this week, Professor Schoellhammer advocates 'The world needs more Australian agriculture and mining". However, as Kerry and the professor discuss, the challenge lies in changing deep-rooted idealologies.

 

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S4 Ep35: Renewable energy services provider Carl Duncan

Momentum continues to grow in the sustainable and renewable energy field, with plenty of applications emerging in the beef industry's processing and lotfeeding sectors, especially.

 

In this week's Weekly Grill podcast, host Kerry Lonergan talks with Carl Duncan, former sustainability officer with Teys Australia who now heads sustainable energy solutions provider NRG-One.

The company helps agribusinesses reduce their carbon footprint for a variety of reasons, from reducing operating costs to making brand claims around carbon reduction.

How far can solar, methane capture and wind projects go in the bush?

S4 Ep34: Lotfeeder and grainfed branded beef exporter, Lachie Hart

The head of the vertically-integrated Stockyard grainfed beef business, Lachie Hart, sat down last week for an extended chat with Weekly Grill podcast host Kerry Lonergan.

Among a host of topics touched on by the pair was Stockyard’s experiences as one of Australia’s trail blazers in the field of sustainability performance-linked finance; the rapidly growing cost to operate in the commercial lotfeeding industry; Stockyard as a multi-generational family business; trials and adoption of new technologies like live animal scanning for marbling performance; and how the Stockyard business has evolved from its earlier heavy focus on Japan to other high-value export markets like the Middle East.

 

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S4 Ep33: Evolving state of Australia's rural property market, with LAWD's Danny Thomas

 

There's a lot happening in the international and domestic environment that's shaping the Australian rural property market heading towards 2025, leading property marketing identity Danny Thomas tells Weekly Grill podcast host Kerry Lonergan in this week's episode.

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S4 Ep32: Turning the tide on the anti-farming agenda - Claire Taylor

Young Scotswoman Claire Taylor has risen in prominence as an ag communicator since tackling a Nuffield Scholarship last year, helping turn the tide on the global anti-farming agenda.

Farming is coming under increasing fire on multiple fronts, and the industry has a job to do, to rise above the noise and present a stronger, more united voice against many of the criticisms thrown at its door, she tells Weekly Grill podcast host Kerry Lonergan in this week’s episode.

Throughout her Nuffield scholarship, Claire uncovered brilliant examples where farming has a voice at the decision-making table and strong relations with policymakers, the media, and members of the public. Her objective is to share these stories and encourage farmers to step outside the agricultural echo chamber and better communicate with members of the public, media and politicians, to ensure their voices are not only heard, but valued.

Claire grew up on a small beef farm on the west coast of Scotland, later studying Politics and International Relations at Edinburgh University. She spent ten years working with the BBC and the Scottish Farmer – first as a reporter and later as political editor - covering the ag sector she cares so passionately about.

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S4 Ep31: Agribusiness lawyer Trent Thorne on livex class action, legalities around drone use

Recent episodes of animal activists using drones to intrude on feedlot sites has reignited interest in laws and rights over intrusion on private property.

 

In this week's Weekly Grill podcast with host Kerry Lonergan, Brisbane-based agribusiness lawyer Trent Thorne from Hamilton Locke steps through the laws, regulations and rights surrounding drone use, and how they apply to commercial businesses like feedlots and cattle properties.

Among other topics, the pair also discuss developments in the long-standing live export class action following the suspension of live export cattle trade into Indonesia in 2011, and what it takes to climb Mt Everest.

 

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