Southern beef and lamb school

Michelle’s upbringing on a farm in South Gippsland inspired her to study a PhD in Animal Science at the University of Melbourne. She has been working in the meat processing industry for 9 years and is Supply Chain Manager at Gundagai Meat Processors, leading the livestock buy team at Gundagai Lamb.  

Ethan began his career as a Livestock Buyer for Teys Australia in 2014 based in Brisbane. During the years 2015 to 2017, Ethan worked as the Livestock Manager for Teys Australia at their processing facility in Rockhampton, Queensland. Following this Ethan transitioned to General Manager for their Biloela plant, also in Central Queensland, and held this position for three years. Having finished working in the commercial space of Teys Australia as the Key Account Manager for Service Kill in Brisbane, Ethan has come back to the Livestock department working on National Feeder Cattle Procurement, servicing Teys’ three eastern seaboard feedlots. Complementing his processing and livestock knowledge, Ethan has a strong commercial and customer acumen having completed his degree in Business, Animal & veterinary Bioscience as well as completing his MBA from Edith Cowan University. 

Stephen Rennie is a respected leader in Australia’s livestock and red meat industry. Raised in Walcha on a beef and sheep farm, he began his career over 38 years ago as a livestock buyer for a North Coast processor. Stephen is currently the National Livestock Manager for Coles, with responsibility for managing beef and lamb Livestock procurement nationwide. Stephen leads a skilled team and works closely with suppliers to strengthen relationships and drive innovation in procurement strategies. He has championed sustainability initiatives, including the launch of Coles Finest Certified Carbon Neutral Beef and the expansion of Graze Grass Fed Beef and Lamb brands. His previous experience includes seven years as Trading Manager at Elders’ Charlton Feedlot and more than a decade in livestock, merchandising, and production roles within the Woolworths Victorian meat operations. 

Dr Sam Walkom is a Senior Research Fellow at AGBU. Sam’s research is focused around maintaining and developing tools to bring about realised industry change through genetic solutions and implement key findings into the analysis pipeline responsible for disseminating breeding values to breeders, allowing sheep and cattle breeders to take his research and produce real world change within their production systems. This is epitomised by Sam’s role in developing a genetic solution to footrot in New Zealand Merino.

Peta is the Manager of Sheep Genetics with Meat and Livestock Australia (MLA) and has held various roles within the MLA Livestock Genetics team over 8 and a half years. This includes roles within Sheep Genetics and across the Beef and Sheep Genetics R&D portfolio at MLA. She completed a Bachelor of Rural Science at the University of New England in 2017. Peta is based on a property near Armatree in Central West New South Wales where her family run a commercial and seedstock sheep operation alongside a cropping enterprise. Her passion includes enabling producers to access Australia's world leading genetic evaluation service and using it to drive meaningful results on-farm. 

With six generations of sheep breeding in the Taylor family, Chad and Louise have combined traditional farming experience with cutting-edge breeding technologies to produce the modern Mumblebone Merino. Using advanced tools to drive measurable genetic gain, Mumblebone is now well established as an industry leader in aligning high-performance production goals with the increasingly-discerning needs of their customer. Mumblebone’s industry-wide recognition speaks to the company’s unerring focus on innovative breeding and their quality team to bring it all together.

Rozzie grew up on a small sheep and cattle enterprise in southern NSW. She completed a Bachelor of Animal Science at the University of New England (UNE) in 2014, and went on to work in the beef feedlot industry for two years following. Rozzie now works for LAMBPRO, Australia’s largest prime lamb seedstock business and has done for the past 9 years. Her current role is Operations Manager. LAMBPRO provides genetics to over 350 lamb producing businesses around the country. In 2025, these clients produced over 1.4 million lambs. 

Professor Wayne Pitchford began as Lecturer in Animal Breeding and Genetics at the University of Adelaide in 1992. He completed Honours in Agricultural Science at University of Adelaide in 1987 and PhD at University of New South Wales in 1992. His teaching and research are in Livestock Production, Meat Science, Animal Breeding and Genetics. He has had research leadership roles in the beef, lamb and pork industries. His current projects are in genomics, maternal productivity, meat quality and data assisted decision systems in the meat industry. 

Genetic Program Specialist, Jamie Drury, WWS Australia, is responsible for the development and implementation of the genetic strategy program, ULTIMATE in Australia. Jamie completed a Bachelor of Science, majoring in Chemistry and Biochemistry, and postgraduate studies in Animal Nutrition and Agricultural Economics. Jamie has studied farming systems across Australia, New Zealand, Canada, USA and the UK. He has written and presented papers on topics that cover nutrition, farming systems and breeding. Jamie spent 25 years running his own dairy business and has filled Board and Industry representative roles. Jamie’s mix of education, research experience, industry roles and a lifetime of farming give him the ability to provide the knowledge and practical advice to succeed for his clients, implementing genetic strategies that drive business profitability.

Joe Grose is a Veterinarian and the General Manager of 3D Genetics. 3D Genetics is a animal breeding company that utilises science to breed the most profitable Wagyu cattle outside of Japan. 3D Genetics have a full time PhD qualified Quantitative Geneticist and a software engineer on staff who help run a modern genetic analysis and breeding program in-house. 3D Genetics now supplies approximately 15% of the Wagyu Bull power in the Australian Industry.

Growing up on the Monaro Sally developed a passion for livestock and agriculture pursuing a Degree in Ag followed by post grad studies in Genetics and Animal Breeding Management. Sally's career has taken a number of paths, working with NSW DPI for 20 years, before establishing her own consultancy business, SheepMetriX, in 2011. Based in Young NSW, SheepMetriX supports sheep and goat producers across Australia and internationally, with a focus on assisting clients capture and utilise data to make informed decisions around breeding program design, genetic selection, reproduction performance and grazing management. Sally delivers a number of major industry extension and research initiatives, all having a strong emphasis on taking the science and putting it into practice.

As the Agricultural Innovation Program Lead at Charles Sturt University's Gulbali Institute for Agriculture, Water and the Environment, Jane's research has focused on strategies to improve livestock productivity and economic outcomes for Australian farming systems using innovative field and technology-based approaches. She investigates novel pharmaceuticals, diagnostics and management practices for the animal health industries designed improve productivity in Australian sheep and beef systems, both pre- and post-farm gate. She has a particular interest in how good health maximises carcase quality and performance, and how novel technologies can assist the meat inspection process.

Bill has been a researcher and professor of agricultural economics at the University of Melbourne since 1980. His career focuses on farm management economics, risk analysis, and the economics of agricultural systems. Bill has taught farm management economics since 1985, supervised dozens of postgraduate students, and authored works including The Farming Game.

Vi Nguyen is a digital strategy consultant and founder of Ryka Global, helping organisations prepare for a rapidly evolving tech landscape. With deep experience in AI and digital transformation, agriculture and innovation, she advises industry leaders, organisations, academia and government agencies on AI adoption, digital strategy, and future-focused capability building. Vi has led organisations and initiatives in the APAC region on paddock to plate traceability, the delivery of the Australian Agriculture Data Exchange with Charles Sturt University, MLA, FRDC, AWI and CSIRO, on-ground AI capacity-building projects in Australia, Sweden and Vietnam. Vi brings a practical, human-centred approach to demystifying emerging technologies and enabling real-world impact.

Georgia Turner is the Livestock Supply Chain Support Officer at Greenham Australia, where she drives compliance and transparency across the beef supply chain. She supports the development of digital tools like Greenham Connect, improving on-farm data accuracy and producer engagement. Georgia works closely with producers to deliver programs such as the NEVER EVER Beef Program and the Greenham Beef Sustainability Standard (GBSS). Holding degrees in Agriculture and Business from the University of New England, she combines practical industry knowledge with strong communication skills and a passion for sustainable, future-focused agriculture.

Mark runs a 1200 acre mixed enterprise operation at Yin Barun, just south of Benalla on the Broken River consisting of Angus cattle, fine wool merino sheep, lucerne, cherries, organic pumpkins, foraged mushrooms and medicinal gum trees. He has a keen focus on positive environmental outcomes on the farm, this was acknowledged in 2024 when he was Awarded the Australian farmer of the year for Diversity and sustainability. 

Michael is a 5th Generation farmer in the Cootamundra/Harden region. After years away from farming, he returned in 2014, completed a holistic management course and transitioned to a mainly grazing business with breeding lambs and running backgrounded cattle. 

Steph has worked as an agronomist in South West Victoria, specialising in pastures and as a property overseer in Holbrook. A component of her latter role included optimising pasture production through rotational grazing and managing seasonal feed deficits. Steph is passionate about improving natural resources and sustainable agriculture outcomes. Since joining Holbrook Landcare Steph has managed ‘Testing Tropical Pastures’; a project that has allowed her to work alongside producers and industry experts to understand how a change in practice can support on-farm production.

Dr Guangdi Li is a Principal Research Scientist at Wagga Wagga, NSW Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development. His research interests are pasture and crop agronomy, acid soil management, mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions, including soil nitrous oxide emissions and livestock methane emissions.

Veterinarian, ruminant nutritionist and beef producer. Science and Veterinary Science degrees from Sydney University, Masters and PhD from Queensland University, and a fellow of the Australian College of Veterinary Scientists in Ruminant Nutrition. Adjunct Professor with the Veterinary School at Charles Sturt University, owner of Central Veterinary Services Cowra, and principal of the consultancy business, Australian Livestock Production Services. ALPS provides nutrition and herd health services to intensive and extensive ruminant enterprises throughout Australia, plus applied research, undergraduate and post-graduate teaching, and producer training.

Craig has 26 years pasture agronomy experience in the south west slopes region, based at Tarcutta. Working with a diverse client based of mixed farmers, wool, lamb and beef producers.

Jim Larkin, along with his son, runs a mixed farming operation at Binnaway in Central West NSW. Their enterprise incorporates a self-replacing angus breeding herd with a focus on genetics, hay production and cropping. The Larkins have a strong focus on high quality pastures, lucerne/chicory/arrowleaf clover, sub tropical pasture and forage crops grown over a wide range of soil types. They aim to continually improve their production system by improving soil fertility, pasture quality, weed control, grazing management and utilisation. Sustainable land management is a priority through improving infrastructure, water management, ground cover and livestock shelter.

Isabele runs a mixed farming business across three farms in the central west of NSW with her siblings Ruth and Floyd, and husband Pete. The core focus of the business is the prime lamb industry; researching and developing genetics, verifying genetic capacity and working alongside other producers to improve their lamb production systems. Isabele is General Manager of the overall business, and specifically manages the research program, stud stock breeding and commercial lamb production. Her knowledge and experience with data collection and analysis of carcase data feedback, both at a research and commercial prime lamb level, provide a valuable contribution to the producer/processor relationship conversation. Isabele actively seeks to develop communications with all parts of the supply chain, working specifically to encourage a feedback flow from processors and meat buyers to lamb producers. In 2024, Isabele was awarded Weekly Times/Coles Sheep Farmer of the Year.

Ripley Atkinson is an experienced agribusiness professional, specialising in the red meat and livestock sector. Ripley’s hands-on experience working across cattle and sheep operations nationwide gives him a unique, ground-level perspective on the dynamics of the Australian livestock market. Ripley, through his role at StoneX, is leading the development of risk management and hedging tools for Australia’s livestock industry to utilise and manage price and market risk. As Australian Meats & Livestock Manager, Ripley works with clients across the country in both lamb and cattle supply chains, helping them manage price volatility and market risk through practical, forward-looking solutions.

Peter grew up on a beef cattle property in the North-West of NSW and is a passionate educator.  Peter is Professor of meat science at the University of New England and president of the Australian ICMJ association. His research revolves around ensuring global consumer satisfaction of Australian red meat covering all aspects of red meat supply-chains focusing on critical control points which affect the eating quality of meat from genetics, to on-farm management, processing, tech to measure meat traits through to the consumer.  

After completing a Rural Science degree from UNE in 1996, Sharon has had 27 years’ experience working in the livestock industries - breeding and genetics, rural reselling, education and training with the Beef CRC, she has worked in the live export for 17 years (living overseas for 5 of those) and since the start of 2021 is now PM for Animal Wellbeing Research, Development and Adoption with Meat and Livestock Australia. Sharon completed a Master of Rural Science degree in 2007 which specifically focused upon the impact of long-distance road transport on the welfare of cattle, with emphasis on developing scientific indices to measure and quantify animal welfare. Sharon also has her MC license and on the weekend when time permits she loves to “drive”, this helps to have a good working knowledge of the livestock transport industry and associated challenges. Doing this as a side hustle helps link science with practical, on-the-ground solutions as well as an ability to relate effectively across a range of stakeholder levels.

A/Prof. Benjamin Holman is a Meat Scientist at the Gulbali Institute of Charles Sturt University, Australia. Before this, he was a Senior Research Scientist (2014-26) at the NSW Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development. Benjamin’s study of meat production, processing, and preservation has been impactful, benefitting stakeholders across the meat supply chain. His scientific leadership has resulted in his receipt of several prestigious awards, editorial board appointments, and invited contributions. Benjamin lectures and actively shares his enthusiasm for meat quality, its nutritional enhancement and sustainable production.