BEEF Central publishes an occasional summary of appointments, departures and achievements occurring across the red meat supply chain, both private sector and government. Send details for entries to admin@beefcentral.com

• NAPCo flags branded beef intentions with chief marketing officer appointment
• ACC/Coles livestock team departures
• New CEO at Livestock Biosecurity Network
• Return to ‘Pink shirt’ for well-known property identity
• Droughtmasters appoint new president
• New recruits at RCS
• Final farewell to AMIC CEO Kevin Cottrill
• Passing of the ‘Territory Tick’

NAPCo flags branded beef intentions with chief marketing officer appointment

The North Australian Pastoral Co has clearly flagged the prospect of moving into vertically-integrated branded beef production, with the appointment of the company’s first chief marketing officer.

Experienced business manager Rob Blackwell was last month appointed under contract to the new position of CMO. He has a career spanning 30 years in fast-moving consumer goods and was previously the CEO of McWilliams Wines.

“Importantly, he has a real passion for our branded beef vision and agriculture,” chief executive Stephen Thompson told staff in an internal introduction.

Mr Blackwell’s other agricultural commodity experience included a term as commercial director for SPC Ardmona, and he has previously built strong working relationships with Woolworths and has direct experience in key Asian markets.

“From his time at McWilliams, he ‘gets’ working in family cultures and understands the importance of heritage, provenance and long-term thinking,” Mr Thompson said, in a clear reference to NAPCo’s own philosophy.

Mr Blackwell will work with the NAPCo leadership team to achieve strategic marketing objectives and “commence the company’s transition to add capabilities as a branded beef marketer,” staff were told.

It’s a big step for the 140-year-old pastoral company, which up to now has ‘stuck to its knitting’ in concentrating on grain and grassfed cattle production, rather than down-stream pursuits like branded beef.

Mr Blackwell’s primary responsibility will be in creating the brand plan for NAPCo branded beef product across countries, customers and channels for ongoing execution as the company grows its production capacity. Beef Central will keep an eye on NAPCo’s branded beef progress.

ACC/Coles departures

The Coles/Australian Country Choice northern beef supply chain has seen two recent senior staff move on.

David Daunton, a popular member of the ACC management team, has left the company after almost 18 years, most recently serving as livestock manager. Mr Daunton coordinated supply between ACC’s contracted feedlots and the Cannon Hill plant, as well as procurement for the company’s own feedlot operations.

His roles are now split between David Winter, livestock logistics manager (slaughter) and Damien Barsby, livestock-agribusiness manager (breeding, backgrounding and feeding).

Prior to joining ACC in 1999, Mr Daunton spent 11 years in livestock marketing with Wesfarmers Dalgety.

At much the same time as Mr Daunton’s departure, Coles’ head of northern beef procurement in Queensland, Jim Guilfoyle left the company, since moving into a senior property marketing role with Colliers International.

Mr Guilfoyle has extensive experience along the red meat supply chain, including lengthy periods in a feedlot trading role with Elders, and purchasing commodities and feeder cattle for JBS Australia.

He joined Coles in 2012, moving to Brisbane two years ago as part of his new role ensuring Coles was purchasing the best possible beef for its Queensland customers.

His new title with Colliers is manager – transaction services, rural and agribusiness, focusing on Queensland and Northern NSW.

He brings a wealth of knowledge to the Colliers business, along with his significant existing database of landholders and cattle producers in high-value production areas. Part of his role will be in transactions further along the supply chain, beyond production – a growing emphasis within the Colliers network.

He will be based at Colliers’ Brisbane agribusiness office for the next 12 months or so, but it is planned that he will later move to a new base at Tamworth in NSW.

New CEO at Livestock Biosecurity Network

The Livestock Biosecurity Network recently appointed Duncan Rowland as the organisation’s new chief executive officer.

Mr Rowland’s recent employment since 2004 has been with Animal Health Australia, where he served most recently as executive manager for biosecurity and product integrity services, strengthening the country’s animal health system.

His appointment to LBN brought his considerable wealth of knowledge and experience in biosecurity, animal health and welfare into LBN, a Network statement said.

LBN chairman James Kellaway said Mr Rowland’s appointment was a step in the right direction for the continued growth, and ongoing ability for LBN to provide excellence in biosecurity, animal health and welfare extension services to the livestock industries.

“Duncan has already contributed a great deal to LBN in his AHA capacity. His rapport with both LBN staff and directors and his understanding of LBN has him well placed to succeed as CEO,” Mr Kellaway said.

Mr Rowland starts in his new role in mid-October, marking a new era for LBN which will focus on creating enhanced partnerships, fostering innovation, providing outstanding services to stakeholders and securing sustainable funding.

“The LBN board has the utmost confidence that LBN will continue to deliver value to its partners, stakeholders and producers under Duncan’s leadership and with the ongoing contribution of its valued staff complement,” Mr Kellaway said.

Return to ‘Pink shirt’ for well-known property identity

Experienced northern Australian rural property agent Andrew Adcock has re-connected with Elders, the agency he started with 28-years ago in Charleville, western Queensland.

Mr Adcock leaves the Ruralco agency to rejoin Elders as its northern zone real estate manager, based in Brisbane, taking responsibility for New South Wales, Queensland and the Northern Territory. He last worked with Elders 14 years ago, before joining Ray White Rural.

“With the continued interest in the rural sector, it is exciting to be back where I started, working once again with my friend and mentor, Dick Allpass, and the iconic Elders brand,” he said in a message to colleagues and acquaintances around the industry.

“There are a lot of exciting things happening in the marketplace with the interest both domestically and internationally in all things rural, and we continue to field inquiries from international investors.”

Droughtmasters elect new president

The Droughtmaster Society has appointed a new national president, following its recent annual general meeting.

Taking over from Michael Flynn as president is Paul Laycock from High Country Stud at Eskdale in southeast Queensland. Elected vice president was Doug Birch, from Birch Droughtmasters near Monto.

Paul and family founded High Country Droughtmasters in 2010, joining 200 registered breeders, as well as holding the Performance Plus Droughtmaster Bull and Female sale on property annually in August.

“I want our board to continue to work side-by-side with our members, enabling all breeders, small and large, new and old, to continue with the tremendous success of the Droughtmaster breed and to grow and enhance their operations and achieve the success they seek for themselves and their families,” Mr Laycock said in a statement.

Also during the annual election of office-bearers, Kevin Woolcock, Mostyndale stud at Springsure and Doug Miles, Trafalgar stud at Morinish were re-elected as national directors.  Two new directors were also elected – Sharon Harms, Oakmore Park, Greenmount was elected southern zone director following the retirement of Michael Flynn, and Dean Allen, Western Reds Stud at Longreach was elected as the third national director.

New recruits at RCS

The Resource Consulting Services (RCS) team continues to grow, with Vic Milward, Katie Turner and Deann Baldwin recently joining the team.

Hailing from south-west Queensland, Katie Turner has recently joined the RCS team as a livestock extension officer as part of the MLA Future Livestock Consulting Internship Program. She will will work with RCS clients on all aspects that impact rural enterprises including business management, ecology, grazing, livestock and people.

Originally from Zimbabwe, Vic Milward joins RCS as advisor – soil health specialist. Vic has worked for many years in advisory, agronomic and marketing roles. His interest in biological agriculture and soil life has led him to the RCS role, where he will provide expert advice and services to clients across Australia, assisting them to optimise soil health and crop and pasture production.

Final farewell to AMIC CEO Kevin Cottrill

Long serving Australian Meat Industry Council chief executive Kevin Cottrill retired recently in Sydney after 15 years with the organisation.

New CEO Patrick Hutchinson gave special credit to Kevin’s dedication to the post farm gate sector (retail, smallgoods and processing) and the key role Kevin played in the 2003 merger between the Australian Meat Council (AMC) and the National Meat Association (NMA) that formed today’s AMIC organisation, which has gone on to be the single voice for the post farm gate red meat sector, and the only recognised Peak Industry Council representing the meat processing, retail and smallgoods industries.

Passing of the ‘Territory Tick’

Regular Beef Central reader Dr William (Bill) Ransome provided this heartfelt tribute to his father-in-law, Daryl John (Dick) Barry, a.k.a. the ‘Territory Tick’, who passed away in Gympie on August 10.

“I realise that Dick (as we knew him) was in no way well known or prominent in the beef cattle industry in any recent sense, or a ‘big shot’ by any measure; but he was a real character of his place and time across the North, and kept up contact with a great many of his Territory/Western Qld friends, even though his station work ended back in the eighties,” Dr Ransome told Beef Central.

“His type needs to be remembered, I think, by those who came afterwards. He worked on Creswell Downs, among several other places, in the early sixties – from age 15 – and was schooled in the droving game by Owen Lewis, just before road trains came to dominate the scene.

“He ran with the Darcys of Mallapunyah Springs for many years, sometimes making extra money ‘tossing bulls’ (dangerous but fun: £7 per beast, he said?); was shangaied to WA after a wild party in the mid-sixties – staying to work stock for a couple of seasons – and managed stations including Brookdale and Suvla in the seventies and early eighties.

“If you had met him in person you would know the type: only just over five feet tall, but with a pigeon’s strut and a rich, booming, country Qld voice. He was a very practical man, unassuming – excellent with horse or machine – and somehow, he seemed to be master of all he surveyed, though he owned none of it,” Dr Ransome wrote.

“There are accounts of aspects of his outback life which he shared, including a story (I believe it to be true) that Bob Katter  contributed to his running-away fund from Mt Carmel in Charters Towers, and buck jumping with the likes of Chilla Seeney on the rodeo circuit. There are many many other stories: he lived a truly wild and free Western life that I don’t think we can even properly imagine today.

Published below is the brief, and ‘deeply inadequate’ eulogy prepared by Bill and his mother in law (Dick’s wife) Caroline, for his funeral service.

Daryl John Barry was born at Tipperary Flats, Mt Morgan QLD on the 30th (or 31st) of May 1947, youngest of 5 – plus, there were always lots of extended family around, as mum, Annie, was eldest of 10, and some lived locally. So he played with lots of cousins. His dad was a miner and champion ballroom dancer who taught his son that it was polite – and popular – to dance with every woman in the room, where possible. This he always remembered. Dick also had a rule that if you went out for a meal in someone’s house, the MEN washed up afterwards. He was a fairly wild washer up (also dancer!).

He wasn’t into schoolwork, but liked sport and swimming, and unsupervised stuff like making a canoe from a sheet of tin. A favourite game on Mt Morgan’s steep and dangerous road up the range involved an empty cardboard box and a long piece of string and boys hidden from mystified drivers.

In later life Dick was a great reader, as Gympie Library could tell you. Westerns and Thrillers were his genres of choice. But in early days there was conflict at school with a fierce nun called Old Frizzy.

The family moved to Mary Kathleen, a uranium mining town, where Daryl’s father was a foreman. Dick always spoke of this town as a very happy place. It had a great swimming pool.

The Mines sent children to boarding school for their high school education, so off Daryl went to Mt. Carmel Christian Brothers, Charters Towers. He excelled at sport, and even more so at misdeeds. He and a friend stole – and ate- a whole cold roast intended for the Brothers’ Sunday lunch, and rode an infuriated owner’s young horses, which were grazing near the school. He and a friend raised an escape fund from their fellow students and ran away from school, but were caught on the train about twenty miles distant. The police were kind and fed the boys lavishly, which was always remembered with appreciation.

Daryl ditched school aged about 14. A job at Mary K’s telephone exchange was good, but a party (possibly held at the exchange?) was a bit of a mistake … He did love a party …

Aged 15 he drove the school bus at Mary K. His mother and the police sergeant fixed the driving licence, which remained an inaccurate record when it came to calculating his true age for many many years afterwards.

Daryl headed ‘out bush’ and became a stockman.  A head stockman he held in high regard and who taught him much, was called Owen Lewis. By this time Daryl was no longer Daryl but Territory Tick. He loved the night sky, and always said it was the camp’s bedtime reading. You lay there, watching for shooting stars. Sometimes Tick became camp cook – if required. He was a competent cook and could make a brownie too. The camp would go to places where they had to take mules with ‘the water canteen’. Jenny was a mule he talked about sometimes: she used to just stop and lie down when she thought it was time for a rest, and it was very difficult to get her up again – so in the end they just all stopped and had a rest when Jenny did.

In the off season Tick and other stockmen used to camp at a Roadhouse called Barry Caves. They were customers but also used to work as barmen or builders. They were a wild but good hearted mob, and friends then remained friends for life.

Tick roamed far and wide as a stockman. He was kidnapped at a wedding at Freweena and ended up in Western Australia. He knew Argyle Station homestead before it was sunk in a mighty man-made lake. He reached Alice Springs once, by mistake, on a bus from which he forgot to get off. Something to do with a bottle of rum; but great kindness was shown to him, as so often. He toured Alice Springs for a day, and was safely loaded on another bus to return to his proper destination.

Tick went to New Zealand. He missed lifeboat practice on the boat going over, some delay in the bar … He laboured picking tobacco in New Zealand and worked with trotting horses. On his one and only trip to England  he rode a horse into a pub, an event that is remembered in the bar of the Queen’s Head at Brandeston, to this day.

In 1975 Tick met his future Pommie wife , Caroline, who had come out to stay with her friend the equally Pommie Fiona, wife of Norm Darcy of Mallapunyah Springs. The races were on at Brunette Downs. Tick and Caroline were married the following year in Cloncurry. By great good luck stockman friend Toby was tracked down, with only a few hours’ notice, to be best man at their wedding.  By this time Tick had done a stint as a drover – Reg Fickling was his boss – taking cattle from Augustus Downs to Kajabbi railhead. Tick and Caroline then went to the Nobbies Station out from Quamby. By then, as well as Tick’s clever half dingo  cattledog, Sandy, the pair had acquired a kangaroo joey, Josephine. “I hope the next one looks a bit more like you,” somebody told Tick. But the next addition to “Ma and Pa Kettle’s farm,” as Tick called it, was Lucky, a poddy calf. All these went to Brookdale Station on the River Brooke south of Burketown where Tick was to be manager. Tick’s old Holden ute, reputed to be held together entirely by araldite and number 8 wire, got them there safely. They survived Cyclone Ted and by July 1977 had an addition to the family who did indeed look a lot more like Tick. This was Janie.

Their next home was Cotswold Hills, out-station of Suvla near Winton. Dick then became manager of Suvla. The owners disliked roadtrain prices, so more droving was done on the stock route (‘rout’) when cattle were due at Winton railyards.  In January 1980 Rosie was born in Winton. It was the hottest summer for 20 years, and Suvla only had 32volt electricity with  Dunlite wind power. Dreams of a ‘little green farm’ became a possible reality, and the cavalcade set forth for the Gympie region. By March 1980 home was number 2 Young Road, North Deep Creek.

Moving from the west was very hard for Tick. He loved home, but missed “out west” terribly. It took him many years to become a ‘farmer,’ but gradually he achieved it, and made lots of wonderful friends in the macadamia nut farm world and his local community around Gympie.

Dick particularly enjoyed working many years for Justin Houlihan, both on the nut farm, and doing cattle work, sometimes with horses the old way. In retirement, Dick took great pleasure in his social round, circling Gympie in his faithful 1984 Corona, and in his footy tipping with good friends Marshall and Annette and Lindy and Toby.

Dick was funny and charming, vigorous, good-humoured, cheeky, and cheerful. His voice carried across the hills and echoed through the valley. The cows looked up, and came to his call: ‘Come on, babies!’ He had a unique turn of phrase: ‘The doctor says I can’t eat that: there’s too many conservatives in it.’ Dick could be impatient and impulsive, and he hated authority, rebelling against any attempt to restrict his freedom. He was wild, but there was also a kind of guileless innocence to him. Dick’s attempts at deception and concealment were almost universally unsuccessful. He was one of a rapidly disappearing generation of true outback characters, and it was a great privilege and absolute joy to have known him.

As Dick would say at the end of a characteristically hilarious phone message: ‘Over!’