Introduction
March 17, 2020
Hey Young Country readers,
I was born and bred in Feilding, Manawatu and grew up running around on my grandparents’ sheep and beef property near Kimbolton. Agriculture and farming was always something I was keen on from a very young age, and I was so lucky to have a family that encouraged that passion (even if it meant spending school holidays cleaning out underneath the woolshed). My family ran a poll Hereford stud for a number of years which I became heavily involved with, being gifted my own heifers as a birthday present in later years. Showing cattle and cattle judging quickly became a huge passion of mine and I was fortunate to get involved with a number of youth events within the NZ beef industry and win a number of titles.
I went to Feilding Agricultural High School and then studied a Bachelor of AgriScience at Massey University. After graduating I spent a year traveling Europe and then Aus, which is when I came across the company I now work for and learnt about their grad program.
The Australian Agricultural Company (AACo) is a nearly 200-year-old company and is Australia’s largest integrated cattle and beef producing company. We own and operate a mixture of properties, feedlots and farms making up around 7 million hectares of land in Queensland and the Northern Territory (over 1% of Australia’s land mass!). We specialise in grain fed beef and premium Wagyu beef production and are a unique company that control every element of the supply chain. I was so fortunate to be offered a place in their grad program and moved to QLD in January 2019.
The first 12 months of the program involved rotating around our feedlots and stations all over QLD and now I am in my second – and final – year working in more specific areas of the business. Currently I am based back in Brisbane in our head office working in our Breeding and Genetics team. 3 of our properties are breeding/stud properties that supply bulls to our other stations to produce crossbred cattle for our feedlots so I work closely with those.
I am living the best of both worlds, establishing a career in an industry I love and am so passionate about it, whilst having a “working holiday” and getting to explore another country. I look forward to sharing some stories with you from my travels and experiences across the ditch!
For more about Hannah Gibb, we interviewed her last year for Dairy Exporter.
