Spotlighting and celebrating locals

A bold project to link up and cross-pollinate the efforts of organisations across the Mildura region to help community resilience and drought risk management has proven a great success.

The title of the proposal said it all: “The Mallee Matters: Achieving whole of community drought preparedness through inclusive collaboration, social network analysis and leadership cultivation in NW Victoria.”

Funded by a $65,920 grant, Mallee Sustainable Farming (MSF) coordinated the program, uniting the vision of a range of not-for-profit and community organisations and building on the group’s experience working with Climate Change Scientists from the South Australian Research and Development Institute.

One element of the program, led by Dr Jay Cummins, involved producing reels for social media. Topics included teaching refugees how to better manage water resources on their plots in The Food Next Door Co-op, to A Think Locally Act Globally project with guest presenters from India, Nepal and Bangladesh offering a global perspective on the importance of community resilience. Other groups featured in the mini-documentaries included the Emerging Leaders Program and the work of the Birchip Cropping Group’s Young Farmers Network.

“It was a good process to come together and to develop a greater appreciation of what the particular needs are within the rural communities and what people’s view of the world is and what their definition of community resilience is and what their priorities were to help build that as well,” Jay said.

Jay said they were most proud of the way the reels brought people and stories together, celebrating local achievements and demonstrating what is possible when regional communities work together to create a drought-resilient future.

“With our agri-reels production it was about building up the skills and understanding of all project partners in terms of using social media to promote local initiatives, but also placing a positive emphasis on the value of rural communities in terms of employment opportunities in agriculture and natural resource management,” he said.

“It was about improving communication and getting the message out there as well.

“But providing that communication network, I think we’re really pleased with the series of newsletters that we produced for the project as well.

“So, it was about improving and sharing knowledge but also celebrating the successes of the project.”

One of their most significant achievements Jay said was building a strong team spirit among participating organisations, with trust developing over time to build meaningful connections between previously isolated organisations.

He was most proud of how MSF modelled this collaborative spirit and led by example, such as in the tailored leadership initiative for women which empowered a small group of rural women to develop self-confidence and leadership capabilities.

“Those projects certainly helped identify how they could better support, provide more of a targeted approach to working with small business in rural communities,” Jay said.

“I think it gave improved understanding of what the challenges are within these different segments of the community.

“If you look at the Birchip Cropping Group, their focus was on supporting young farmers, but it was about building connection and a community of young farmers and trying to instil confidence in the future in the farming industry.

“It’s about being able to talk to one another and have that fellowship in both the good and the poorest seasons. They’re certainly important elements of resilience. Building their confidence and self-esteem as well.

“It’s a bit like setting up a new football team and you bring in players from a dozen different clubs or organisations and at the end of the day, we’re all kicking goals together as well and we’re able to sort of build up that element of trust and trust in one another and the organisations as well. So that’s probably the biggest achievement.”