4 minute read
Invaluable skill set
BY RENEE CLUFF
Donna Campagnolo’s vast and unique combination of knowledge, abilities and experience is helping to steer the strategic direction of Australia’s sugar industry.
Silkwood cane grower Donna Campagnolo wears many hats. She’s also a scientist, an agronomic consultant, a horticulturalist and a biosecurity expert with experience in corporate governance, value chains, and export markets.
Donna holds a Bachelor of Science in Botany Zoology and over her career, has worked with a range of tropical fruit growers for the Queensland Department of Agriculture, most recently as the Manager of Operations for the Panama Tropical Race Four biosecurity program in the banana industry. She’s also researched and grown teak trees for a management investment scheme and owns and manages Australia’s only commercial pepper farm.
But whatever the task at hand, whether it’s clonal evaluations, fertiliser trials, integrated pest management, or dealing with government departments (and she’s certainly done all these and more), Donna always has a practical approach. She’s bringing that mindset, along with her ability to think strategically, to her latest role as Grower Director on the Sugar Research Australia (SRA) board. The third-generation cane grower is at the forefront of driving the organisation’s strategic direction, and she said it’s an exciting time.
“I think the way SRA is looking at the sugar industry is not just as sugar,” she said. “We are looking at the other things growers can benefit from out of growing sugarcane. I think that’s probably the way it needs to go for us to be viable. Every year, our margins become smaller and smaller, so you need a thousand hectares to make money.
“The problem is that growers get paid for the sugar, they don’t get paid for the fibre or the molasses. If there’s more diversity in terms of what we can get out of the crop, that would have to change and be reflected in the Sugar Industry Act. Otherwise, it would be up to the mills to have to change that formula. It could be particle board or cogeneration, whatever they make, the grower has to get something out of it. I think that’s important because fuel, fertiliser, machinery, wages for harvesting crews, all these costs have gone up.”
“Varieties are important and that’s probably the mainstay of SRA but there are a lot of other potential challenges and opportunities the industry needs to plan for, even if it’s in the background. But you’ve got so many competing entities for research. I’d like to see more collaboration and less doubling up when it comes to research projects.”
Donna is well aware of the importance of her scientific and governance experience in the SRA role. “I hope my scientific mindset doesn’t skew my thinking,” she mused. “Science is evidence-based and even a ‘no result’ is a result.
“The industry has to be innovative to be competitive. Failure is a result. Even in variety breeding, the failures are part and parcel.
You’ve got to try stuff
“If there’s transparency in decisions you make, to me that’s fine. If they’re decisions that people don’t like, it’s important that you can show why you came to a particular decision without any conflicts of interest.”
Donna purchased 47 hectares of cane land in the Innisfail District from her father Levi and Uncle Louis almost two decades ago, and today also leases a further 37 hectares. On any given year, she fallows around 10 hectares of land.
Improvements to the property in recent years have included an in-drain denitrifying bioreactor and extensive fencing on the farm’s rainforest border to keep feral pigs out.
Her other passion is pepper, carrying on a project her family began in the 1980s. “Dad worked in the Philippines, Indonesia, Argentina and Florida,” Donna said. “He’d do a couple of months helping set up cane plantations and upskill in terms of technology. He saw the pepper growing during those trips and decided to import some plants.”
The crop is predominantly grown in an equatorial climate. The Innisfail district has suitable conditions, being 17° south of the equator and in Australia’s wettest region. “Pepper needs high rainfall, that’s how it flowers,” Donna said. “Around 100 millimetres is required to bring about flowering.”
The vines are grown around hardwood posts. Donna’s crop is pesticidefree, with parasitic wasps used as a biocontrol to deal with problem insects.
During a frantic two-week window, usually in October, the peppercorns are hand harvested. Two to three tonnes of product are picked, processed and packed every year. Whilst it’s hard work in a narrow time frame, Donna said there is strong demand, with the pepper usually sold out well before the next harvest begins.
