Eradu farmers Fiona and Liam Mann and Toodyay’s Darren Best nominated for Syngenta Growth Awards

Syngenta has announced the nominees for its Growth Awards this year with three West Australians being recognised.

Eradu farmers Fiona and Liam Mann have been nominated in the Innovator category, while Toodyay’s first generation farmer Darren Best has been nominated in the Sustainability category.

The Manns, from WA’s Mid West, launched their own range of cold-pressed canola oil in 2020 called BLOCK 275, which has since taken off and stocked by a variety of retailers across the state.

The canola oil is grown, stored, pressed, filtered and bottled on farm.

They also crop wheat, canola and lupins, and run a harvest and spray contract business to boost their income.

Mr Best has been running a crop production operation near Toodyay since 2008 after putting aside his boilermaker and welding skills for a life on the land as an ag contractor and now farm owner.

He took a risk prior to 2020, after crunching the numbers, by reducing his hay production from 60 per cent of the operation to 10 per cent, and expanding his canola operation, which he said had paid off dividends.

Syngenta said there was a “strong group of future focused growers, advisers and community leaders” that formed this year’s nominations, in a cohort of 33 nominated by Syngenta staff.

“Empowering regional communities and a passion for securing the future of ag for the next generation are themes that underpin many of this year’s Syngenta Growth Awards nominations, announced this week,” Syngenta said.

Syngenta Australia and New Zealand managing director and country head Paul Luxton said since the inaugural Growth Awards in 2014, “this is the first time we’ve announced nominations before our regional finalists are decided”.

“We received such a diverse and remarkable line up of nominations, we wanted to shine a light on all their achievements and recognise their amazing contribution to their local communities and the agricultural industry across both Australia and New Zealand,” Mr Luxton said.

He said he could tell from the nominations received that not only is there a sense of community empowerment, but entrants are also looking to the future of farming, and how they can overcome the modern challenges the industry faces.

He singled out “husband-and-wife sustainable paddock-to-plate farmers Fiona and Liam Mann” for special mention that would make the decision of determining regional finalists and eventual category winners extremely difficult.

The next phase of the judging process will see nominees asked to complete a series of challenging questions designed not only to demonstrate their achievements and their expertise, but to uncover their views about collaboration across the industry and big picture topics from future agricultural challenges to food security.

After this, regional finalists across the four categories will be announced in June.

The shortlisted nominees will not only be in the running for the overall titles, they will have the opportunity to join the 50 strong Growth Awards alumni program.