How Bush Summit destination Griffith tapped into its potential as an agricultural powerhouse

Now the food bowl of the state, the regional city is an example of rural pioneers daring to dream and tapping into an area’s true potential.

There is an old saying in Griffith that once you have tasted the channel water you will always come back. It does not sound too appetising, but the Riverina city in the heart of the Murrumbidgee Irrigation Area is all about the water.

“We wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for the water,” Griffith mayor John Dal Broi said.

“In that way we are like the rest of regional NSW where water is key.”

And that is why Griffith is the perfect spot for The Daily Telegraph to hold its third Bush Summit.

The first Bush Summit in Dubbo two years ago was held during the depths of the drought. The second in Cooma last year followed the ­devastating bushfires and defied all odds to be held in the middle of the pandemic.

Griffith. Mayor John Dal Broi. Picture: Dylan Robinson

This third summit in Griffith will be crucial in mapping our way clear of the pandemic.

Griffith is the perfect place for it — a quintessentially Australian town designed by Walter Burley Griffin in 1914 as part of the ambitious plan to irrigate the area and turn it into the food bowl of the state.

That worked. Farmers are currently harvesting the rice and grapes for the wineries that make and export Aussie wine all over the world. In January they harvested the prunes, which are the source of so many “regular” jokes in the area.

“The old Italian families still take the dried prunes and put them in grappa, which is a lovely way to have prunes and get drunk at the same time,” Mr Dal Broi laughed.

Yarran Wines at Yenda, just east of Griffith, is just one of the region’s booming winemakers. Picture: Matt Beaver

Of course everyone has heard of Griffith’s mafia connections going back to Calabria in Italy and stories of drug busts, but Mr Dal Broi is keen to point out the town has moved on a long way from those days.

“We are built on migrants and now have people from more than 60 ­nationalities all living and working happily together,” he said.

“We have 27 different places of worship.”

Which makes it the ideal setting for the leaders of the world’s most harmonious multicultural society to meet and brainstorm not just what is missing from the bush, but how the bush can lead Australia out of the COVID crisis.

NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian said: “It’s fitting that this year’s Summit is being held in Griffith, a town ­established just over 100 years ago as part of establishing the Murrumbidgee Irrigation Area, which unlocked NSW as an economic powerhouse.

“The foresight required to turn the arid country around the Murrumbidgee into some of our most productive agricultural land is what is required again as NSW continues our economic recovery from the pandemic,” she said.

The celebration of the Murrumbidgee Irrigation Area’s centenary in 2014.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison will join her as a keynote speaker at the event and said: “Our regions have been a powerhouse of our economic recovery from the COVID recession.

“Australia’s regions contribute to a third of our economy and, as we work towards our Ag2030 Plan to boost farm gate output to $100bn, the Bush Summit is one of the best ways we can all look at how we can create more jobs and grow our regions,” he said.

That has been proven by the last two Summits, which together have drafted more than 20 calls for action, a number of which have already been agreed and implemented, resulting in substantial policy changes at both state and federal government level.

In 2019 they included the immediate introduction of the “right to farm” legislation to stop the scourge of farm “raids” by activists.

There was also a major drought ­relief package announced by the Prime Minister on the day, a major ­financial commitment by both the state and federal governments to water augmentation schemes and three major dam projects to help towns and communities better withstand future droughts.

Struggling small businesses were given a commitment by the state government to a phased increase in the payroll tax free threshold up to $1m and farmers were given access to concessional loan agreements to implement farm water initiatives and access to counselling support services.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison with Bush Summit award winner Jane Cay, the CEO and founder of Birdsnest. Picture Rohan Kelly

The Daily Telegraph’s “Bush Telegraph” awards, designed to acknowledge and celebrate innovative and successful regional business and people, were launched and a permanent Rural Advisory Panel made up of farming, industry and community leaders was established.

In 2020, the second Bush Summit was held in Cooma and was one of the very first in-person “COVID safe” meetings held anywhere in Australia as the nation began to emerge from the restrictions of life under the pandemic. It was broadcast live on Sky.

It too had a water theme, coming from the heart of the Snowy Mountains with the backdrop of the $6bn Snowy 2.0 hydro project that has since been given the green light, creating thousands of regional jobs.

That Bush Summit also saw a victory in the amendment of the Koala SEPP to provide a better balance ­between safeguarding koalas and overly restrictive rules on home and landowners.

It came on the heels of the bushfires and has subsequently seen two key recommendations met — the ­introduction of the 10/50 rule to ­enable property owners to clear undergrowth and fire fuel from within metres of their property, as well as the introduction of transparent monitoring of suicide and mental health data to enable health and counselling ­professionals and communities to better target lifesaving counselling services.

Daily Telegraph editor Ben English with Premier Gladys Berejiklian. Picture Rohan Kelly

The Daily Telegraph editor Ben English said: “There are still a number of outstanding objectives yet to be achieved, including the establishment of a ‘National Regional Cabinet’, eliminating black spots for internet and communication coverage, and the ongoing battle to create a level playing field between regional communities and our cities on minimum standards.

“The 2021 Bush Summit in Griffith will give us the chance to bring those and other new issues into the ­spotlight.”

A lot of powerful people will be going to Griffith for the Summit and drinking the channel water.

That should see positive changes coming for the bush that will flow on to the rest of us.