Letter from the Chair – August 2025

A few weeks ago, some members of the Sheep Sustainability Framework (SSF) Steering Group (SG) had the pleasure of meeting with Prof Ken Giller of Wageningen University in the Netherlands. Ken has published extensively on regenerative agriculture, a topic our industry has been discussing for some time. It is an ‘attribute’ increasingly valued by customers of agricultural products (including meat and wool), but without much understanding of precisely what it is and how to demonstrate and measure its practice. 

The discussion was a valuable input into Steering Group deliberations. Our aim is to eventually include indicators of regenerative agriculture in our annual reports. I’m grateful to Ken for sharing his insights and to SG member Lach Monsbourgh for organising the meeting. 

There has been a reorganisation of Meat & Livestock Australia’s (MLA) resourcing of the SSF. Alister Hawksford, who recently joined MLA from the Bureau of Meteorology, has taken over the running of the SSF, among other responsibilities. I welcome Al to the Framework and look forward to working with him.  

At the same time, the Steering Group is very sorry to farewell Courtney Nelson as our secretariat. Courtney has contributed greatly to the Framework and our discussions, and we’re pleased she will remain within MLA so we can keep in touch. 

This MLA reshuffle is one of the reasons we have postponed the launch of the annual report this year. Normally, we aim to release the report by August, though the timeline is always challenging given the work required to compile, analyse and present the data. We are now aiming to complete the report by the end of September, in time for the Consultative Committee meeting in October/November.