Business

The streets of Alice Springs will be transformed into an alfresco art gallery when the Alice Springs Street Art Festival (ASSAF) takes place from 23 July to 8 August 2021. The festival will see four of Australia’s top street artists Kaff-eine (Vic), Gus Eagleton (Qld), Brontë Naylor (Qld) and Miss Polly (Darwin) team up with local creatives Tamara Cornthwaite, Karine Tremblay, Mark Circus and Kim Donald to paint six new murals across the CBD.

A staff shortage in Bamaga has led to criticism of a policy change that snubbed NPA from employing overseas workers. Companies in Weipa, Cooktown and Thursday Island can employ Australian-based overseas workers in hospitality jobs, but businesses in Bamaga cannot ... “There is now a very small and limited pool of skilled labour, especially in the hospitality industry where chefs and food and beverage professionals are as scarce as hen’s teeth," says Chris Foord, Bamaga Enterprises GM.

A representative from the Singleton Horticulture Project was in Tennant this week to chat with businesses and stakeholders about the future of the almost 3,000 square kilometre horticulture lease which will be used to grow grapes and rockmelons. The multi-million dollar project at Singleton Station will be developed in four stages over an eight year period and expected to create thousands of jobs each year in the region.

Catherine Grimley. The Community Lawn sale remains a great way to spend a Saturday morning. Even though it was a little quiet, stallholders still served the needs of locals looking for something different or tasty, with Wan’s Asian food, hand-made earrings from Barkly Bliss and baked goods from the CWA ladies amongst others.

Sadly, it has become painfully clear that our political leaders have lost the capacity, and even, it would seem, the willingness, to compare the impacts of varying public policy positions. The evidence of this is in the crude lockdowns which provide an opportunity for politicians and bureaucrats to look like they are 'doing something' and that they are 'in control' when in fact neither proposition is correct.

Packhorse Pastoral Co has forked out $30 million to acquire large-scale Roma district property Stuarts Creek and cattle, in one of the Maranoa region’s largest single grazing asset transactions, as it embarks on a five-year mission to grow the cattle and carbon fund to $1.5 billion.

Shenhua Watermark Coal has moved to sell off its Liverpool Plains landholdings with expectations of $120 million after the New South Wales government paid the company to give up its mining licence. They comprise three aggregations, Breeza, Tambar Springs and Barraba, covering a combined 16,570 hectares in the north west’s Gunnedah region.

Rural Funds Group (ASX: RFF) has launched an equity raising, as the group bets on macadamias, cattle and water in central Queensland. Rural Funds Group is looking to raise $100 million, at an issue price of $2.47, through a fully underwritten 1-for-8.4 accelerated non-renounceable entitlement offer.

Australia's northernmost pastoral property, Bramwell Station, has been put up for sale amid heightened demand for domestic travel and some of the best seasonal and market conditions seen in living memory. Located 240 kilometres south of the tip of Cape York, Bramwell Station spans 131,900 hectares and is the last stop before the tip of Cape York and at the start of the famous Old Telegraph Line four-wheel-drive track.

We are blessed with the quality and talent of our local business operators, and the current treatment is, frankly, cruel. We have seen multinational chain stores, who seldom pay tax, operate almost without impunity throughout the COVID-19 fiasco and yet, the beating heart of our country, small and medium business are wearing the impacts.

Gabrielle Duykers. After almost 20 years behind the bar, Jack Jennings and Rhonda Brown say they are excited to get their weekends back, as they rejoice in the successful sale of the Bushman’s Arms Hotel ... Upon reflection of his time in the industry, Mr Jennings said pubs had been unfairly given a “bad rap” in recent years. “I think people forget the good that pubs do for the community,” he said. “Over the years we’ve sponsored nearly every sporting group going around and even the sporting groups from out of town. Pubs are a centre of a community, they’re fantastic for the communication of people, and in really small towns when the pub dies, the town dies.”

Timber Towns Victoria calls on the Victorian Government to provide clarity and certainty for the timber industry, workers and communities following a recently announced Government review of the Timber Code of Practice (Vic).

Casino is about to get fresh with its own weekly farmers market. John and Frieda De Kleuver are organising the market for the Casino Lions Club. The plan is to hold a market every Saturday morning at Crawford Square in South Casino, starting in September.

Butchers inside major supermarkets could soon become extinct. No more stopping for a friendly chat about the cut of your meat with the butcher while you shop ... The Australasian Meat Industry Employees Union said the change would see qualified butchers ‘redeployed’ into other roles at the supermarkets.

Geoff Helisma. NSW Fair Trading is investigating ticket reseller Viagogo, as consumer complaints against the company spike in line with the reintroduction of ticketed events. The [Clarence Valley] Independent revealed that tickets for a Paul Kelly concert at Yamba Bowling Club were sold out within minutes of going on sale – some of these tickets were advertised on Viagogo’s website for up to $740 on the same day.

A spaceport on the outskirts of Weipa is still a major possibility as an Australian-based company eyes the Cape York location. Discussions have already begun between the Palm Branch Group’s Spaze Oz arm and key stakeholders in Weipa and Napranum. The site would be located near the RAAF Scherger base, about 43km from Weipa.

Wendy Kozicka believes the state government could buy Cape York’s most northern cattle station for conservation. The owner of Bramwell Station said it wouldn’t surprise her if the Queensland government made an offer to buy the property before it goes up for auction on August 11.

Kevin Tolhurst, Jerry Vanclay. Some ecologists and conservationists, opposed to timber harvesting, are trying to use bushfire disasters as a lever to stop native forest harvesting, but their case is based on opinion, beliefs and selective science. A 2016 study of over 1 million hectares burnt by wildfire in the 2003 fires in Victoria, showed that fire severity across the landscape was driven by weather conditions, slope aspect, fuel levels, atmospheric stability, and the scale of the fires. There was no discernible impact of timber harvesting on fire severity at the landscape scale.

The Victorian Government’s long-deferred decision to announce more National Parks in the West of Victoria last week dodges the real challenges of managing and conserving these forests. The Mt Cole – Pyrenees, Wombat, and Wellsford forests have all been re-assigned after an investigation by the Victorian Environmental Assessment Council (VEAC) completed in June 2019.

With James Blundell officially opening on Saturday at 12pm, you’ll be wowed with the monster trucks and thrilled with all the action of a two day campdraft. Plus, rock climbing, side show ally and plenty more.