International

Playing games on horseback is not just for kids. The 37th World Championships for Adult Mounted Games will be held at Werribee Park from October 8 to 15, with 18 nations competing. Most would know the story of how Mounted Games were created by Prince Philip as a competition for children who could not afford an expensive, purebred pony and that in 1957 the Horse of the Year Show staged the first Mounted Games Championship for the Prince Philip Cup.

A record number of young cattle handlers from around Australia and New Zealand converged on Parkes for a packed program of learning new skills, competing and forming lifelong friendships at the Herefords Australia National Youth Expo ... the expo drew a record 143 young handlers aged from five to 25 from NSW, Victoria, Queensland, South Australia and a team from New Zealand Herefords.

AirPhysio is an Australian Made and Owned Medical Device manufacturer based in the Northern Rivers of NSW ... AirPhysio has expanded from 5 countries in January 2021 to 106 countries in the past 2 years, they decided to enter the Middle East through Arab Health in January 2022, bringing home l75 leads from over 25 countries..

Tony Mahar. Australian negotiators must continue to hold the line to ensure a fair and commercially meaningful deal with the EU. This was always going to be a tough negotiation. Fair access to the EU market is something the farm sector has sought for decades.

Australia’s first raw sugar shipment to the United Kingdom under the new Australia-United Kingdom Free Trade Agreement (A-UKFTA) was loaded in Townsville on 10 July 2023, opening an important new market for the Queensland sugar industry. Under the new agreement, which came into place on 31 May 2023, tariff-free raw sugar exports to the UK have resumed for the first time in 50 years...

One of the world’s fastest and most iconic bowlers, former Australian cricketer Brett Lee, is taking Australian avocados to consumers in India. Hort Innovation has announced that the popular sportsman, at home and across the globe, has signed up as the new Australian Avocados ambassador.

The dreams of four young Australian riders came true when they lined up to compete in the Global Amateur Tour held at Quintas Equestrian Centre near Puebla in Mexico ... It is a two-star FEI event that includes international riders on borrowed mounts and local riders on their own horses.

“Freeriding is an extreme, high speed, aggressive sport. It's all about big mountains and steep slopes. To me, it's far more interesting than snowboarding down the same run over and over again. Where’s the challenge in that? In freeriding you go to places others don’t go."

From June 17 to 25, 2023, the Special Olympics World Games took place in Berlin and for the first time in Germany, and Sophie Nichols of Watchem was thrilled to be able to compete.

The original ‘Australian Garden’ exhibit, created by Designer Phillip Johnson, Horticulturalist Wes Fleming and the Trailfinders Team, was the first Australian entry to win Gold and Best in Show at the London Royal Horticultural Society Chelsea Flower Show in 2013.

South Australia has secured the hosting privileges to an international wine event which attracts major purchasers from across the globe, in a coup for the State. Adelaide will host the November 2026 International Masters of Wine Symposium, bringing together around 500 delegates from premier wine importing nations around the world.

Australia’s largest regional writers festival explores the theme of 'Wild Imagination' - Featuring more than 120 writers, thinkers and commentators ... The festival also offers writers’ workshops, an engaging program for children and several feature and satellite events in venues across the Northern Rivers.  

A farmer from New Zealand has won Australia’s most famous endurance ride, the Tom Quilty Gold Cup, completing the 160km course in the third fastest time in the event’s history. Ashley Cole, riding the nine-year-old Arabian stallion Tonki Dee Boo Novak, crossed the finish line at Stirling's Crossing, Imbil, Queensland, at the eight hour, 44 minute-mark, just a minute ahead of Catherine Bailey and Razorback Targaryen in second place.

From Pozieres, France, to Grafton, Australia, the spirit of the Legacy Centenary Torch Relay 2023, continued to burn brightly when it arrived in the Clarence Valley on June 26 to commence its Grafton tour as part of its nationwide journey commemorating the 100th anniversary of Legacy, an iconic charity dedicated to providing support and assistance to the families of deceased and seriously injured Australian Defence Force personnel.

Patrick Goldsmith. Point Turton’s Hugo Taheny has brought home an impressive medal haul after representing Australia at the 2023 Virtus Global Games in Vichy, France. The first time he has competed overseas, Taheny claimed a gold medal in shot-put and broke his own world record twice, finishing with 11.98 metres.

Barossa Mayor Bim Lange is thrilled about the return of the 2024 Santos Tour Down Under, saying the Barossa will welcome not one Stage, but two ... “This is another great opportunity to put the Barossa on the world stage, and we couldn’t be happier Race Director Stuart O’Grady has yet again recognised our capacity for hosting this major international event”: Barossa Mayor Bim Lange.

Last Saturday was a Territory-wide day of action in response to the NT Government’s recent decision to green-light fracking in the Beetaloo basin ... Community members were engaged and shared a common outrage at the Government’s recent decision. The event demonstrated that the community does not want fracking gas fields on Country.

In a significant step up in regional One Health and disease prevention capabilities, Wildlife Health Australia has achieved official designation from the World Organisation for Animal Health (WOAH) as a Collaborating Centre for Wildlife Health Risk Management. This new international wildlife collaborating centre based in Australia will ensure wildlife health is integrated into One Health decision-making across the Indo-Pacific region to benefit public health, biosecurity, animal health, food security and biodiversity.

Industry and Hort Innovation are working together to prime the Australian almond sector for growth amid a 118 per cent rise in overseas demand over the past decade. From exporting 52,795 tonnes in 2013 to 115,049 tonnes in 2022, the almond industry is gearing up for further expansion. Delivered through Hort Innovation and led by the Almond Board of Australia, the $7M program aims to increase almond exports by at least 50,000 tonnes over the next three years and push export sales beyond $1 billion.

Ukraine could become the first country in the world where the evolution of agriculture will be replaced by devolution. The war makes farms and large agricultural holdings inefficient. These enterprises use large capital, hired labor, complex machinery, large plots of land and work for export. But war cannot destroy the private farms of the rural people.

When we wrote about how crosses with the magnificent heavy horse breed the Clydesdale were the quiet achievers in the horse world last week, we were very quickly shown just how popular and much loved they are.

The Veteran Games is an exciting opportunity for former and current serving military personnel to showcase their physical resilience, teamwork and problem-solving in an Australian-first team competition.