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Gavin Butcher. Forest sustainability has taken on different meanings in Western Australia – changing depending on the audience. In one corner the Minister for Forestry, Jackie Jarvis, has repeatedly claimed the closure of the native forest industry was necessary because it was unsustainable. In the other corner is Stuart West, the General Manager of the Minister’s agency, the Forest Products Commission, overseeing harvesting operations in the jarrah and karri forests which have been independently certified as being sustainable.

Banks should ensure rural South Australians – like those living in the South East – have access to cash, a state MP says. One Nation’s Sarah Game introduced a bill to SA Parliament last week to protect the right of South Australians to pay cash for all government services, including council fees and charges.

It was the Saturday that began at 8 a.m. with junior netball, and featured North-Central’s 15 grand finals of football, netball and hockey. It drew a record "gate" of $43,203 at Donald for the climax of a 2024 season that began on April 13, and concluded with a day of great excitement last Saturday, September 14.

It was a weekend to remember for the Maldon Football and Netball Club, with both the Under 17.5s Football and Under 17s Netball teams claiming Grand Final victories on Saturday. The young stars made their club and community proud, capping off an incredible season with hard-fought wins.

Only weeks after bringing home the bronze medal from the Paris Olympics Matthew Denny has excelled at the Diamond League held in Brussels at the weekend. With an opening round throw of 69.96m Matthew took out the discus final for the second straight year and broke the 40 year old meet record.

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Featuring Floodlights and James Range Band - 10 days of live music and workshops through remote communities in the Northern Territory ... Celebrated  live music and workshop program  Guts Touring  is back for another year, unveiling the two bands who will be performing throughout the Northern Territory for their 2024 program.

The Miles Government is investing $8.7 million to restore crucial habitat and address a key disease threat to the iconic koala. Two organisations - Queensland Trust for Nature and Healthy Land & Water - will share in $8.5 million for habitat restoration while Queensland University of Technology and the University of the Sunshine Coast will share in $200,000 for research into koala chlamydia.

The Miles Labor Government is backing Central Queensland’s sustainable future by investing in a new gas-to-electricity power project that will reduce mining emissions by more than one million tonnes of carbon dioxide. The project will expand the underground mine’s drainage system to capture more fugitive gas, preventing it from being released into the atmosphere.

Possibilities abound for the new owner of the clubhouse portion of the former Cambooya Bowls Club, which sold at the end of last month. The 15 Lucy Street property, which includes the clubhouse and a storage shed on 1,624m ² of land, was sold for $371,000 by Colliers International on the 30th of August.

AFL officials were pleased to see a large increase in the crowd for this year’s Riverina League grand final at the Narrandera Sportsground on Sunday. What was described as the biggest Riverina League grand final crowd post COVID turned out to watch Collingullie-Wagga upset the previously undefeated Ganmain-Grong Grong-Matong.

Sean Cunningham. Agvision Yanco took place last week to promote agricultural careers to hundreds of students from throughout the Riverina-Murray region. It is the biggest regional NSW interactive event which promotes careers in agriculture.

A decision by the Victorian government to cease the funding allocation for the regional delivery of chilled products at the end of June 2024 has left some regional FoodShare organisations including Corryong, high and dry without chilled food products … Wendy Lovell, has asked the Minister for Carers and Volunteers … to provide additional funding directly to rural and regional Foodshares to enable them to continue sourcing chilled products.

In its latest update, Snowy Hydro has advised that a new tunnel boring machine (TBM) will be deployed to help keep the Snowy 2.0 project on its delivery timeline. New ground testing techniques have provided a better understanding of the full extent of a complex fault zone on the route of the 17km tunnel that will connect Snowy 2.0’s upper reservoir to its underground power station.

We had a great September meeting with good attendance. We enjoyed a lot of entries in competitions and a good trade table ... We finished our meeting with a kokedama (moss balls) workshop.

Andrew Mole. More than seven years of hard work is about to go live after the long-awaited Barham micro abattoir last week passed its audit for poultry processing with flying colours. The rubber stamp from the NSW Department of Primary Industries means the facility is licensed and ready to operate.

The Royal Flying Doctor Service (RFDS) (Queensland Section) is this month celebrating 60-years of service from its Mount Isa base. Established in 1964, the Mount Isa Base covers a waiting room of more than 800,000 square kilometres, connecting the residents of this significant north-west Queensland region to leading, and often lifesaving, health services ... ARR.News found out more from RFDS Mount Isa Base Support Manager, Ducky Jeacocke.

MAKS Caravan Centre apprentice Zackary Tozer, from Westbrook, is a finalist at the 2024 TAFE Queensland – SkillsTech CSQ Apprentice Awards. The Apprentice Awards has run since 2018 and identifies top apprentices in a range of categories, with only 14 winners on the night out of more than 12,000 eligible apprentices, thanks to a raft of sponsors led by Construction Skills Queensland.

East Greenmount equestrian instructor Linda Shore, alongside her student Nicola Saunders from Toowoomba, have just returned from spending a week training and competing in Working Equitation in Canada at the 2024 Cross Nations Cup ... Working Equitation is currently one of the fastest growing new equestrian disciplines in Australia with one of the largest clubs in Queensland based in Toowoomba.