PODCAST: the new frontier for finance
Nigel Sharp, Director at Tiverton Rothwell Agriculture Fund, reflects “This is a great way to demonstrate a successful collaboration. A lot of conservation and agriculture in the past has been seen working in opposite directions and that’s not the way we think and it’s not the way a property like this is going to thrive.”
Emerging trends
Working together is key theme in how the land will be managed moving forward. Sharp says the aim isn’t to lock up the land for conservation only - the new owners will continue to manage sustainable agriculture on the site.
“A lot of these properties require grazing as well. So building up a biomass and locking up places can work absolutely against the way nature intended,” he explains.
In addition to its environmental value, the Great Cumbung is an important Indigenous landscape, with many cultural sites along the Lachlan and Murrumbidgee rivers.
“We know there are thousands of really important cultural sites in this landscape,” Gilmore says. “We're working closely with the traditional owners to make sure their cultural and social aspirations for the property are met as well as the natural, environmental and financial ones.”
Gilmore hopes to see this trend of agriculture and conservation continues across the country.
“Looking back in 10 years - at least from the Nature Conservancy’s point of view - if it's a thriving natural landscape and the wetlands are still in good health, if there are local jobs being sustained and created and if others are replicating this model in other parts of Australia then I think we've really succeeded,” Gilmore says.
