The Weekly Grill

The use of drones on farms and grazing properties has grown dramatically over the past few years. Drones are now routinely being used for monitoring, mapping, spraying... and in some situations mustering stock. This week podcast host Kerry Lonergan caught up with one of the industry's early adopters, Jack Sykes, co-principal of AgriDrone, to discuss the rise of the use and application of drones fo...

On the eve of next week’s Cattle Australia seminar and AGM in Dalby, MLA’s executive chef and Product Business Development Manager Sam Burke chews the fat with The Weekly Grill, host Kerry Lonergan. The pair discuss consumer trends during the current cycle of rising beef prices, how food service operators are adjusting their businesses to remain competitive, the role value-adding is playing in del...

In this week's episode of The Weekly Grill, host Kerry Lonergan chews the fat with independent red meat and livestock analyst Simon Quilty, covering the opportunities ahead for Australian beef and lamb in a global market facing shortages, tariff challenges, and trade access issues for the next year or two.     Barring weather setbacks or some form of exotic disease incursion, it's hard not to be b...

In this week's episode of The Weekly Grill, host Kerry Lonergan chews the fat with red meat wholesaling identity David McNally, head of Australian Wholesale Meats.    Since 2001 AWM has grown to become one of the largest domestic beef wholesalers in the country, with offices in Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne supplying food service customers across the restaurant, pubs and clubs sector, retail butc...

In this week's episode of The Weekly Grill, host Kerry Longergan catches up with two veterans who took part in Australia's incredible feat in the 1970s-80s era in eradicating Brucellosis and Tuberculosis from the national beef herd. Ron Granville was Queensland's chief veterinary officer during the BTEC era, and Brian Radunz was a senior cattle vet in the Northern Territory. The pair talk about th...

In this week's episode of The Weekly Grill, host Kerry Longergan catches up with newly crowned Young Organic Champion of the Year, Stephanie Frankham.  Stephanie has been instrumental in developing the organic red meat sector, transitioning more than 50,000 cattle to organic production, and pioneering sustainability initiatives, including emissions reduction strategies for producers.     The Weekl...

This week, podcast host Kerry Lonergan dials in Patrick Hutchinson, Chair of the Australian Beef Sustainability Framework. The pair discuss the hot topics of environmental stewardship, animal welfare and economic resilience. Sector by sector, how is the industry performing in the sustainability space, and how best to achieve our future sustainability targets? A lot has already been achieved and a...

This week, podcast host Kerry Lonergan catches up with Livecorp CEO, Wayne Collier. The pair's wide-ranging discussion covers: Indonesian, Vietnamese and Middle Eastern markets, and how they are performing The current mood in Western Australia Crewing live export ships - staffing shortages/who foots the bill? The success of shipboard management and improvements of mortality numbers Biosecurity iss...

Artificial intelligence is now starting to creep into the Australian red meat supply chain, whether it is accurately counting sheep or cattle off a truck into a meatworks holding yard, or picking the shape of tri-tips from a range of primals passing down a processing conveyor belt and packing them in a carton. In today’s Weekly Grill podcast, host Kerry Lonergan chews the fat with Dr Tom Lee from...

With sweeping tariff changes and drastically declining beef production in the US, global instability in the Middle East and Ukraine, lingering effects of drought in southern Australia, there was a lot to talk about in the latest Weekly Grill markets update podcast with regular commentators Chris Howie and Matt Dalgleish. In today’s episode Kerry Lonergan catches up with the pair on cattle price tr...

In the 1980s, farmers were concerned that union intransigence and rigidity, as exemplified by the Mudginberri dispute, threatened the future of Australian agriculture and industry productivity in general. Mudgenberri presented the opportunity for the NFF, with AFFF support, to challenge and defeat the old, inward-looking standards that had long passed their used-by date. Farmers ‘put their hands i...

In this week's episode, podcast host Kerry Lonergan catches up with processor Roger Fletcher, the man behind Australia's most successful integrated sheep meat processing business, Fletcher International. In a wide ranging conversation, the pair discuss Roger's humble beginnings droving sheep around Glen Innes; the opportunities he seized along the way to help build his $1.4b empire; and current hi...

With frenched cutlets now selling in some metro butcheries for $95/kg. and even the humble shank retailing in supermarkets for the equivalent of $7.50 each, domestic lamb prices are today testing the boundaries of what the market ever thought possible. But even at those ticket prices, independent retailers say there is no margin in lamb at current wholesale levels, two leading independent butchers...

Some salient lessons in succession planning were aired during last Friday’s annual Rural Press Cub breakfast held as part of the Brisbane Ekka, where three generations of the Hart family from Stockyard Beef shared the stage in front of an audience of 700. Founder Robin Hart, his son Lachie and granddaughter Ali later sat down with Weekly Grill host Kerry Lonergan to talk about multi-generational f...

In this weeks' podcast episode, host Kerry Lonergan chats with recruitment and labour specialist Tom Reardon, on the ongoing labour challenges in regional and rural Australia.   Two years ago in a previous conversation, Mr Reardon, the head of labour resourcing firm PeopleIn, described the labour situation in rural Australia was as bad as he had ever seen it. What's happened since?   PeopleIn curr...

In this weeks' podcast episode, host Kerry Lonergan chats with LAWD's gregarious property marketing identity, Danny Thomas.   Among other topics, the pair discuss:   The federal super tax and its' impacts on rural properties  SMSF rules and listings of rural properties  Interest in Australia’s ag properties from US Canadian super funds China - are they turning their attention to South America? Vie...

In this weeks’ podcast episode, host Kerry Lonergan chats with MLA’s General Manager – International Markets, Andrew Cox.   While their discussion was recorded prior to the recent announcement about re-approval of US beef imports to Australia, the pair discuss a range of topics including the impact of US tariff measures on global beef trade, and where Australia sits in relation to other nations’ t...

In an era when leading restaurant chefs are viewed more like rock-stars than food purveyors, Sydney restaurateur Neil Perry is the Bruce Springsteen of the Australian fine-dining industry.   His Sydney restaurants Margaret and (part-owned) Rockpool recently featured among the World’s Top 100 steak restaurants, ranking No 2 and No 12 respectively. What does he think about the future of Australian r...

Paul Harris has built a successful Rockhampton-based rural accountancy practice over the past 40 years – but outside spread One of the Fullblood industry’s true pioneers, Paul and family have quietly built up one of Australia’s largest Fullblood Wagyu herds on showcase pulled scrub buffel grass and leucaena grazing country in Central Queensland. In this podcast, host Kerry Lonergan chats with the...

Prof Jim Pratley is one of Australia's best known ag educators, with a distinguished  40 year career. In this wide ranging discussion with Weekly Grill podcast host Kerry Lonergan, he discusses what governments and industry could be doing to attract more students  to careers in ag, and how ag education could be tailored for indigenous students. Prof Pratley began his teaching career in 1972 at Wag...

With sweeping tariff changes in the US, dramatic currency movements, floods and widespread late summer rain in pastoral areas of QLD and NSW, there was a lot to talk about in the latest Weekly Grill markets update podcast with regular commentators Chris Howie and Matt Dalgleish. In today's episode Kerry Lonergan catches up with the pair on US President Trump's evolving tariff negotiations and the...

IN today's podcast episode, host Kerry Lonergan sits down with three women turning the tables in an historically male-dominated meat industry. The Meat Business Women networking and personal development organisation held its annual conference in Brisbane recently, attracting a rowdy crowd of 250. The organisation aims to empower women to make their mark in the meat industry. Founded in the UK in 2...

IN today's podcast episode, host Kerry Lonergan chews the fat with prominent live export identity and veterinarian - Katherine-based Ross Ainsworth. The pair discuss recent live export trade trends, and how the industry manages the growing population of esturine (Asian) buffalo in the NT   Topics discussed:   • Escalating numbers of wild buffalo in Arnhem Land  • The environmental problems  • Comm...

IN today's podcast episode, host Kerry Lonergan sits down with Consolidated Pastoral Co CEO Troy Setter. The pair discuss topics of high interest within the beef industry presently, including the impact of Queensland's foreign owner land tax on investment appetite; the likely trade impacts of Brazil's recent gaining of FMD-freedom without vaccination; CPC's diversification/expansion out of beef in...

IN today's episode podcast, host Kerry Lonergan sits down with up with US animal genetics expert and award winning ag communicator Professor Alison Van Eenaammen. Prof Van Eenennaam is a distinguished Professor of Cooperative Extension in the field of Animal Genomics and Biotechnology in the Department of Animal Science at  the University of California, Davis where she has been on faculty for over...