Wednesday, May 24, 2017

Top End cut flower grower is calling on next gen to get involved in the industry

Caroline Plouff

Jan Hintze has been involved in agriculture for nearly 40 years in the Top End, with the last 20 years dedicated to growing flowers.

Now in her 70s, Ms Hintze said the youngest person she knew in the industry was in their 50s.

"I put mostly this down to it is so much hard physical work that children of farmers look at what their parents are doing and think 'no, I'm not doing that'," she said.

"That's not always the case though, sometimes the children decide 'yes that is the way I want to live' but a lot of the time that doesn't happen."

But Ms Hintze said it is not only the cut flower industry that is struggling to attract young people, it is agriculture as a whole.

She said in order to change, the industry needed to highlight the benefits of being a farmer.
"We need to make sure the children that are coming along understand more about what is actually involved in farming," she said. 

"You don't need to spend fortunes at the gym because you have already walked 10 kilometers a day. It is a really great life."

When it comes to selling a life in the cut flower industry to the next generation, Ms Hintze said the focus should be on the beauty.

"There is a whole stack of upsides to it, it is a very good cash crop for starters, you have got an income coming from it every week," she said.

"You walk out and you see the flowers growing and they are so beautiful and you know that you are going to sell them to people who appreciate them.

"It makes a difference in their lives, whether it is for commemorative occasions or just a bunch of flowers to go on the dining room table, it lifts peoples spirits and it is fairly good to be in an industry that does that."

With just a handful of growers [six or seven] left in the industry in the Territory, Ms Hintze said the reality was if young people did not get involved in growing cut flowers, Australia would have to rely on imported flowers.

"We have introduced so many diseases and pests bringing flowers in from overseas that it has devastated various sectors of not only the flower industry but other horticulture areas as well," she said.

"We need to be able to look after Australian people with product that is grown to our standards.

"A lot of the flowers that come in from overseas have been sprayed, dipped and or treated … in systems of cultivation that don't meet our standards of chemical control which we would never be allowed to do if we were growing them and shifting them around Australia."

For More Information: Lydia Burton

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