Helping Regional Communities Prepare for Drought Initiative

0:01 [Music]

0:11 I came to Mullewa as a graduate school teacher and when

0:14 you're new to Town the best way to get

0:17 to know people is to get involved

0:20 there comes a point particularly in a

0:22 small community where if you've got some

0:25 skills that are useful people start

0:28 turning to you to ask for help and

0:30 that's when you really start to think

0:31 about leadership

0:34 support the drought resilience

0:35 leadership program gave to me was a

0:38 really clear picture of how expansive my

0:42 role could be in this community

0:43 [Music]

0:45 climate change and increasing

0:47 temperatures are going to have an impact

0:49 on the frequency and the severity of

0:52 drought if we have really strong social

0:55 Connections in the community

0:57 then I think we can weather most storms

1:00 I think my impacts only just beginning

1:03 building that social cohesion and

1:05 building that vision of who we want to

1:07 be and working towards it it's like

1:09 putting something in reserve for when

1:10 things get tough and and that's what

1:12 I'll be able to contribute to over the

1:15 next couple of years rural Australia is

1:18 super important to achieving climate

1:20 change action this is where the wind

1:21 farms and the solar farms and the green

1:23 hydrogens all going to happen out here

1:25 so I want people to really appreciate

1:27 the value in investing in us I think the

1:31 journey is just beginning

1:33 foreign

1:41 my father was born in Morrow and my

1:43 grandparents came out to morwell from

1:45 Scotland very early in the 1900s

1:47 I lived through the droughts when I was

1:49 a young when I was a young child and I

1:50 watched my parents go through it and

1:52 struggle through it

1:54 the challenges around drought not only

1:56 affects the farmers and their income the

1:58 ongoing challenge with Community is then

2:01 there's not as much employment going on

2:02 there's not as much money circulating

2:04 within the community repercussions of

2:06 that are massive like dropping a rock in

2:09 in a pond the Ripple goes out and out

2:11 and out and affects more than just the

2:12 farmers

2:13 I've always believed in good

2:15 leadership's always going to make good

2:17 communities good teams the drought

2:20 resilience leadership course actually

2:21showed me that there's lots of different

2:23 ways to lead and you've got to be open

2:25 to change to make good leaders there's a

2:28 lot of people in these small country

2:29 towns that I don't think are being

2:30 recognized that they're really

2:31 struggling through life so the programs

2:34 and the work I'll do moving forward will

2:35 be developing programs to stop people

2:38 being in struggle Street and getting up

2:40 on their feet

2:46 part of being resilient is being able to

2:48 recognize that that change needs to

2:50 happen quickly and not wait because if

2:53 you wait you may miss the moment

2:54 [Music]