This year, the winner of the YLFY Award receives $5,000 funding towards an overseas study trip and a scholarship to attend the Australian Rural Leadership Foundation’s TRAIL course valued at $9,350.
The Australian Lot Feeders’ Association (ALFA) is excited to announce two well-known and respected industry leaders will join the judging panel for the 2018 ALFA Young Lot Feeder of the Year (YLFY) Award, which is proudly sponsored by Performance Feeds.
The YLFY Award embodies passion, leadership, development and initiative and is designed to encourage emerging, dedicated employees to contribute their ideas and vision for lot feeding at a national level.
This year, ALFA welcomes two long-standing industry leaders to the judging panel, Geoff Cornford & Matt Luhrs, whom have both previously been named Young Lot Feeder of the Year in 2004 and 2009, respectively. Mr Cornford and Mr Luhrs will join a representative from Performance Feeds to complete the judging panel.
Mr Cornford joins the panel as an esteemed leader with many years of experience. He worked for The North Australian Pastoral Company for most of his career, commencing as a jackaroo at Marion Downs station and recently left the company after serving as Chief Operating Officer.
He managed Wainui Feedlot from the year 2000 to 2015 and led several expansions that saw the feedlot capacity increase from 7,000 head to 18,000 head, providing an annual turnoff capability of 65,000 head.
Mr Cornford lead an expansion of the company’s farming operations that saw the enterprise become one of the largest irrigation farming operations in south east Queensland. He is also an author of the Australian Cattle Welfare Standard, a member of the National Residue Survey committee and a graduate of the Australian Rural Leadership Program and Harvard Business School.
For Mr Cornford, joining the judging panel is “a good way of giving back to an industry that has given me so much.”
When Mr Cornford won the Award in 2004, he took advantage of the main prize, being funding towards an overseas study trip.
“I was fortunate to use the study trip to learn about the non-operational aspects of the US beef industry, such as their industry representation, regulation and politics. This experience gave me insights and knowledge into international trade and how these factors affect our industry,” he said.
This year, the winner of the YLFY Award receives $5,000 funding towards an overseas study trip and a scholarship to attend the Australian Rural Leadership Foundation’s TRAIL course valued at $9,350.