Margo Andrea, Pork Australia CEO - Stepping down (27 April)

0:00Welcome back to Rural Queen's Land today on the Resonate Broadcast Network Monday morning, the 27th of April. Margo Andrei joins us this morning, CEO of Australia and Pork. Good morning, Margo. Thanks so much for being with us. Good morning, David. Love it to talk to you. Firstly, congratulations in order. You've stepped down from this role. Obviously, a big decision after a long period of time that you're going in a different direction, but obviously, still there, you've decided to obviously hand in the reins and step down as a CEO. I have. It's been a wonderful seven years, which is what it'll be, and I'll finish early August. While we do a transition to a new CEO, I've absolutely loved it, and it's a brilliant industry, and I feel like we've fit in a really good spot, industries in a great spot, Australian Pork in a great spot. So I'm going to step down and let someone else take the reins and go off and have a break. Well, there's no secret in the fact that the sales and the numbers and consumption has

1:03been up and up and up since you've been in that role. So Australian Pork is in good hands when you step down because you've done a phenomenal job. I've got to ask you though, consumption wise, you'd be very happy. Pork is in a great position at the moment where, or when you look at all the protein sources, it just seems to be the real shining light at the moment. It does, and I couldn't be more proud of pork producers across the country. But what we're finding is all of the cost delivering pressures and things like that. People are turning to pork because of the fact that it is a well-priced protein, but it's also got so much power packed in protein and all of the new research telling that it's got cognitive powers, as we call it. So it's really turning into the go-to protein for your waistline, but also your hip pocket. And then of course, because of all the work we do environmentally to reduce our emissions and minimize waist off farm and things like that. It's also really good for the planet. So consumption has been increasing, which is fantastic,

2:07and we're seeing that people are really understanding the role that protein has in a diet, particularly for those who are seeking a really good healthy diet. Are you surprised by you talked about consumption, just how it has become the shining light? I know you guys, your campaigns and what you've done has been very pointed, but it has certainly now, like it's a price point as well, with cost of living crisis, very real. It's very much a price point. It's seen as when you look at what you could buy it for B for what you could buy. This is the one that seems to be, and my wife's prime example, she said that we're eating more pork than we've ever eaten before. Yeah, and I think we've worked really hard to not only lift the branding of pork and get some pork on your fork, and that we do cover breakfast lunch and dinner, of course, but what we've been trying to work is show people how to cook pork and how easy it is and how versatile it is, and that it can be a really good option for families and kids,

3:13kids love pork. I love, you know, all the different ways you can do it with your stir fries and your roasts, and traditionally I think we were seeing as a specialty, whereas now what we're trying to show is that, you know, we're in every day meal as well, and can be enjoyed, and you're exactly right. We're a really well priced protein. In a world where people are trying to justfully make decisions around everything, porks become a nice table. It's an easy to go to, but they know that kids and families are loved and great for older people's diets as well, like the power of the nutrients and vitamins in our products, means that you can have a really well balanced diet that delivers everything the body actually needs. So we've worked really hard on that, and I am really proud to see that the pork industry itself is being seen as a leader, whether that's in bi-security or animal care or looking after our people, and to see that having a light shot on it is just wonderful, because these are rural and regional Australia

4:17communities that our industry is in. So whether you're across the supply chain, the amount of people we support through whether it's a 36,000 people we employ, or the fact that, you know, we do live and breathe rural and regional Australia and support our communities and give back constantly, and it's just wonderful that people recognize that. How big a threat is the wild pig population at the moment to the bi-security of your industry? I would say that, I mean, you can talk for your crosses. The pig plague is the big thing for me. It is, and it just keeps going. So when I first started, we knew feral pigs are a problem that no one really was looking after, and then we started looking at through a plan to get everybody working together. We used to have a fantastic export market for feral pigs, and I guess through extra regulation and the changes in just the way we're operating, we actually lost those export markets. So it's how do we reestablish export markets? How do we

5:22reestablish that a landholder can all work together and have a plan and have the sensing? And I guess there, I say it, find ways to support our farmers to have those incentives to put up the fences and do the baiting programs and do those control programs. And then next step also work as governments that state and petrol on helping us support that, but also what they do in this national parks and things like that, because there are also problems for our landholders. So yes, I would love to establish an export market. Yes, I would love to find a way to really fund these programs properly. And we've seen bits of funding that we need a long-term funding solution to this as well. But basically, we need to incentivise our farmers to help them eradicate or manage these problems. Yeah, you know, it just absolutely. And it's funny, you know, like when you talk about those kind of things, that makes so much sense, because the minute we lost that market, there's no secret, the correlation of the

6:26feral pig population has gone up and up and up. So the regulation that we continually look at the red tape, that's the issue for me. And if we can get on top of that, the fuel crisis is obviously having some sort of effect with the price. Are you comfortable at the governor aware and they're absolutely looking at the right direction to sort of wind it back a fraction at the moment? Yeah, it just feels a little bit like Dave Javu, when we started these conversations for a couple of months ago, it felt almost like back in the early days of, you know, education, this is our industry, this is how we operate, this is what we need. And really starting to work as an industry on, you know, what we're the design requirements, petrol, what are the plastics for packaging, all of those things are fertiliser, which have been winter crops and summer crops, and just having all the data available. And I, we sadly did see a lot of panic in the early days, and I think that comes back from, I often say we have a unique opportunity in quiet times to

7:32actually understand and plan and test and exercise for these things. And I think food security is something that doesn't need to be all of those national priority, and we do need to be understanding what we have installed, what's available, what we need, what those critical inputs are. And I've always been able to get the maintenance, how do we come back to our manufacturing here in Australia and become a bit more self-alliant on some of the key inputs that we need, so we don't get caught out. But, you know, I saw diesel prices today dropping into about 285, after you were I live in, so we've definitely seen the price come down, but the economic impact of all of our industries is just too hard, so certainly, especially those low income workers, you know, it was tough. Yeah, you did right. Margot, we will talk to you before you stand down, but you have done a phenomenal job over seven years to put pork at the forefront with an advertising campaign with governance and with the way and direction you've steered it. Congratulations. We really appreciate

8:33what you've done for this show as well. We will talk to you obviously before you stand down when the new CEO is announced, but thanks for being with us this morning. Yeah, love it, and thanks to everyone, and of course, please stay safe and look after yourself. Good on you. Rural coins landed today. Margot, Andre, CEO of Australian Pork. This is Rural coins landed today on the Resonate Broadcast Network.