IN HER time as Victorian Agriculture Minister Jaala Pulford has absorbed reams of information about the industry and can quickly give you the low-down on the critical issues confronting rural and regional areas.
However, within her education about all matters agricultural there had been little time for practical training.
Ms Pulford finally got the chance to rectify that and put theory into practice and take the reins of a combine harvester for the first time last week.
The brave soul to entrust a complete novice to the controls of a machine valued north of half a million dollars was Victorian Farmers Federation president David Jochinke.
After a day of consultations with the VFF and other rural groups in the Wimmera, Ms Pulford got the chance to join the ranks of those who have been smashing the hectares this year.
She got the opportunity to harvest a paddock of wheat at Mr Jochinke’s farm 25km north of Horsham due to one of the latest harvest in recent memory.
The paddock in question had been severely frosted, which meant it had not been a pressing priority for Mr Jochinke.
“The quality is not great so we have left it while we did other things.”
“We are just going to get it into bags and try and market it later.”
And after a nervy start Ms Pulford acquitted herself well, managing to take off a couple of runs of the wheat without incident.