At Southern Farming Systems (SFS), Claudia Gebert loves putting the science into action and working with the region’s farmers.
Claudia grew up in Geelong and Shelford and although she didn’t live on a farm her father Ian works in the wool industry and the family always had a small farm.
From Year 10, she started to look at agriculture courses at universities and chose Melbourne University’s Bachelor of Agriculture. Claudia did two years at its Parkville campus in Melbourne and the final year of the course at Dookie.
She said the course gave her a good a foundation in sciences including biology, chemistry and geography and introduced to a broad range of agricultural industries, from plant and agronomy to animal health and nutrition and much more. In her final year, Claudia did a research project on drench resistance in sheep.
Her interest in agronomy grew at university and her resolve to work in the industry was strengthened by doing work experience with agronomy research and sales companies in various regions of Victoria.
“Work experience is useful for learning and show your initiative and passion – I just called around and found most places happy to have you for a week,” she said.
“There are so many different jobs out there.”
Work experience at the Birchip Cropping Group introduced Claudia to trial research and she was “…really amazed with the level of innovation and the importance to that region’s farmers and their businesses”.
She said trial research gave her a first-hand understanding of agronomy. She also did casual work during her university years with GrainCorp, including taking grain samples at harvest.
Claudia encouraged graduates to keep their heads up and persevere when looking for employment. She finished university in 2014, and for the next year, tried different jobs, including wool classing at Ackroyd and Dadswell wool brokers in Geelong, wool trading at United Wool, some casual work at SFS, and rousabouting.
She valued these different experiences and she said they helped her realise that she wanted to work directly with farmers, so she jumped at the opportunity to work full-time with the not-for-profit organisation SFS.
Claudia works out of SFS’s Inverleigh office, which takes care of the organisation’s western Victorian sites.
She is responsible for some of the trials, which include but are not limited to plant growth regulators (PGRs) and different crop varieties.
Claudia values her networks with other young people in agriculture in the Western District, and has also found playing netball a great way to get involved with the local community.
“Ultimately Dad and I would love to have a larger farm. It’s what we’ve been working towards,” Claudia said.
Work experience is useful for learning and show your initiative and passion...
- Claudia Gebert, Southern Farming Systems
