Gannawarra Shire Council has won the Premier’s Regional Recognition Award in this year's Premier's Sustainability Awards for their sustainability focus, featuring the first large scale solar farm and battery storage in Victoria.
Many small rural communities struggle to remain sustainable with reducing populations, declining rate revenue and a lack of jobs, but the Gannawarra Shire has taken a strategic approach to fortifying the future of the local economy by identifying platforms of nature-based tourism, renewable energy and innovative agriculture.
The environment features strongly as a base for the Gannawarra brand; the large scale solar farm and battery storage could inspire the development of further creative projects transforming not only the municipality, but providing a high level of financial and environmental sustainability.
The night’s other top honour, the Premier's Recognition Award, was presented by the Minister for Energy, Environment and Climate Lily D’Ambrosio to Yume Food for developing an online marketplace for reducing waste and landfill impact.
Yume finds quality surplus food products and connects suppliers with buyers to help mitigate the 9.5 million tonnes of food that annually goes to landfill.
Sustainability Victoria chief executive Stan Krpan said winners across all ten categories should be applauded for demonstrating the best of sustainability diversity.
“This year’s finalists and winners come from all sorts of backgrounds and sectors, representing the most wide-ranging projects from the most amount of entries in the awards’ history,” Mr Krpan said.
“The diversity of sustainability endeavor we have seen this year, undertaken by every kind of group, organisation or business imaginable, is outstanding and we’re delighted that the awards can tell their inspiring stories.”
Another regional winner was Beeac Primary School, which was recognised in the education section for students’ work in developing a project that educated the community about the brolga, a local threatened species, using arts as the focus.
Zoos Victoria and Phillip Island Nature Parks were recognised in the environmental protection category for their ‘When Balloons Fly’, Seabirds Die’ campaign.
The campaign encourages people to use bubbles instead of balloons at outdoor events, reducing plastic pollution and saving marine life.
In the environmental justice section, GWMWater and Dja Dja Wurrung were recognised for their memorandum of understanding that proves respect for country and major infrastructure can work hand in hand.
The Premier's Sustainability Awards was held at the Forum Theatre in Melbourne last Thursday night.
