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Northern Area Manager appointed

Northern Area Manager, Aaron O’Connel.

In October, BioAg placed an ad in The Land newspaper asking for committed individuals to join the biological farming revolution and help change the face of Australian agriculture.

30-year-old Aaron O’Connell has answered the challenge and has commenced as the Northern Area Manager with Australia’s leading supplier of biologically-active solid nutrients and liquid microbials.

Based between Uralla and Walcha in the New England, Aaron will service and develop the company’s rapidly growing customer base and distribution network in northern New South Wales.

Graduating with a Bachelor of Rural Science degree from the University of New England, Armidale, in 1999, he spent two years as a farmhand on cotton properties in central and northern NSW.

He then spent five years as a Project Biologist with Agrisearch Services Pty Ltd, Gosford, a privately-owned research facility that conducts chemical efficacy, crop safety and fertiliser trials for crop protection companies.

Aaron said he was looking forward to the challenge of not only establishing a customer base, but also illustrating the efficacy of BioAg soil nutrition programs via on-farm demonstrations.

“At Agrisearch, my sole focus was on testing new crop protection products and fertilisers but I have come to the conclusion that there has to be a better way of farming,” he said.

“I am looking to move away from high-input agriculture and get involved in activities which seek to improve sustainability of agriculture, such as biological farming.

“My interest in biological farming started when I spent six months working as a farmhand on an organic dairy farm in Denmark in 2000 as part of the International Agricultural Exchange Student Program.”

Aaron has expertise in horticultural crops, including vegetables, grapes, citrus, ornamentals and turf, as well as practical experience in broadacre cropping, cotton and livestock operations. He is no stranger to northern NSW, having grown up in Moree and Tamworth.

Out of hours, Aaron is a keen sportsman and outdoor enthusiast, listing tennis, rugby, camping, mountain bike riding, off-road motorbike riding and travelling among his interests. He has recently returned from a 15-month working holiday in the UK.