Such as increasing responsibility on people in the community to look after their land and to look after their areas, and yet out in the rural areas for instance, there are a very small minority of people looking after a large majority of the landscape. What we need to do is allow people to get this information out, and allow us to discuss it so we can work at some better ways of being able to manage all these things. Because Landcare in essence is good. I mean Landcare wouldn t still be going if people on the ground, both urban and rural people, didn t think that it was something that was of benefit. One gets a sense that Landcare facilitators perhaps are not fully appreciated higher up in the system.
Landcare facilitators are very much left to themselves, to be out in rural communities.
The Landcare facilitators and co-ordinators are the finger on the pulse of people with the community, and they have the information, they are feeling and working with and experiencing all those things that are going on. They re hearing all those other important pieces of information that most people don t know about. I think it is extremely advisable that facilitators and co-ordinators have an opportunity to be able to get the information that they are gathering from the ground to other areas, whether that be politicians, bureaucracies, whatever. I think that this information transfer needs to be more open and more easily accessible. Coral Love, Landcare facilitator from East Gippsland, and winner of the inaugural Heather Mitchell Memorial Fellowship.