AGM & Conferences

2023 ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING, CONFERENCE AND TRADE EXHIBITION

PENRITH PANTHERS RUGBY LEAGUE CLUB, 123 MULGOA ROAD, PENRITH NSW 2750

CONFERENCE THEME:

Future of Honey Bees Drought – Bushfires – Pandemic – Floods – Pests – Varroa

REGISTRATIONS ARE NOW CLOSED

NOTICE OF ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING

The Association hereby gives notice that its Annual General Meeting and Trade Exhibition will be held on Thursday 18 and Friday 19 May 2023 at Penrith Panthers Rugby League Club, 123 Mulgoa Road, Penrith to conduct the following business:

  1. Opening & Welcome
  2. Present
  3. Apologies
  4. Confirmation of the Minutes of the 2022 Annual General Meeting
  5. Matters Arising from the Minutes
  6. Presidents Report
  7. Receiving and considering the financial statements of the Company for the financial year ended 28 February 2023
  8. Receiving and considering the Branch reports
  9. Declaration of Executive members Election Results
  10. General Business
 

Come along and enjoy two full days of presentations by industry leading experts, both international and local, covering subjects including Varroa, recovery and resilience, pest and diseases, Honeybee nutrition, the Pacific Labour Scheme and more.

 

Our feature Trade Exhibition, which will run for the two days of conference, will showcase trade booths from over 25 exhibitors and will also include an evening function on Thursday night, sponsored by Lockwood Beekeeping Supplies, to enable attendees to meet the exhibitors and explore the Trade Exhibition, with canapés and drinks provided.

 

Friday night will host our Annual Conference Dinner, sponsored by Varroa Easy Check.  Featuring a two course meal, entertainment by Comedian Ventriloquist, Darren Carr, and a live auction, this will be a night not to be missed!

The NSWAA 2023 Conference has been subisdised by a Grant received from The Early Needs Recovery Program.

The Early Needs Recovery Program is part of the $150 million Primary Industry Support Package which is co-funded by the Australian and NSW Governments. For more information about the program, please visit Early Needs Recovery Program – Local Land Services (nsw.gov.au). 

Bee-Creative 2023

A creative outlet can help deal with anxiety and stress and is a lot of fun. Bee-Creative is designed to showcase the artistic benefits for those not just in the beekeeping industry but also any bee themed art and craft. Everyone is welcome to share their interests. Certificates will be awarded for most popular display as voted by delegates and trade exhibitors. Voting to commence Thursday morning, finishing Friday morning of the conference day. Winners will be announced after lunch on Friday 19th May 2023.

OUR 2023 CONFERENCE SPEAKERS

Dr John Roberts

Dr John Roberts

Senior Research Scientist, CSIRO

Dr John Roberts is a Senior Research Scientist with the CSIRO in Canberra. His research applies molecular approaches and tools to address a variety of health and biosecurity issues that impact Australia's honey bee population and the valuable pollination services it provides. One area of his research is investigating how we can use hive environmental DNA or 'eDNA' collected by honey bees as they gather nectar and pollen for cross-industry surveillance of bee pests and diseases, plant pathogens and noxious weeds

Dr Madlen Kratz

Dr Madlen Kratz

DPI Honey Bee Industry Development Officer

Dr Madlen Kratz works with the Department of Primary Industries in NSW as the 'Honeybee Industry Development Officer'. Her background is in research on honey bee nutrition, foraging behaviour, and pollination. She focuses on bee health and productivity for the Honey Bee and Pollination Industries. Current areas of work include evaluating supplementary feeding practices for their costs and benefits to beekeepers, assessing alternative pasture species for their value to honey bees, and evaluating the attractiveness of blueberry flowers to bees under crop covers.

Dr Mary Whitehouse

Dr Mary Whitehouse

Co-Funded Senior Research Scientist in Insect Biological Control, Applied BioSciences, Macquarie University

A focus of Dr Mary Whitehouse is to assist agricultural industries save money by drawing on her experience in cotton, where Integrated Pest Management (IPM) has helped cotton become highly successful and profitable. She has 30 years research experience and over 100 publications, reports and conference proceedings with over 2000 citations - 58 of those publications are specific to IPM and related topics. She has always worked closely with agriculturalists and currently leads a team whose aim is to work with apiarists to develop an IPM response to varroa mite (should it become established in Australia). The aim is to maintain control of Varroa by using IPM to stop it developing resistance to control methods. Whitehouse’s talk will clarify the concept of IPM, how it could be used to manage varroa mites, the potential challenges and knowledge gaps, and will invite comments from the audience on their perspectives.

Dr Samuel Ramsey

Dr Samuel Ramsey

Founder and Director of the Ramsey Research Foundation

Dr. Ramsey received his B.S. in entomology from Cornell University and his Ph.D. in entomology from the University of Maryland College Park. He completed his post-doctoral training with Dr. Jay Evans, Steve Cook, and Daniel Sonenshine at USDA-ARS Bee Research Laboratory and now serves as Endowed Professor of Entomology at CU Boulder’s BioFrontiers Institute and the Ecology and Evolutionary Biology Department. Featured on Hulu’s Docuseries: Your Attention Please as well as in the Washington Post, on NPR, CNN, Wired, CBS This Morning, Khan Academy, Seeker, The Today Show and several local news segments, Ramsey is celebrated as an engaging science communicator. He uses this talent to make science more accessible to a broad audience. His nonprofit, The Ramsey Research Foundation, works to remove barriers that slow the progress of and decrease access to science by developing novel pathways for scientific funding and by removing paywalls that keep the public from engaging with published scientific work.

Dr Kenya Fernandes

Dr Kenya Fernandes

Microbiologist, University of Sydney

Kenya is a microbiologist at the University of Sydney. Her research involves surveying various New South Wales honeys for their antibacterial and antifungal properties including peroxide and non-peroxide activity, and investigating the relationship between forest health, bee health, and the antimicrobial properties of honey through microbiome analysis. Kenya’s work aims to improve our understanding of bee and hive health and to add value to New South Wales honey within the medicinal honey industry.

Emily Noordyke

Emily Noordyke

DPI Plan Bee Industry Development Officer

Emily works at the Department of Primary Industries on the Honey Bee Genetic Improvement Program, helping beekeepers select for desired traits in their queens. Before moving to Oz from the U.S., she worked for the Bee Informed Partnership Technical Transfer Team and got her Master's in entomology from the University of Florida, with a focus on pollen substitute research.

Dr Nadine Chapman

Dr Nadine Chapman

Research Fellow, University of Sydney

Nadine Chapman is a bee researcher at the University of Sydney. Nadine’s research is primarily industry focused. She co-leads the Plan Bee honey bee genetic improvement program, which aims to increase honey production, pollination and bee health. She is also leading the AgriFutures Australia funded Resilient beekeeping in the face of Varroa project, which aims to identify the best strategies for Australia if the Varroa eradication program is unsuccessful. Nadine enjoys the satisfaction of working on projects of intrinsic value to society; we need our bees to secure our food. She relishes working with different stakeholders and trying to understand their needs and find ways to meet them. She has a passion for communication; science should not be kept in the ‘ivory tower’.

Dr Cooper Schouten

Dr Cooper Schouten

Lecturer, Science, Faculty of Science and Engineering, Southern Cross University

Dr Cooper Schouten is the project leader for the Bees for Sustainable Livelihoods Research Group and Lecturer at Southern Cross University. Cooper specialises in international agricultural research and has extensive beekeeping research, capacity building, training and extension experience working throughout of the Indo-Pacific region with local government, private sector and NGO’s. Cooper has produced 12 peer-reviewed publications in the 2019-20 period and has recently completed two Small Research Activities and final reports for ACIAR (AH/2015/002 and LS/2017/100). Cooper currently oversees a four year ACIAR project in PNG and Fiji (LS/2014/42) with active research in the fields of honey bee nutrition, biosecurity, queen bee breeding, post-harvest handling and marketing, and gender equity and participatory approaches to apiculture.

Dr Soumi Paul Mukhopadhyay

Dr Soumi Paul Mukhopadhyay

DPI Sensory & Consumer Science Researcher

Dr Soumi Paul Mukhopadhyay is a sensory and consumer researcher with NSW Department of Primary Industries. She has had over 15 years of “Fast-Moving Consumer Goods” (FMCG) industry & academic/research experience in India, Italy and Australia with Nestle, Whirlpool Corporation and Goodman Fielder, to name a few. She completed her PhD in 2015 with Charles Sturt University (CSU) at Wagga Wagga with NSW DPI and Grain Research and Development Corporation (GRDC) funded project on ‘Eliciting sensory and consumer preferences of Australian desi Chickpeas’ (DAN00139). Soumi has expertise in understanding how sensory and consumer science can facilitate better promotion and placement of various products (from grains, legumes, honey, dairy, fruits and vegetables, wine and olive oil to everyday grocery products). She brings together a fresh perspective of how sensory attributes of different food products can be better communicated to various stakeholders in the language they understand.

2023 Conference Partners