Rural
3 March, 2023
Healthy soil the secret to life
By Calvin Muller A chance meet-up of a retired Warracknabeal farmer with a passion for healthy soil and a soil advocate from Melbourne has led to a competition for students on the importance of healthy soil. The inaugural competition was held at the...
By Calvin Muller
A chance meet-up of a retired Warracknabeal farmer with a passion for healthy soil and a soil advocate from Melbourne has led to a competition for students on the importance of healthy soil.
The inaugural competition was held at the end of 2022 and was open to all primary and secondary schools in Australia.
There was a special category for schools in the Wimmera area, supported by the Wimmera Catchment Management Authority (CMA).
Calvin Muller has just turned 89 and has lived and farmed in the Warracknabeal area all his life.
Mr Muller wants to get a message out to young people on the importance of healthy soil to our food and our landscape.
Bev Middleton has lived in Melbourne most of her life and, since retirement has focused her energies on learning about soil, life in the soil and the importance of healthy soil to
human lives.
She is a director of Healthy Soils Australia and founded Soil Week Australia.
Mr Muller and Ms Middleton connected after she was interviewed on a radio show, and they decided they wanted to work together on soil.
Mr Muller said it was the young people who would make a difference to how we treated our soil, so together they created the Healthy Soils Competition for students.
The competition attracted more than 60 entries from primary and secondary schools in every state and territory, including Ringarooma in Tasmania, Bees Creek in the Northern Territory, Vermont in Victoria, and Girraween in NSW, covering from rural and urban schools.
Entries from schools in the Wimmera area were outstanding, with prizes going to
Warracknabeal Primary School, St Arnaud Primary and Horsham College.
The winning entries were videos, stories, presentations, posters and even a rap about soil.
Ms Middleton and Mr Muller received great feedback from teachers and students alike, who said “We had fun" and it was “exciting” to learn something different.
The competition was a great success thanks to support from Microstart Biological Farming Solutions and the Wimmera CMA.
Mr Muller and Ms Middleton are planning for the Healthy Soils Competition to be bigger and better this year so schools and school students should keep a look out in order to be part of the initiative.
Details are on the Soil Week Australia website: https://soilweekaustralia.com.au/schools-competition/