It has been an exciting ride, Wallace Taylor, OAM, says of his career.
Gladstone-born and Rockhampton-based Dr Taylor was recognised today for his service to the information technology sector and to rural development with the Order of Australia Medal.
His career history is so varied it has taken him from Charters Towers as a beef extension officer in the 1960s through to a speaker at the famed Salzburg Seminars in 2003 and 2005.
Dr Taylor says he was “astounded” when he found out about the award, and credits his career highlights for being born at the right time just after WWII.
This was a time positive time when Australians had a sense of getting things done and a sense of responsibility.
“A lot of people don’t appreciate that in today’s population terms, there were about 350 Australians killed each week for five years,” he explains.
After studying at Gatton College in the 1960s, Dr Taylor joined the Department of Primary Industries “because I was interested in riding horses, chasing cattle and trying to be a rodeo rider”.
He failed at the latter, he says, but started out at a cattle research station, Swans Lagoon, and discovered “riding horses came with a lot of pliers in your hands and a lot of fencing”.
Dr Taylor was posted to Rockhampton as the contact officer during the Brigalow Area Three scheme, and in the late 1960s moved to Charters Towers.
“That was when the big, bad beef slump hit and it was really bad, so I became involved in people trying to get equity and get themselves out of trouble.”
At this time, some were a bit “cranky” with the United Graziers Association, and Graham McCamley approached Dr Taylor to help set up the Cattlemen’s Union.
He took long service leave from the DPI, rolled up his sleeves and introduced out-of-work journalist Rick Farley to the graziers.
“That was a lot of fun,” Dr Taylor chuckles. “I took him in and there was Graham McCamley, Alan Shannon, Ian Park - all really conservative people - and I took in this guy who had just finished working for the Labor Party. He had long hair, rings and things hanging around his neck and a hand bag.
“They asked, ‘What are you doing to us,’ and I said we need somebody and this is the only bloke available.”
Rick Farley, who died in 2006, went on to great things including making waves with the National Farmers Federation and establishing Landcare.
Letters of support for his OAM nomination describe a man who consistently goes beyond the call of duty. A visionary and an innovator who is always at the forefront in introducing new ways that have assisted communities.
In the late 1970s, he was encouraging producers to adopt computers and analyse how they were operating their businesses.
Such was the respect he garnered in Charters Towers that a group of 10 producers got together and funded him for a six-week study trip of the United States’ beef industry.
After taking setting up the Cattlemen’s Union, Dr Taylor says he “did all sorts of things”.
His career took a direct shift towards information technology when he developed skin cancer and needed to keep out of the sun.
He went back to university and completed a science degree, then a PhD at CQUniversity in information technology, and as before in his career, looked at ways to use this for community benefit.
His list of achievements in the rural sector spans pages, including setting up FieldFest, the first major industry/community showcase in central Queensland.
He was also instrumental in establishing a Centre for Agricultural Technology as a joint venture between CQUniversity, CSIRO and the DPI.
Dr Taylor also set up another community-based approach - the Community Informatics Network, which involved CQUniversity and the Rockhampton City Council. The aim was to provide training in the use of computers for all community members.
For this, he was awarded the Rockhampton Citizen of the Year Award in 2001.
His interest in information technology now sees him spend almost half his time in South Africa, where he is is the Founding Director and Chair of The Information Society Institute.
His work in South Africa also saw the establishment of the ikamva National e-Skills Institute, a government-owned company tasked with “e-skilling” all sectors.
Dr Taylor has been invited to speak at many international conferences, including the Salzburg Seminars, and the UNESCO World Summit on the Information Society program in St Petersburg, Russia.
One of the his career highlights, however, was Building Rural Leaders Foundation Program.
There was funding to run it for two years, but it ran for close to 20 years and had 1200 people go through it.
“It was something I was really passionate about and I think it did have some kind of on-going effect in the industry.”
His extensive career has given interesting insights into the cattle industry - and he says it’s vastly different landscape now than in the ‘60s and ‘70s.
“There were a lot of things not going well in those early days, which is why I started the rural leadership program,” he says.
But what the industry had back then were people who were active participants in supporting their industries.
“There were real icons in the industry that don’t seem to be there now, and they were innovative.”
Admittedly, there was more fat in the system and there was more help available.
“I don’t think the industry has moved on as well as it could have, and cattle producers by their nature are individualistic and it’s a challenge for them with having to cut costs and still remain individualistic.
“The answer is increasingly about how you operate as a collective and that is not natural territory for cattle producers.”
There is less support these days, the economies of scales required are different and it is a much tougher game.
“There is a huge need for rural leadership or the adoption of modern ICT devices in all sorts of ways.
“I think the way society as a whole has become is less tolerant of the needs of rural folk - they are busy and have problems of their own.
“Fewer people involved in rural industry so it is becoming more and more isolated.
“It’s a shame but I think there are a lot of people trying to do things - but it gets harder to hand farms on, whether they are big enough to be viable.”
Dr Taylor says he is humbled at the award, and the letters of support from Tom Mann, Sir Graham McCamley, Terry McCosker, Jim Miller and Shaun Coffey.
There is a cost to doing community work, and this is family, he says.
So the final thanks goes to his wife, Rhonda.
