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Many of you know I tragically lost my Dad to suicide in 2016, and that traumatic event and the unfolding dairy crisis, were the two catalysts that brought about Gippsland Jersey. Our annual mental health calendar is an integral part of our mental health brand pillar since it began in 2018. It is delivered free to dairy farmers all over Victoria every year, with the intention of starting a conversation around mental health, in which the daily 'office' can be a very isolating environment. We hope the calendar finds its way to the wall in the dairy, or maybe in the family kitchen, and serves as a reminder for any farmer in a tough moment, that there is always someone who has walked the same path and come out the other side, and that's it ok to ask for help. 

‘Don’t conform with everything that’s out there, think outside the box sometimes. Think individually, what’s good for your neighbour isn’t necessarily good for your farm!’

Produced by Connect Well East Gippsland + Wellington and Gippsland Jersey, the 2022 'The Hand that Feeds You" calendar includes the stories of 12 East Gippsland farmers and extols the virtues  of sharing and recognising the inner struggles many of us, especially those who work on the  land, have faced in the past 12 months. 

ICE CREAM. THAT’S how Sallie Jones, one half of Gippsland Jersey, parses memories of growing up in idyllic Lakes Entrance, in East Gippsland, Victoria, before her dad, the dairy farmer Michael Bowen, tragically took his own life in 2016. “He’d flick a big chunk of freshly churned ice cream onto the back of your hand,” she recalls. “Ice cream on tap.... It was the childhood that children could only dream of.”

Naomi Ingleton was Australia’s Queen of BUTTER and proved herself years ago as the biggest and best makers of artisanal or cultured butter in Australia. Naomi (originally a Gippsland girl) is almost single-handedly responsible for the growing appreciation among Australians that butter doesn’t have to taste like butter blocks you buy from the supermarket.

In under 18 hours, Gippsland Jersey had arranged to visit Pakenham, Narre Warren and Wheelers Hill for people to pick up pre-purchased boxes of six two litre milk cartons.