 Okay, good morning everyone. Thank you for joining us for today's Sheep Industry Fund public meeting webinar. I'm Eleanor Amir, Assistant Director at Good and Wine in Perza and I'll be chairing the session today. Firstly, I'd like to acknowledge the traditional owners of the lands across the state on which we meet today and pay my respects to their elders past and present and extend that respect to other Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander's people who are present today. I'd like to hand over, I think, directly to Casey so that she can take you through the update to the Sheep Industry Fund Management Plan today. Sure, thanks Eleanor. Welcome to the meeting. The purpose of today's meeting is to present the revised Sheep Industry Fund Management Plan 21 through to 2526. A copy of the Management Plan is available on the Perza website now. It's at the link there. The plan doesn't have too many changes this year but I'll highlight any of those as we go through. In terms of the agenda today, I'm just gonna go through a little bit about the fund, then walk you through the plan and present it and there'll be time for some questions at the end. So just some general information about the fund. The fund, the Sheep Industry Fund established under the Primary Industry Funding Schemes Act 1998 which is an act that makes provision for funds, establishing funds for primary industry purposes and other funds as well and other purposes as well. It sets high level requirements for establishing the fund for contributions to the fund, how to apply the fund, the management plan and the annual reporting in particular. It sets, so all the requirements for the management plan that we're presenting today are actually in the act and specifically that the minister must ensure that management plans are prepared for the fund and presented at public meetings like the one we're having today. It also sets that the management plan must cover a five year period and must be revised and presented at least once every 12 months. The fund itself is established by its own regulation and there's currently 15 funds that are established under the act and the Sheep Industry Fund regulations get listed there on the screen. And the regulations established the funds, set the fund administrator state what the fund will consist of and then all the specific rules relating to contributions to the fund, free funds and how the fund can be applied or what it could be used for. Just some specifics about the Sheep Industry Fund it's administered by the minister, the contribution rate is currently 67 cents per sheep which comprises two components. One is 55 cents per sheep which is a general contribution rate and a 12 cent per sheep contribution rate that is specific to funding the dog fence rebuild. Contributions are payable by or on behalf of the vendor of the sheep. And then when I say on behalf of that's when the contributions can be collected by stock agents, abattoirs or also anyone who carries on a business for involving the purchase of the sheep for slaughter or sale of carcass that could be a butcher. So we'll move on to presentation of the management plan itself. This update has been completed in consultation with Livestock SA in specifically the sheep industry fund board that's established under the Livestock SA. Following that consultation the plan was approved by the minister and now we're now presenting it at the public meeting in accordance with the requirements of the act. The plan starts with a bit of an introduction on general aspects of the fund and I've just covered that in my little explanation about the fund. So we'll move on to the next part of the management plan which is the estimate of contributions. So the estimate of contributions is something that is updated every year. It's updated based on our history of contributions into the fund as well as we've got a model that we also use some data that's available some forecasting data that's available to model how we expect contributions to change over the coming five years. So in this, the estimates this year are that sheep sales will increase steadily over the next five years and from, yeah, 6.1 million up to 6.6 nearly 6.6 million in 25, 26. So I just wanted to stress the figures in this table and the sheep sales that it's based on estimates only they are going to be their subject to being impacted by seasonal conditions and anything else that may happen other impact can impact sheep sale numbers. They're based on the best and the most recent data that we've got available and we review those and update them every year. So they change year to year based on the best data that we've got available. This table, the format of this table has changed since last year. We've now outlined the specific components relating to the 12 cent dog fence rebuild contribution and how much money that's forecast to bring into the fund. Then the second part looks at the general contribution rate and then provides the total estimate at the bottom. And that's just to delineate the dog fence rebuild contribution is really available for that specific purpose. Whereas general contributions are available for a number of other things as prescribed in the regulations. I also wanted to highlight that the dog fence rebuild contribution rate is forecast to be required up until a point in probably 24, 25. Again, this is something that we monitor very regularly and will update in the management plan on a yearly basis as to where our forecasts are showing us that the industry funding target will be met at the moment it's looking like that will be sometime in 24, 25 that the industry funding target we met and therefore from 25, 26 that contribution rate will drop to zero or his forecast to drop to zero. The next part of the plan relates to investment of the fund. This is a standard statement that is in all our industry fund management plans. And it says that PERSA administer the financial operations of the fund on behalf of the minister in accordance with the regulations and the Public Finance and Audit Act. Contributions are invested in a separate interest bearing account at the Department of Treasury and Finance and interest is paid monthly on the monies that are held and that's treated as income into the fund. There's a minor change with this one this year. Previously interest has been paid quarterly. It's now been paid monthly. So we've just reflected that in the management plan this year. On to the purposes of the fund. The purposes of the fund are prescribed in the regulations and I've summarised them here. There's been no change to this. And in fact, the management plan is a straight read from the regulations. But in summary, it can be applied for rebuilding any portion of the dog fence for maintenance or improvement of the dog fence for on advice of a body that in the opinion represents that in the opinion of the minister represents sheep producers payments to that body. Now, just highlight that one as that's the one that a majority of the funds go out under at the moment to this year to livestock SA. So D is around payments for other purposes for the benefit of sheep producers. There is the repayment of contributions which we often will talk about as being refunds. And also the regulations enable the payment of expenses of administering the fund. So there's more detail in the wording that's in the management plan. I've just sort of paraphrased the regulations there. The next section of the management plan goes on to outlined investment priorities. These are priorities that have been developed by industry. Previously, dating back to the advisory group when that was around and now are still current and we've worked with the sheep industry fund board to discuss and consult on them and they believe they're still current. So there's been no change to these this year. Again, there's more detail in the management plan but it outlines the investment priorities as being animal health, traceability, predator control, advocacy and industry development. And if you have a look at the projects that have been funded and that information is available via the PERSA website and also via the page on the Livestock SA website you'll see that the way the fund is applied and the projects that are funded all fall under those investment priorities. The management plan actually also before I go on to, yeah, sorry, I skipped out the ineligible and ineligible activities in that section are also outlined under the management plan. I won't go through them today but they're listed there and talk about the criteria as well that activities funded will be assessed against and clearly outline the types of activities that are ineligible for funding under the sheep industry fund. The next section is to do outlines funding guidelines. So all of these guidelines under this section apply only to payments that are made under regulation 7C, which are the main payments to a body that in the opinion of the minister represents sheep producers. As mentioned before, currently for this year it's Livestock SA fulfills that purpose. So the eligible organisations are, yeah, outlined there. They also must be a legal entity that are through requirements. The minister must have approved that they represent sheep producers and there must be a legal entity. In terms of the application process, the eligible organisation may request a payment from the fund via an application in May each year. There is a, there is some provision in there that the minister may consider applications for funds at other times if that was needed and if there were extenuating circumstances surrounding that. And the management plan also sets the application requirements as well in terms of what needs to be what needs to be in the application. The applications are assessed and approved by the minister as administrator of the fund. And that includes checking that the proposed activities comply with the regulations and the management plan and that they're also within the expenditure authority that's for the fund as well. And if approved then the organisation is then required or expected to undertake the activities that were outlined in their application and also there's a requirement for them to also post the details of those projects or activities on their website so that that's publicly available for all contributors to view. The management plan sets out also that the amount though is available for payment from the fund under that regulation seven seed for a representative body. And the main requirements that cannot can't exceed the fund balance. There is some further information in the plan as well around how that amount is calculated and also outlining that we're possible and subject to seasonal variability in the sheep sales as well that are closing balance of one year of contributions is maintained in the fund at the end of financial year. And that's supported by the sheep industry fund board and livestock essay as well and recognising that it assists in managing variability in income. It provides a reserve to draw in case there is unforeseen circumstances and it can also assist in managing refund payments toward the end of the funding guidelines. It outlines the reporting requirements that there's a progress report due at the end of January and an annual report at the end of July from an ineligible organisation. And also the payment terms that that organisation can expect. So this one has had a change this year, only a slight change and it recognises now the management plan or content in the management plan outlines and clarifies that the payments under that regulation to industry or reserve to a body is a GST exclusive. And to assist in managing that we've also we have shifted or increased the percentage of the payment that's paid out in July or as soon as the within 30 days of when the application is approved to 50%. So it's 50% in July, 30% in October and 10% in February and April. The final part of the management plan deals with some more administrative matters. So the first one is around grievances that any concerns about the use of the fund can be raised in writing with the minister. It also sets a process for changing both the general contribution rate and the dog fence rebuild contribution rate. And finally outlines the annual schedule for updating the management plan. The main sort of dates to be or things to be aware of a consultation commences usually towards the end of the calendar year from October through to December. We finished that off by finalising the plan in January and aim to hold the public meeting annually in March. Just missed March this year. So that's the end of my presentation about the presentation of the management plan and I wanted to open up if there were any questions. Okay, thanks, Casey. Just checking in with Ian and Jodi, there's no questions come through chat or Q&A section. No questions at all. Okay. Okay. I think happy then to conclude the meeting. Thank you everyone for attending and move on to launching that the management plan will go live on our website available to anyone that wants to look it up. If anyone does have any questions, my contact details on the screen they're also on the PERSA website. And if so, you can send me questions if you have any after the meeting.