Beef week in Rockhampton comes around every three years, and when it does the whole industry shows up. Beef 2024 was no exception, and for the Ruminati team it was one of the more significant events in the company’s history to date.
Co-founders Peter Leihn (CEO), Bobby Miller and Will Onus were there for the full five days, alongside Lily, Bill, Cheryl, Annabel and data analyst Tanisha Shields, who was on loan from Agrista. Bobby opened the week with a Carbon Conversation with Carmel Onions from CommBank at the NBN Tech and Innovation Stage, which set the scene for the days that followed.
The Ruminati marquee was busy throughout, with visits from the McDonald’s team including Rebecca Honeysett and Tom Mahony, along with Woolworths, AuctionsPlus, Elders, Fulton Market Group and Agrista. They were joined by a steady stream of producers and feedlotters working through questions about the platform and what emissions tracking looks like in practice for their businesses.
Tanisha presented twice during the week on pathways to beef emissions efficiency, and both sessions drew packed marquees. She went through the data behind what drives emissions intensity in beef systems and where the main levers for improvement sit, which is the kind of analysis that is only possible with a dataset of sufficient scale and diversity. The response from producers reinforced how much appetite there is for that level of detail.
Peter moderated a panel on the NBN Stage with Rebecca Honeysett from McDonald’s, Natasha Greenwood from CommBank, Wyn Snyman from AuctionsPlus and Matt Brown from Heartline Grazing. The conversation covered supply chain sustainability and data sharing, along with what the emissions reporting landscape is going to look like for beef producers in the years ahead. During the panel, Wyn announced a new partnership between Ruminati and AuctionsPlus, which gives AuctionsPlus users the ability to showcase their Ruminati Climate Assessment status directly on the platform, so that emissions data is visible at the point of sale.
The week wrapped with the first Ruminati Climate Assessed cattle going to market on AuctionsPlus. Building a platform that helps producers measure their emissions is one part of the job, and seeing that data start to flow through the supply chain in a way that has commercial relevance for the producer is the next part, which is the direction everything is heading.
Thanks to everyone who stopped by across the week to ask hard questions and share their feedback. We’ll see you at Beef 2027!
