Australia Day awards recognise former DFMC Chair

Former DFMC Chair, Duncan McInnes has been awarded a Medal of the Order of Australia (OAM) in the Australia Day Honours this year. The medal recognises Australians who have demonstrated service worthy of particular recognition.

Duncan was recognised for his service to the dairy industry, agricultural show societies and the community.

He described receiving the award as a very humbling and proud moment. He thanked his wife, Mary, and daughters, Megan, Heather, Kirsten and Ruth for supporting him.

“They missed out on different things, family life and such, from the amount of time I put into dairy organisations,” he said. “It was a downside for them at times, but credit to them.”

Duncan, who has lived in Radford in the Scenic Rim region of south-east Queensland his whole life, runs 500 milking cows that produce around four million litres of milk a year.

Duncan’s community spirit and involvement started in his teenage years when he joined his local rural youth club at age 17.

“I’ve always worked,” he said. “I enjoyed helping out. It was probably a flow on from rural youth, that started off the community service side of things.”

In 1970 Duncan became a member of the Queensland Dairy Farmers’ Organisation and has spent the past 50 years serving the dairy community through various local, state and national industry organisations.

Duncan was Director of DFMC at its inception in 2004 until 2017 and Chairman from 2013 to 2017.

“The idea of the DFMC when it started was to look out for the farmers and make sure their voices are heard. And still today DFMC is representing its members, like in milk pricing negotiations.

“Looking after farmers is the name of the game. It’s important that all of their voices are heard.”

Duncan has been a Councillor in the Royal National Agricultural and Industrial Association of Queensland since 2011. He is a member of several committees, and he is Chairman of the Dairy Cattle and Goat Committees.

“Some people in the dairy industry are doing it tough at the moment with the different conditions around Australia, but I believe they’ll get through it and live to fight another day. We been through some rough patches, and hopefully it’s a bit brighter moving forward.”