About your host – National Carbon Farming Conference & Expo

Carbon Farmers of Australia have been pioneers in the carbon farming industry. Experience counts.

Carbon Farmers of Australia helped establish the farm-based carbon offsets industry

Campaigned and lobbied since 2005 for farmers’ rights to sell carbon they grow in soils, store in trees and reduce on-farm emissions
Made first sales of Australian soil carbon credits in March 2007
Staged the world’s first Carbon Farming Conference, Mudgee 2007. 2022 marks the 10th!
Launched the first formal training program on soil carbon 2008
Wrote and published the first Carbon Farming Handbook 2009
Helped secure $26 million in funds for research to soil carbon for trade
Granted an Australian Financial Services Licence for Carbon Trading, 2012
Participated in the Emissions Reduction fund with close to 200 000 hectares under Government Contracts with Farmers
Foundation Signatory of the Carbon Market Institute’s Code of Conduct for Carbon Agents
Opened Carbon Farmers of Nepal. Developing projects in developing countries
Currently researching all new options outside the ERF for Australian and overseas Farmers to enter the Carbon Trade and be rewarded for their ecosystem services.

Louisa Kiely, B. Ag.Eco

Louisa, Director of Carbon Farmers of Australia, obtained her Bachelor of Agricultural Economics from the University of New England. She worked in the market research industry as a field supervisor while bringing up her 3 children. Together with her husband Michael, in 1991-2003 Louisa established and grew a city based marketing agency from zero to 55 employees. In this business, she was Director and General Manager of Boomerang! Integrated Marketing & Advertising.

Intent on following her first choice of career, she studied for the Advanced Diploma of Farm Management at Sydney University (Orange), trained in Holistic Management, and from 1998 to 2017 she was a woolgrower in the Wellington NSW district, growing fine Merino Wool.

She was selected by the Central Western Catchment Management Authority as one of 10 highly innovative landholders in the Catchment, to be trained in farm planning and soil restoration. Through this training, she and Michael became convinced that soil carbon could solve many agricultural, environmental, and climate change problems.

She co-founded the Carbon Coalition Against Global Warming in February 2006 to lobby for the right of Australian landholders to trade on the emissions offset market the credits they can earn by sequestering carbon in their soils. She has since traveled throughout Australia and internationally meeting scientists and farmers and spreading the word about Carbon Farming.

She was invited to be a delegate at a Climate Change and Conservation Farming Conference in LaFayette, Indiana, organised by the UN Food & Agriculture Organisation. She was also a delegate at the National Carbon Offset Coalition Conference in Bozeman, Montana. She is co-founder of Carbon Farmers of Australia Pty Ltd (CFA). CFA also published the world’s first Carbon Farming Handbook.

Seeking to build bridges with the scientific community, she organised two Soil C Summits between Scientists and Farmers, in Dubbo and Orange NSW. And as co-founder of CFA, she organised and ran the world’s first Carbon Farming Conference & Expo in November 2007. In 2019 the 9th National Carbon Farming Conference & Expo, the biggest yet with delegates from every state in Australia and from all over the world, was held.

She developed the “CarbonCredited™” brand for wool and recruited woolgrowers into this emissions reduction program. Louisa has been recognized for her work and was chosen as runner up in the 2008 NSW Rural Woman of the Year. She has also sat on the board of the Regional Development Australia Committee – Orana Region. This intergovernmental committee was set up to ensure the future strength and development in rural and regional Australia.

As director of Carbon Farmers of Australia Pty Ltd, she was a part of a consortium of 3 companies that developed the first Soil Carbon Methodology submitted to the Carbon Farming Initiative process. Carbon Farmers of Australia also offers farm-ready training in Carbon Farming and Trading.

Michael Kiely, BA (Hons), A. Dip. A., Dip DM

Prior to moving to the country, Michael forged a creative career in Marketing for 30 years. Michael was creative director of a large agency, as well as a regular conference speaker, a lecturer and workshop facilitator for many organisations. He has been a judge for many marketing awards programs. Michael was editor of Marketing magazine for 10 years and was also executive editor. He was founding chairman and managing director of Boomerang! Integrated Marketing and Advertising. He was inducted into the Australian Direct Marketing Hall of Fame in 2001.

Having moved to the country, and realising the huge challenges Agriculture faces, he set about using his skills to research all issues Concerning Farmers and Climate Change.

In this role Michael & Louisa were woolgrowers from the Wellington district of NSW and Conveners of the Carbon Coalition Against Global Warming, a farmers’ and citizens’ movement which aims to have soil carbon recognised as a major solution to Climate Change. They have been delegates at many high-level symposia in Australia and the USA. They led a fact-finding delegation to the USA on behalf of Australian farmers in 2006. While there, they negotiated the first order for soil carbon credits from the Chicago Climate Exchange. Michael has appeared as an expert witness before the NSW Premier’s Greenhouse Advisory Panel and the NSW Department of Primary Industries Climate Risk Management Project.

Michael and Louisa organized and conducted the World’s first Carbon Farming Conference & Expo in 2007, attracting more than 350 delegates from all states of Australia, and across the world.