Sophie Hansen moved to Orange ten years ago where she lives and manages a holistic deer farm with her husband Tim and their two children. She studied print journalism at the University of Canberra then followed a career in feature writing for food and lifestyle magazines both in Australia and Italy.
With over 15 years’ experience in journalism and food writing, Sophie’s work focusses principally on primary industries and producers. She has authored and photographed a book of recipes and stories and for the past four years has written and photographed for her popular blog of the same name; Local is Lovely. In addition to this, she runs food photography and styling workshops and a series of events on her farm including farm kitchen lunches, tours and cooking demonstrations.
As someone whose primary income depends on agriculture Sophie understands how the success of any business hinges on a positive marketing and media profile. Empowering people to use social media platforms successfully opens up new opportunities and provides long term benefits to farming businesses and rural communities.
Sophie’s award ambition is to provide communities the skills they need to take advantage of social media channels to tell their stories, connect with peers and new customers and invite the world into their kitchens and onto their farms. She wants to share her experiences and skills in using social media to promote agribusiness and encourage more rural women to become active and collaborative members of online and actual food communities.
Sophie will use her $10,000 to develop an innovative online learning course called ‘My Open Kitchen’. My open kitchen is designed to assist anyone involved in primary industries to use social media channels to build ‘social capital’ which in turn will deliver transparency, engagement, trust and ultimately financial returns for primary producers.
Sophie believes that the flow-on benefits to primary industries are broad and range from improved sustainability of regional agribusinesses to increase vibrancy of smaller rural communities and build stronger consumer awareness and engagement in primary industries across the country.
Sophie Hansen 2016 RWA National Winner ReportThis report reflects the author’s view. They do not necessarily reflect the views of AgriFutures Australia, nor can AgriFutures Australia verify the accuracy of the information contained in the report.