Laura Watson

Laura is a fourth generation farmer from Gisborne, alongside her husband Jeremy they lease her family farm, a 735ha hill country property where they run a sheep and beef breeding and finishing unit. Laura has a Land Management background and is currently the Project Manager for the Waimatā Catchment Restoration Project which provides funding and support to landowners throughout the catchment to undertake biodiversity and conservation improvement projects.

After returning to the farm in 2018, Laura and Jeremy developed a farm environment plan with an emphasis on enhancing the native biodiversity on the farm alongside maintaining a profitable business. With the support of the Waimatā Catchment Restoration Project they have been able to fence waterways, wetlands and native bush blocks and plant over ten thousand natives within these areas. They have also been able to establish an intensive predator control project to protect these areas and encourage the native wildlife to flourish. “Helping to protect and enhance the ecosystems across our farm and involve our children as we go is really important to us. With the support and encouragement of the Waimatā Catchment Group we have been able to achieve a lot of our environmental goals over the last 4 years, many of which would have taken decades to achieve without them. This goes to show the importance and benefits of supporting landowners to undertake environmental projects on their properties.

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