| Griffith City Council Open for business
Griffith City Council |
| Griffith City Council Open for business Griffith City is the hub of the Western Riverina, a diverse and rich agricultural region of New South Wales. The district is Australia’s largest producer of wine, and is home to other major industries such as rice, cotton, poultry, almonds, cereal production, manufacturing and food processing. In recent decades, those industries have grown and evolved due to the support of a sound transport infrastructure, and a diverse skills base drawn from a growing population.
Griffith City Council | Today, Griffith is also home to a vibrant arts and creative community, as well as fine dining and shopping reflective of its culturally diverse population. The city is a highly attractive place where people come to visit, to develop their lives and careers, and where businesses would be wise to come and invest. “We’re a regional centre,” says Greg Lawrence, Council’s Manager of Tourism & Economic Development. “We’re a strong, positive, growing city that offers great benefits to its outlying towns and hamlets.” Greg’s personal experience in the tourism industry is extensive and varied. Prior to embarking on a career in local government, he worked in the cruise industry for 26 years with companies like P&O, Cunard and Sitmar Cruises, as well as the golf and wine industries. He and his wife also owned a country pub in north-east Victoria. “What I enjoy most is bringing parties together and making things happen,” he says. “That’s what local government is all about – it’s all about being a conduit.” To serve that role better, Greg has also involved himself in a number of local organisations. He has been a Board member of Destination Albury Wodonga as deputy chair, has
| Griffith City Council
Griffith City Council | AWONDERFUL LIFESTYLE served as the President of Australian Institute of Travel & Tourism, and was treasurer of the Deniliquin Chamber of Commerce and an executive of the Griffith Business Chamber. “I like to give back to the industry I love so much, and also learn from it,” he explains. “I believe you’re never too old to learn and take on new ideas.” Over the past 100 years, Griffith’s industrious people have developed a huge agricultural sector, giving the area its modern-day reputation as “the food bowl of Australia.” Griffith’s strength in agriculture has also fostered growth in adjacent industries, such as manufacturing, retailing and innovative technology. As a result of this variety, the region was able to withstand the GFC and 2000s Australian drought. Now that the area is on the other side of those challenges, Greg says that Griffith is rapidly growing into a “first-rate city that punches well above its weight.” To encourage that growth, Griffith City Council is committed to assisting investors and developers in realising their potential – whether that means new subdivisions, complexes, industry, duplexes for the rental market, or
| Griffith City Council business relocation and expansion. “We want to work with investors and developers to encourage growth and new industry in a sustainable manner,” Greg says. “We welcome all inquiry.” Griffith City Council has introduced a number of measures to assist developers. These measures include identifying appropriate funding and rebate opportunities through government programs, assisting with identifying commercial premises and options for suitable land, and assisting developers throughout the DA and Council processes. In addition, Council has also put a lot of effort into attracting new people – residents and visitors alike – to take advantage of the city’s growth. For example, Greg says they have invested heavily in their sporting arena, which has already started to attract premier sports tournaments to the region. “That bodes well, because development by itself is not enough,” he explains. “You need people to continually come and visit your area, so they spend money and support local business.” A city also needs people to experience it in order to share their experience, Greg adds. He describes that kind of word of mouth as “price-
Griffith City Council | less.” “I could spend trillions of dollars on advertising saying how great a place is, but that word of mouth is worth even more,” he says. “We know how powerful TripAdvisor and Facebook are. When someone posts something and says ‘Mate, you have to come and see this place’ – that’s gold.” According to Greg, Griffith City routinely earns those kinds of referrals, which is a credit to the local lifestyle. “We have a wonderful cosmopolitan lifestyle,” Greg explains. “We have an Italian heritage – and the wine, coffee, and food that comes with that – but we also have a real multicultural population, which creates a wonderful atmosphere in our city, as they bring their various food and shopping offerings.” That lifestyle is also one of the many factors that are attractive to prospective residents. Another factor is the city’s accessibility and integration. “People are looking for areas that they can afford to live in, but that aren’t stuck out and isolated,” Greg says. “We’re not far from Melbourne, and we’re not far from Sydney. We have air services, coach services, once-aweek rail services.”
| Griffith City Council On the air services side, Regional Express flies from Sydney seven days per week, with several flights each day. Volume at Griffith City Airport is predicted to grow quickly and Council has even planned for this with their recently redeveloped airport terminal. “People also look at schooling, at employment, and at health,” Greg continues. Griffith has strong offerings in each of those departments. When it comes to education, for example, there are choices ranging from K-12 education, Riverina Institute of TAFE, and Charles Sturt University courses. There are also major employment opportunities across the board. The poultry processing industry, for example, is a major employer, with an established poultry producer recently investing $28 million into their operations, and set to double its output to 62 million birds per annum. There’s also the growth industry of wine production, with the locally-based Casella Wines being the number one Australian exporter to the United States. The manufacturing industry is also one of the largest employers in the Griffith region, employing an estimated 18 per cent of the local workforce. In addition, the city has many banking institutions that provide specialist ser-
Griffith City Council | A LONG TERM APPROACH vices to retail, agribusiness, and commercial enterprise, as well a finance sector that handles some of the highest profile business clientele in Australia. Then there’s retail – between the city’s major shopping centre and the Banna and Yambil strips, it employs over 3,000 people and serves a population of about 52,000. “Health is also a major part of the equation,” Greg reiterates. “We have excellent health facilities, and we’re current in partnership with St Vincent’s Hospital to build the first community private hospital. St Vincent’s is one of the number one leading providers in Australia if not the world, so that really ticks a big box, whether you’re a young person or an older person.” Moving forward, Greg says the list of Griffith’s advantages is only going to grow longer. “We have a very proactive council, and we’re constantly investing and re-investing into our city,” he says. “Our future is looking very bright, and we have a lot of opportunities on the go.” One major investment, for example, is the soon-to-be-developed Western Riverina In-
| Griffith City Council
Griffith City Council | termodal Freight & Logistics Hub, as well as a new business park located behind it. That hub will have a major impact on accessibility to domestic markets, and will provide an ever greater benefit for export and import business by increasing the freight options available. Council is also looking at developing a ‘truck bypass’ route, so trucks don’t have to travel through the middle of Griffith’s CBD – which will improve traffic as well as safety for both drivers and pedestrians. “We’re taking a long term approach,” Greg says. “We know that Melbourne, Sydney and Canberra are getting slowly starved because people can’t buy more land, and if they do buy more land it’s going to cost them a fortune. And getting in and out of Sydney is becoming very expensive, so it’s not effective from a logistical point of view.” As major businesses such as Woolworths, Coles, IGA, and FoodWorks evaluate where to put their future distribution points – or relocate their existing ones – Greg hopes they take a close look at Griffith. “We want them to see that we’re putting the infrastructure in place, that we’re working with private investors, and that we offer some very exciting incentives for investors,” Greg says. “We want them to know that we’re open for business.”
| Griffith City Council
Griffith City Council |
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