Back to the land:
Country Calendar takes a look at a businesswoman who rediscovered her love of the land. Melenie Parkes reports.
Businesswoman rediscovers her love of farming.
Although Laura Douglas (above) grew up on a sheep farm in Mossburn she never considered following in her family’s footsteps.
But about four years ago, she came to the realisation that for all her success in the corporate world in Auckland, she wasn’t happy.
“I never worked on a farm outside of the family farm,” says Douglas. “And I had no business sort of going back into that kind of area. But I’m really passionate about the rural lifestyle and rural New Zealand.”
She moved back to the South Island and started her own business, Real Country, which offers a genuine farm experience for tourists and tour groups. But with Real Country reliant on tourism, Covid-19 meant that her bookings practically dried up overnight.
But Douglas is nothing if not resilient and has since taken on any kind of farm work available to cover the ongoing costs of her business and her animals.
“When it all happened, there was a bit of depression,” she says.
“Then I kind of just pulled my socks up. And in lieu of making money I started volunteering, speaking at all the secondary schools in Southland.”
Douglas’ Country Calendar episode was directed by former Sunday reporter Matt Chisholm.
They had worked together for a segment on the workshops Douglas designed to teach girls farm skills.
Despite essentially mothballing her business, she has managed to find a silver lining amid the pandemic. She has taken on a full-time role as director of the Farlight Foundation and it couldn’t be a more perfect fit.
“We’ve started up a non-profit (business) to help more women get into farming. And we do that by giving them a free year living and training on the station to develop all the practical skills that they need to go into farming,” she says.
“Having a female-only farm training institute in New Zealand is long overdue and I’m really proud that we’re setting it up.”