Councillor to take up high-profile funding role

Catherine Marriott has had a busy few weeks.

On the day she was elected with two other councillors to the Shire of Broome, Ms Marriott announced she was resigning as chief executive of the Kimberley/Pilbara Cattlemen’s Association to take on another high- profile role in January.

Her new position as WA project manager with the Cooperative Research Centre for Developing Northern Australia has the capacity to help bankroll a number of multimillion-dollar projects across the Kimberley region.

The Federal Government body she has joined is primed to pump $75 million of Commonwealth money over the next 10 years to support industry-led research collaborations.

The funding would develop new technologies, products and services addressing industry issues in northern Australia within three areas — agriculture and food, tropical health service delivery and traditional owner-led business development.

Ms Marriott was looking forward to working collaboratively to develop a research hub in northern WA with the State Government, industry organisations, universities, TAFE and other organisations.

She said it would be a place where people and organisations share resources to ultimately deliver relevant research to the community. Her main focus initially would be to network map the region and determine what organisations and funding was available in the public and private sectors.

This would involve exploring the resources of each organisation and determining what projects were going to add the most value.

“We would then look at how to best manage, communicate and disperse information to ensure the research is relevant and utilised by the people that it was designed for,” Ms Marriott said.

“I will also be looking at sharing information more collaboratively with the Northern Territory and Queensland as I feel there is lots of opportunity to learn and share from each other.”

The inaugural CRCNA call for expressions of interest is soon to close and the first round of projects due to begin in the new year.

CRCNA chief executive Jed Matz said the appointment came at an exciting time for the body, with the inaugural call for expressions of interest soon to close and the first round of projects due to begin in the new year.

“Catherine’s vast experience in agriculture, specifically in Western Australia, will make her a valuable addition to the team managing the WA-based projects,” he said.

Ms Marriott was chief executive of KPCA for two years.