This is an extremely popular event which raises overall awareness of ways to live more sustainably and creates an excellent opportunity for organisations including local businesses, non-government organisations, community groups and others to showcase their sustainable ideas, products, services and volunteer opportunities.

Our special guests will be last year’s stars from The Block, Sticks and Wombat. The high profile contestants will be guest speakers at the event, which this year is themed “Sustainable Design”.

They are fun-loving mates from the South Coast who decided to put their limited building expertise to the test and enter The Block. Sticks (Mark Croker) has built his own house and Wombat (Clinton Price) lives in an off-grid container house and is great at up-cycling and reusing materials.

Last year’s event attracted more than 6000 people and I anticipate it will be another busy couple of days that will generate plenty of interest.

Business Connect

THE business bus was in town this week stationed in front of the Bathurst Court House on Russell Street. The service comes to Bathurst on a regular basis and offers free advice to small business owners or people who are thinking about starting a business.

I encourage anyone who is seriously thinking about starting or expanding a business to meet with an experienced adviser and receive personalised support on how to start, grow or innovate your business next time the bus is in town. Visit www.bizhq.com.au to find out more.

ORGANISERS of new and second-year events held between July and December 2018 are being encouraged to apply for the NSW Government’s 2018 Incubator Event Fund, which supports events held in rural and regional NSW.

The fund offers a one-off grant of up to $20,000 for new and existing smaller-scale events. Whether it’s for marketing, public relations, venue hire or attendee research, this $20,000 grant will assist in attracting more overnight visitors to the Bathurst electorate in the hope they stay longer and spend more time exploring our wonderful region. 

I encourage those eligible to apply soon so they don’t miss out on this wonderful NSW Government initiative. The more events we support across our regions, the more heads on hotel beds, diners in restaurants and shoppers in stores.

The Regional Flagship Events Program is managed and administered through the NSW Government’s tourism and major events agency, Destination NSW. Applications for round two of the 2018 Incubator Event Fund are open until Sunday, March 18, 2018. Visit www.destinationnsw.com.au/rfep.

Stocking our rivers

LOCAL fishing clubs were recently delivered their allocations of Murray cod, restocking native reserves in the Macquarie River. This regeneration is through funding partnerships with the NSW Recreational Freshwater Fishing Trust and our local not-for-profit fishing clubs.

The fish were purchased by our local clubs with matched dollar-for-dollar funding from the sale of recreational fishing licence fees.

The Central Acclimatisation Society (CAS) and Dudley Fishing Club released 2800 Murray cod into the river at Bathurst from money raised at the Gone Fishing Day event held at Eglinton and the Bundi fishing club released 8000 fish in the Dixons Long Point area from funds raised by members.

A big thank you to all the local volunteers who help keep our waterways full of these fantastic fish. Visit www.dpi.nsw.gov.au/fishing/recreational