Roots and reach are global in Lameroo
With diversity woven into its workforce and innovation driving its farms, the Mallee town of Lameroo shows its reach as a finalist for the 2025 Agricultural Town of the Year Award.
The two new towering silo murals in Lameroo, looking out across the Mallee, tell the story of a town built on agriculture and propelled forward by multiculturalism, scale and innovation.
“The artworks are opposite in some ways but they complement each other,” says Nicole McMahon, chairperson of Lameroo Forward, a volunteer group that helped bring the murals to life.
“There’s an underlying theme of resilience in farming, but they’re also opposing: man and woman, sunrise and sunset, past and present. They’re symbolic of our story.”
Characterised by low rainfall and sandy soils, Lameroo was once centred on dryland farming and livestock. The “irrigation revolution” in 1990s supported by the underground artisan water basin and new farming techniques, opened up new industries including mixed farming and horticulture.
Nicole is also co-manager of family business McPiggery, one of the town’s two major employers alongside Pye Group, pioneers of the Spud Lite potato and also growers of carrots, onions and cereal grains.
Both McPiggery and Pye Group have been central to building a multicultural workforce, with skilled migrants underpinning their scale and reach into national and international markets in the town of roughly 850 people.
McPiggery is one of the largest single-site, family-owned pork producers in Australia. Employing around 40 people, it has drawn attention for its biogas development, effluent management, feed efficiency and integrated cropping systems that form part of a circular farming model.
Meanwhile, Pye Group operates a $45 million logistics and processing hub, which is the southern hemisphere’s largest potato packing facility and home to more than 200 workers.
Pye Group farms manager Jaco Pauer, who migrated from South Africa 15 years ago, says he has found a lasting home in Lameroo.
“The community is very welcoming and inclusive here,” Jaco says. “We look after each other. I feel at home.”
Nicole says the town’s multiculturalism is a strength that secures its future.
“What we’re doing, we’re doing so we can be here for the next 100 years, so our kids can be here, so our grandkids can be here. That’s our ideal world, and we want to share it.”
Enrolments at the Reception to Year 12 Lameroo Regional Community School, once declining a decade ago, have grown to more than 200 students. It is the only school in Australia to offer Afrikaans, recognising the contribution of South African farming families in the region.
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Busy women balancing farming and young families play a leading role in Lameroo’s agriculture. At McPiggery and Pye Group, women are at the helm, while sisters Lou and Bonnie Flohr are recognised as leaders in both agriculture and community life.
Lou, who won the Grains SA 2025 inaugural Women in Grains Award, is a trustee of the South Australian Grain Industry Trust and reestablished a playgroup in town to help connect families, particularly non-English speakers, to the community.
Bonnie is a farming systems and crop physiology scientist for CSIRO, conducting trial work in Lameroo that contributes to the future of its farming.
“There is nothing better in terms of accelerating adoption and innovation for the district,” Lou says.
“We’ve had a lot of women in our town who have gone away to study and then brought those skills back to our area. We’re actually seeing women take the lead on farms and in industry in our patch. It’s something we’re really proud of.”
Erika Nassif and Will Botha migrated to Lameroo from South Africa almost 14 years ago with their four children. They say the community’s warmth made them feel immediately at home.
“When we first moved here, I mentioned one day to a lady that our family was really cold. By the next week we had been given about ten knitted crochet blankets. I still have them,” Erika says.
The couple were enthusiastically supported when they decided to start a mower racing team, Mallee Mower Racing, which became the first full class of electric race mowers in the world. With more than 50 members, it has become one of the town’s many sporting clubs.
“We know that all work and no play is not a good thing, so we created a sports club that’s a little more quirky than your usual one,” Will says.
“Our youngest member is five years old and our oldest is 73. Anybody can do it.”
Ron and Robin Valentine add to the town’s tourism appeal with their gin business, Mallee Spirits, housed in a former shearing shed turned distillery.
What began as a hobby quickly grew into a business that attracts visitors from across the state. The couple will host their first music festival this November.
“I think the difference for us in Lameroo is we’re trying to be authors of our own future story,” says Ron, who is also the Mayor of Southern Mallee District Council.
“We’re asking, ‘how can we make it better?’ And that’s for future generations.”
