Trainers

Don Nicol - Principal Trainer

A Brisbane-based consultant, Don works across Australia and internationally.

Don has a wealth of technical and practical experience and proven success in commercialisation of genetic technologies. He works in tropical or temperate environments, thus giving his work a 'national' perspective. He managed cattle ranches in Venezuela for six years.
He was a beef adviser with the Queensland Department of Primary Industries and Fisheries in his first ten years here. He developed the highly successful BREEDPLAN commercialisation strategy as national coordinator of extension for the National Beef Recording Scheme.
For a decade he was the breed development consultant to the Angus Society of Australia and laid the technical platform for them to move from a minor to the leading technology breed in the country. He consulted to the Australian Agricultural Co for 8 years advising on their composite breed development & value-adding strategy before joining the company as a Divisional Manager.

In 2000 he organised the release of the GeneSTAR Marbling, the world's first commercial DNA test for a production trait, when he was a shareholder of GeneSTAR Pty Ltd. He continues as an advisor to Genetic Solutions on technology transfer.

He is a member of the Management Committee of the MLA National Beef Genetics Extension Team. He has advised MLA on the extension of genetic technologies and recently produced a CD-Rom on beef breeding and genetics on their behalf.

Don has consulted throughout South America including 18 years advising a group of Argentinean breeders who have adopted BREEDPLAN; regularly speaking at international conferences in South America (where his fluency in Spanish is important). In May 2005 he spoke at the ACCREA conference in Rosario, Argentina to 2400 people.

Last year he advised the Queensland Government on strategies to enhance exports of Australian beef cattle genetics to South America.

Don has a global, supply-chain view on genetics and a passion in marketing genetic technologies to the world.

Wayne Upton

Since 1992 Wayne has been an extension specialist and consultant at the Animal Genetics and Breeding Unit (AGBU) where he is responsible for extension of the use of AGBU products including BREEDPLAN and BreedObject. He has also been in charge of on-farm research projects which have been responsible for the introduction of new technologies to the beef industry such as real time ultrasound for measurement of eye muscle area, fat and marbling. Wayne is responsible for the testing of the accredited ultrasound scanners who collect the ultrasound data for use in BREEDPLAN.

As part of his role at the Animal Genetics and Breeding Unit, Wayne is responsible for consultancies on design of genetic improvement programs to some of the more influential seedstock and commercial herds in Australia. These consultancies have involved developing BreedObject indexes for specific programs and the use of TGRM to design the mating programs.

Wayne has worked extensively in industry to improve data collection for use in BREEDPLAN including the design of commercial progeny test programs for individual herds and the Shorthorn society through the Durham Research and Development Project.

From 1992 to 1999 Wayne was national co-ordinator of breeding programs for the Cattle and Beef Co-operative Research Centre. In this role Wayne was responsible for the design and implementation of the progeny testing of some 350 sires across 30 herds from seven different breeds. The design needed to be robust enough to allow the progeny to be split across numerous treatments such a grain or grass finishing at three different slaughter weights, and still give valid sire comparisons for slaughter traits.

Wayne has a long history in the beef industry of New South Wales and Australia, starting his career with NSW Agriculture then working as a consultant to various groups within the industry. He has been based at the University of New England for over 15 years and has spent some time in a teaching capacity at this institution.

He holds the following Degrees: 1972 Bachelor of Science, University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia. 1988 Masters of Science, University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia. Thesis: "Study of Some Management and Environmental Effects on Reproductive Performance of Beef Cattle".