Madam Chancellor
As Lincoln University celebrates 125 years of service to education we break new ground today with the first presentation of an award for distinguished service by an international alumnus.
The terms of the Bledisloe Medal have always meant that it has had to be made to a New Zealand resident. This by definition has always excluded that vast community of international alumni who have excelled and given magnificent service in many ways in their home countries.
Our 125 th anniversary is an appropriate occasion to put this matter right. We are therefore introducing an International Alumni Medal, equivalent in stature and distinction to the Bledisloe award, and we are making the first presentation today.
Madam Chancellor I will present the inaugural recipient to you in a moment, but first let me review his career as testimony to the worthiness of his selection for this high honour.
John Alexander Andre of Millicent, South Australia, came to Lincoln University in 1959 as a 19-year-old intent on gaining qualifications for a farming career and following in his father's footsteps as a pastoralist on the family property "Ceres", a 3200-hectare spread on the Millicent Flats.
Lincoln was chosen, he says, because he wanted to return to the land and also wanted a degree in agriculture and Lincoln in New Zealand offered precisely the right mix of farm management, science and practical farming.
He graduated Bachelor of Agricultural Science in 1963 and also served on the executive of the Students Association.
John's time at Lincoln, the late 1950s and early 1960s was a remarkable period that produced many graduates who went on to distinguished careers related to the land and other areas. Class mates of John's included Dr Bill Kain, Bledisloe Medallist and later foundation CEO of AgResearch, New Zealand s largest Crown Research Institute; recently retired Meat Board CEO and Bledisloe Medallist Neil Taylor; former Secretary of Labour John Chetwin; and John Labes, former Wool Board director, chairman of WRONZ and New Zealand Sheep Council Chairman, to name just four. Others names you will know include, David Haslam, Dr Peter Nuthall, Allan Frazer and Malcolm and Jim Douglas.
John's own career stands as distinguished as any and that is why we are honouring him today. His own country did so in 1998 when he was appointed a Member of the Order of Australia, and now it's our turn on this side of the Tasman.
Three areas of service and achievement stand out - his contributions to the preventing the entry of exotic livestock diseases to Australia; his commitment to the enhancement of product quality assurance in the beef industry; and his dedication to the elimination of chemical and undesirable residues in Australian meat.
John, we know you are a quiet man and that you are not one to seek publicity for the personal role you play in what you achieve. I apologise therefore if I embarrass you by recounting in public the distinguished service you have given to numerous key organisations in Australia as you have worked in the three areas just mentioned.
You served 11 years on the executive committee of the Cattle Council of Australia, including three as the senior vice-president; you are Chairman of Cattlecare Limited, developers of the on-farm quality assurance programme for beef producers; and you served nine years on the board of the Australian Animal Health Laboratory.
You were a member of the exotic diseases body which developed the Australian Manuals of Procedures to deal with exotic diseases; you served on the National Federated Farmers exotic disease committee that considered applications for imports of animals and genetic material and developed protocols for such imports; and you served on the steering committee that developed the "Meat Standards of Australia" beef tenderness guarantee scheme.
At a state level you served on the ministerial Cattle Health Management Advisory Committee, the Meat Industry Development Board and the Brucallosis and TB Eradication Committee.
All this in addition to being a working farmer on your family property "Ceres" where you run 2000 head of cattle and 19,000 sheep.
Madam Chancellor, it is particularly fitting on the occasion of Lincoln s 125 th anniversary that our first International Alumni Medal should be awarded to an Australian. Pursuing the anniversary theme of "Looking back looking forward" it has been drawn to my attention that Lincoln's very first two international students were Australians. The first arrived here from Victoria in 1882 - student number 59 on our enrolment list - and the second, also from Victoria, came the following year. He was No 77. As was the custom in those days, the roll entry is accompanied by subsequent comments by the teaching staff about the character and progress of the students. Like a sort of report card. Sadly for these first two Australians their time at Lincoln does not appear to have been happy or successful. Remarks from the teaching staff include: "Lazy and rowdy", "inattentive and mischievous", "idle", "has neither good manners nor principles", and eventually in the case of No 77 "suspended for continued breaking of regulations and insubordinate conduct".
By the time John Andre arrived here in 1959, the "remarks" column was well and truly dropped so I have no way of knowing what his teachers might have thought of him. I am sure, however, that given his outstanding career since graduation and the great credit he has brought to Lincoln as his alma mater his time here as a student would have been the exact reverse of what s recorded about those first two Australians.
Madam Chancellor may I present John Alexander Andre, Bachelor of Agricultural Science, Member of the Order of Australia, for the award of the Lincoln University International Alumni Medal.
For further information contact
Ian Collins, Journalist, Lincoln University, Canterbury
Tel: (03) 3252811 ext 8549.
Email: Ian Collins