NQ grazier, conservationist and former MP recognised

The Giru grazier received the honour for significant service to conservation and the environment through the management of wetland systems, and to the Parliament of Queensland.

He has an extensive list of environmental credentials, including the chairmanship of the North Queensland Dry Tropics from 2007-2015 and as honorary executive director and founder of the Wetlands and Grasslands Foundation, since 1999.

He manages the Wongaloo Wetlands Regional Park in trust for the Queensland government and told a Reef, Range and Red Dust conference in Caloundra last year that cattle had helped bring invasive weeds under control in the park located between Townsville and Ayr.

It contains the largest-ever brolga congregation in Australia and is a significant breeding ground for the birds, and is grazed with cattle as the “only practical alternative” for controlling weeds on the 1700ha tropical wetland.

Mr Stoneman was a representative on the Queensland Regional Natural Resource Management Groups collective between 2007 and 2015, and prior to that was the Australian coordinator for the US-based LT Jordan Institute international intern program with the Texas A&M University.

He held a position as an adjunct professor in land development and sustainable development with the university in 1997.

As a grazier since 1960 Mr Stoneman remains a member of the Australian Brahman Breeders Association, and helped introduce the liveweight wet curfew of cattle, through the Queensland Meat and Livestock Authority, in the 1980s.

After being elected to Parliament for the National Party in 1983, Mr Stoneman was briefly the Primary Industries Minister in Russell Cooper’s ministry before a change of government.

He became the Parliamentary Secretary to the Premier and North Queensland representative in the Borbidge government from 1996-1998.

Mr Stoneman also distinguished himself as a leader for the rural education lobby, receiving life membership of both the Queensland council of the Isolated Children’s Parents’ Association and the Cairns Radio branch, of which he was inaugural president.

He also helped form the Nebo branch and was Queensland ICPA president from 1980-82.

He is the patron of the Townsville Gun Club and the Giru Show Society, a member of the Museum of Tropical North Queensland advisory committee, a trustee for North Queensland Wildlife Carers, and the first officer of the Margaret’s Creek Rural Fire Brigade.