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House of Assembly - Fifty-Fifth Parliament, First Session (55-1)
2025-09-02 Daily Xml
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Frome Electorate

Ms PRATT (Frome) (15:20): I would like to update the house on a few activities that have been taking place in my electorate of Frome, and in particular some special visits that I have been able to coordinate in the town of Kapunda. Most recently, I happily welcomed the member for Morphett, the shadow minister for mining and energy, who had been waiting for quite a while for an opportunity to catch up with a very special business, a partnership, a husband and wife team, Leon and Philippa Faulkner of EnviroCopper, who have kept me abreast of their aspirations for the copper lode in Kapunda. For a number of years now, we have had ongoing conversations, but their association with the town of Kapunda extends over the last eight years.

They have had a very thoughtful, sensitive and inclusive approach to working with the residents of Kapunda, setting up a shopfront in the Main Street and making sure that, through their own level of expertise and knowledge of the in situ recovery (ISR) technology and extraction procedures, not only as a community have we been learning a lot more about ISR but the community of Kapunda has been able to slowly socialise themselves and educate themselves about what it means to be a town of such rich history, going back to 1844 or thereabouts, when Kapunda first discovered it was sitting on the mother lode—the copper lode—that we understand really established the boom economy for our early colonial state.

We have been educating ourselves not just about the copper lode that exists but about the opportunity to develop a new economy for Kapunda and the Light region through the in situ recovery process. For a number of visits, I have had the fortune to walk out beyond the quarry, walk out into paddocks and see the diameter of a piece of PVC pipe that goes down into the ground in this liquefied extraction process that is cutting edge. It is used by BHP and other copper mining behemoths around the nation, a modern, innovative, environmentally friendly approach to extracting copper that we understand extends right across the state.

This is an economic opportunity for our state The government recognises that, and I am really proud that Leon and Philippa Faulkner of EnviroCopper have established themselves within the Kapunda community to display and project forward what those economic opportunities might be as energy and mining in copper ISR steps through the processes that are laid out.

Kapunda has so much potential in so many areas. JT Johnson's hay baling plant is just across the road. I had the good fortune to find that the Japanese Consul General, Mr Furuya, accepted my invitation to visit my electorate so that I could share with him those export trade and tourism opportunities, not just in the Light region, not just in Kapunda, but further north in the Clare Valley as well.

We did visit JT Johnson's, the biggest employer in Kapunda, to explore those trade relations that are so important to our state as we continue to invest in our primary industries and in our capacity to grow our local economies, and also to recognise the rare commodities that we have throughout the state. I am proud that the primary industries of Frome are so strong.

I want to give a shout-out to a little business that I have loved to call a neighbour. 2B Nourished has certainly nourished me over the years. They have since been able to relocate their business further up Main Street into a bigger footprint. Kylie, her family and her team have now expanded their footprint to the Kapunda Strength Studio, which is next door to the coffee shop—a pretty good arrangement, if you ask me—and their grand opening was yesterday. I could not be with them but I wish them well as they deliver a new era of wellness for Kapunda.

The SPEAKER: Another little spot to put on the 'must call in and taste something delicious' list.

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