Event chief says Show must go on… line

ONE of Bendigo’s longest running annual events has been cancelled for the second year in a row, but plans are being busily made to move many of its popular competitions either online or offsite.

Ian Furze, executive officer of the Bendigo Agricultural Show Society, said apart from World War II, last year was the only time since 1859 that the Bendigo Agricultural Show had not been held.

“Now we’re two in a row,” he said. “It’s heartbreaking, to be honest. Everybody was geared up for this one because we missed the last.”

Despite the setback, Mr Furze said the Show Society’s committee and other main stakeholders, such as the Country Women’s Association, are working furiously behind the scenes to still hold as many Show competitions as possible this year in a “safe and permitted” way.

“The main thing that we don’t want to do is lose that contact with our supporters and exhibitors, so we’re looking at running just the basic activities online,” he said.

“A lot of those will be centred around the craft sections in particular, the cooking, the photography, the knitting, the needlework etc.

“Normally we’d get around 4000 entries for a Show across those categories, so there’s a lot of people that are potentially missing out.

“We’re just working through the list of what we can do now without going too big, because obviously we’re limited in our capacity to be able to do a lot without the revenue.”

While there’s an acknowledgment that some traditional and much loved events may not be possible, the Show’s organising committee are focusing on how to deliver what is possible in the current conditions.

“There may be 40 or 50 competition classes across the board,” Mr Furze said.

“So we’re trying to touch as many of the sections as we possibly can and to give everybody an opportunity, particularly the juniors to exhibit their prized creations.

“How to enter for some of the categories will be different. We’re looking at a combination of online, where they’ll simply be able to take a photo of their entry, send it in, and it will all be assessed from the photos.

“Some of the sections though, it’s a little bit difficult to judge from a photo. Cooking is a perfect example of that.”

“So we’re also hoping that there will be gaps within the lockdowns around showtime that people will be able to drop their entries off.”

Final details are expected to be confirmed for which competitions and how they’ll run in the coming days.

Keep an eye on the Bendigo Agricultural Show Society’s Facebook page at facebook.com/BendigoAgShow for further developments.