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18/11/2025
Ally Osborne’s connection to nature feels instinctive in the way she speaks, thinks and sees the world around her.
“I don’t know if it is something you learn or if it’s something you’re born with”, Ally reflects. “But in my childhood, I felt like I was immersed in nature”.
Growing up on her family’s beef cattle property near Holbrook in southern New South Wales, Ally spent her time after school on her horse out in the back bush paddocks which adjoined a neighbouring wildlife reserve. It was a childhood steeped in the land, and one that has quietly shaped her career path.
Today, Ally is Rabobank’s Chief Sustainability Officer, with a remit across Australia. And while it is a fair cry from Holbrook to the bustle of Sydney, her journey has remained grounded in a love of working with farmers and caring for the land and its ecology. From running a farming business with her husband Stewart, to completing a Nuffield Scholarship focused on sustainability, and holding roles with organisations including the Biodiversity Conservation Trust, each experience has led her to this one – one she describes as “made for me.”
Joining Rabobank in February 2024, Ally says the opportunity to take on this role came about quite unexpectedly.
“I wasn’t looking for a new role,” she says. “I think it must have come up on my LinkedIn feed and I actually ignored it the first time I saw it, as I had recently changed jobs. But then I thought – this job is made for me. I can’t not apply.”
Ally’s appointment marked a return to Rabobank, having helped establish the succession planning arm of what was then Rabo Financial Advisors nearly 25 years earlier.
What now feels like “full circle,” Ally says the years in between were spent working with farmers, undertaking research, running her own business, working with corporations and start-ups in sustainability and even authoring a book.
After finishing school, Ally studied a Bachelor of Rural Science at the University of New England in Armidale.
“In hindsight, I think I was much more suited, in terms of my interests, to the Natural Resource Management course across the road,” she smiles. “But I was from a farm, and all the farm kids at the time did Rural Science.
“Ecology just wasn’t on the radar. Growing up, it wasn’t something we talked about or something I had considered studying.”
Upon finishing Uni, Ally joined Hassall & Associates in Dubbo where she worked with farming clients around the principles of Holistic Management and Grazing for Profit.
“It was all around land management,” she says, “not just managing your animals, but your grass and your landscape.”
“I remember sitting in that Grazing for Profit course and thinking, wow, I have just learned more in one week than I learned in four years of my degree.
“Suddenly we were talking to farmers not just about agronomy but asking: what is it you want to achieve here? What’s your long-term goal for your family and your landscape? It was really eye-opening and I was really lucky to be there.”
During her time at Hassall’s, Ally also worked on a project liaising with farmers impacted by the designation of Willandra Lakes as a World Heritage site, and later travelled to Zimbabwe, as part of a combating desertification project.
“I probably realised then the enormity of the sustainability challenges ahead of us”, she says.
Sparking a curiosity to learn more – not just about sustainability but how we define it, Ally embarked on a Nuffield Scholarship, with her research taking her to Asia, the US, Europe and Africa.
While she enjoyed the experience, Ally says she came back “a little underwhelmed with the progress everywhere, thinking - this is going to be hard.”
Motivated to deepen her understanding, Ally then began a PhD in Agroecology and Sustainable Agriculture at the Institute for Sustainable Futures, which included a stint at Maningrida in Arnhem Land.
But before she could finish, Ally says she got tapped on the shoulder to do some work with the Dairy Research and Development Corporation in Melbourne.
“They said, we would like you to run a project in New South Wales for the dairy industry?” With the role seeing her work with dairy farmers as they made decisions in the wake of deregulation.
“I was sick of not getting anywhere with my PhD, as I hadn’t found a supervisor that could help me and really pull me along, and I had no money, so I was like, yes. And jumped into that.
“And gosh, I did lots of things after that, with one project leading to another.”
At the time, Ally was living in Sydney but travelling frequently for work. “I would fly back in from Bega or Dungog or somewhere and think I just don’t want to be coming back here.”
So, she packed up and moved to Orange to work in succession planning with what was then, Rabo Financial Advisors.
“I had done my training with Lyn Sykes, who ran a training program for farm family facilitators,” Ally explains. “And I had worked with families in the dairy industry in my previous role, so it all fitted really nicely.”
It was also during this time that Ally and Stewart moved to his family’s mixed farming property at Koorawatha, outside Cowra, where they raised their young family – Heidi, Archie and Xanthe.
“I was actually working remotely from the farm way back then, with the team based in Dubbo,” she says. But being 45 kilometres from town, and with the kids starting primary school, they made a move closer to town before making another leap a few years later to Sydney.
“It was really hard for me to find something satisfying, workwise,” Ally says. “And with our eldest getting closer to starting year seven, we thought – do we just go to Sydney? Do we try it?”
Nearly a decade on, Ally says the move has been “fantastic, career-wise”.
Working with the likes of GrainCorp in leadership facilitation, Ally then took on a role with the newly formed Biodiversity Conservation Trust (BCT) in 2018.
“A bit like Hassall’s, this was a pivotal career choice for me because the BCT was just being set up to provide income streams for farmers conserving biodiversity. And it just ticked all my boxes. So, I applied for every job there!”
Ally was appointed Regional Manager for Sydney and the Hunter Regions, leading the delivery of biodiversity credit generation across New South Wales and the establishment of conservation agreements, regionally.
It was during that time that Ally says she “learnt to put on a different set of glasses”.
“I remember growing up on the farm, I wasn’t really aware of the ecology. I was so focussed on the horses and the cows, the sheep, crops or the feed, I wasn’t looking out for what birds or wildlife we had there on the farm.”
But working alongside ecologists at the BCT changed that.
“They’d pull up at the front gate, wind the windows down and drive at five kilometres per hour,” she says. “And I would just be thinking, what are you doing? And they’d say, I am listening for what I can hear.
“And I thought – wow. I never did that. I used to fly down our driveway. Now when I go out on farm, I ask: what can I hear? Where’s the closest vegetation, water, shade or shelter? Where’s the connectivity?"
Since stepping into the Chief Sustainability Officer role, Ally says she brings these learnings into her way of working.
“Working with a bank that works closely with farmers and land managers, there is an opportunity to influence in a really positive way. To reward and recognise really good land management and to incentivise positive change, where we can. I really don’t think there’s anything more important.”
Getting out on-farm and meeting with farmers has also been central to her approach.
“I make a point of getting out on-farm, regularly,” she says. “Because how can we support our clients if we don’t know where they are at and what they’re thinking?”
One of Ally’s first initiatives in the role was to understand what Rabobank’s clients value about natural capital – and why.
This led to a series of interviews with farmers across Australia, as a way to share what motivates them, what practices they are implementing on-farm to both enhance environment but also productivity, the barriers to further adoption and how the bank can support these initiatives.
“I wanted to understand that” Ally says. “Having that opportunity was such a privilege. They gave their time and their stories and they really shared – this is why I value it, this is why I invest and this is the value it brings to the system. That learning has been so powerful for us at the bank.”
It was through these conversations and subsequent case studies, Ally says, that the Rabobank Land Stewardship Award was born. “A client asked me, why don’t you reward and recognise better land management practices in a more proactive and structured way?
“And they were exactly right. I love it when clients challenge us like that – what a fabulous group of people to challenge you like that.”
Launching on 13 November, the award is open to Rabobank clients and aims to celebrate farmers who are leading the way in building resilient and productive farming systems.
“This is an opportunity for our clients to share how they manage their land. Stewardship means something different to everybody and this is about sharing those stories.”
The top five entrants will be featured in professionally produced videos to showcase their farming practices as part of the selection process. With two winners then receiving a fully sponsored place on Rabobank’s Executive Development Program and a position for their spouse on the partner program.
“I am really excited about our Land Stewardship Award,” Ally says. “Every time I hear a client talk about a native population or some biodiversity on their farm, I feel like that’s a little win.”
Ally says she is also excited about Rabobank’s partnership with the Zero Net Emissions Agriculture Cooperative Research Centre (ZNE-Ag CRC) producer demonstration sites, which will look at some practical emissions reduction options, as well as some of the work the bank is starting to do around helping clients evidence their sustainability claims.
“The data piece, for clients to be able to evidence their sustainability practices, their operational efficiency and their land stewardship, I think is going to be increasingly important,” Ally says.
Ally and her family hiking at Rakiura in New Zealand