22 May 2019

One is the son of a retail manager from Japan’s third most populous city; the other from a tiny town in Southern Italy.

Both have travelled halfway around the globe to forge a career in agriculture in Australia and have turned to TAFE NSW to teach them the finer points of farming.

Kyosuke Kudayama, 28, and Gabriele Bochicchio, 29, are midway through agricultural courses at TAFE NSW’s Primary Industries Centre (PIC), one of the nation’s foremost farm training hubs.

For Mr Kudayama, who is studying a Diploma of Agriculture, the course is a perfect pathway to fulfilling his dream of running a dairy farm in Australia.

As a child, Mr Kudayama would travel daily to his grandmother’s home deep in the Japanese dairy belt of Hokkaido.

“I would look out the car window and I fell in love with the dairy farms,” he said.

He vowed to one day run his own dairy farm and arrived in Australia three years ago, working at dairy farms at Deniliquin and Goologong before enrolling in a Certificate III at TAFE NSW and then the Diploma.

“TAFE NSW is much more practical than university and the teachers are very close to the students,” Mr Kudayama said. “They’ve all worked in the industry and have good contacts; they’ve introduced me to people in the industry I wouldn’t have met otherwise.”

Mr Bochicchio is working on a rockmelon farm in Griffith as an agricultural technician and irrigation manager but decided to enrol at TAFE NSW to broaden his skillset.

“Once you get the skills you become much more confident and competent,” he said. “I can feel my skills improve day by day and learning at TAFE NSW and then applying that learning to my job is very helpful.”

Mr Bochicchio hopes to stay in Australia and continue in the field.

TAFE NSW Head Teacher of Agriculture Rob Harris said international students were increasingly being drawn to the TAFE NSW PIC.

“We’re getting interest from well beyond just Japan and Italy,” Mr Harris said. “It’s a unique facility in the sense we have a working farm on site and we are located centrally to a lot of diverse agriculture.

“Our staff also have a wealth and depth of experience across a lot of agricultural industries.”

TAFE NSW PIC offers courses in a broad range of areas, including agriculture, animal studies, horticulture, shearing and wool classing and ag mechanical.

To find out more about studying at TAFE NSW PIC, phone 13 16 01 or visit www.tafensw.edu.au.

Media contact: Daniel Johns, TAFE NSW Media and Communications – Business Partner, 6938 1441, mobile 0477 722 428.