Pulse industry farewells stalwart
THE PULSE industry is mourning the death of industry stalwart JanBert Brouwer.
Born in Indonesia and educated in the Netherlands, Dr Brouwer emigrated to Australia in the 1970s and held a number of roles, heading up breeding programs in the field pea, chickpea and lentil sectors, along with time working on other broadacre crops such as oats and triticale.
He was heavily involved in the pulse industry and science community and held roles as Pulse Australia’s vice chairman and was Pulse Australia’s inaugural delegate on the International Pulse Quality Committee.
As a breeder, Dr Brouwer was responsible for the development and release of three oat, three triticale, eight field pea, two chickpea and three lentil cultivars. He said he found pulses the most interesting of the crops he worked on.
Dr Brouwer spent most of his working life in Victoria, in particular in Horsham, with Agriculture Victoria and its predecessors, before becoming the research and development manager with the Wimmera Grain Company, but also spent time in Sydney.
He arrived in Horsham in 1983 and remained in the town until his death.
Along with his research work, Dr Brouwer also worked with students through a role as Senior Fellow with the Institute of Land and Food Resources at the University of Melbourne in their Crop Production sector.
Through this he was the co-supervisor of five post-graduate students located at The University of Melbourne, RMIT and The University of Western Australia.
As a scientific author, he was responsible for 21 journal articles, 59 conference papers and numerous technical reports.
Prior to arriving in Australia he worked in countries as diverse as Barbados, South Africa and Brazil.
Outside of work, Dr Brouwer was passionate about gardening and nature.
Together with his wife Mabel he was involved in a wide range of community organisations such as the Wimmera Growers of Australian Plants, Friends of the Wail Arboretum and Friends of Grampians / Gariwerd.