I wanna be a Producer

EMILY YARRA & MICHAEL KOBIER

Brightside Produce, Anembo, NSW

“We just wanted to live out in the bush,” says Michael Kobier, half the duo that runs Brightside Produce. For Emily Yarra, Kobier’s partner in life and business, the progression to full-time work from law school didn’t excite her. The couple lived in Canberra at the time and dreamed of moving to the country and avoiding the city commute. “[But] we weren’t sure how that looked in a practical sense,” says Yarra.

Six years of WWOOFing (working on organic farms) in North America and Europe, labouring on commercial farms in Australia, reading, taking courses and dreaming gave them the answer: Brightside Produce, a chemical-free, organic farm in Anembo, 90 minutes’ drive south-east of Canberra. “We moved out here in July 2015, planted in October and were selling by December,” says Yarra.

They started by supplying friends and family with boxes of produce harvested that week. These days they grow between 15 and 30 varieties of heirloom vegetables at any time, supplying 25 produce-box subscribers (there’s more on a waiting list) and a range of Canberra cafés and restaurants, including Bar Rochford