The future is female? It can be – if we name it, back it, and fund it.
Women have long powered progress: in science, in innovation, in agriculture. But history shows their contributions have been sidelined.
At evokeAG. 2025, the conversation went beyond reckoning to resolution. The Great Fallacy: The Future is Female tackled equity, power, money and opportunity head-on – confronting the structural barriers still holding women back and asking what it will take to dismantle them.
Joining her on the panel:
- Sally-Ann Williams, CEO, Cicada Innovations
- Kylie Frazer, Co-Founder and Partner, Flying Fox Ventures
- Lisa Hewitt, Queensland and Northern Territory General Manager, Elders
- Jocie Bate, Co-Founder and CFO, SwarmFarm Robotics.
Not new – just not recognised
Before talking about the future of women in agrifood, the panel made one thing clear: this isn’t about inviting women in. They’ve always been here.
“Women have been leaders and knowledge holders of both Western and Indigenous communities for millennia,” said Sally-Ann Williams. “We’ve always been part of the story – in STEM, in innovation, in agriculture.”
She pointed to wartime examples: “When men went to war, women ran farms and factories. We did the mechanics.”
“And we were the first programmers. The fact that men got to the moon was because women wrote the code that got them there.”
To Sally-Ann, the problem isn’t absence – it’s recognition.
SwarmFarm’s Jocie Bate agreed, noting that it wasn’t until 1994 that Australian women could officially list their occupation as ‘farmer’. “And until 1984, women couldn’t access a loan without a male guarantor.”
Jocie Bate in action at evokeAG. 2025.
Concrete boots on the climb to capital
Systemic exclusion isn’t just historical – it’s ongoing, particularly in capital. Venture capitalist Kylie Frazer explained that the gender funding gap is stubbornly vast, and the impact, compounding.
“Women receive a fraction of the funding that men do, yet they’re expected to achieve the same milestones,” she said. “This year, the average size of an early-stage funding round for a woman-led company was $1 million. An all-male company: $3.4 million.”
Regardless of the size of the cheque, all founders are expected to hit the same milestones at the same time. “We’re effectively giving women concrete boots and asking them to get to the summit at the same rate,” said Kylie.
And, as host Julia Spicer pointed out, it’s not just opportunity at stake. It’s economic potential. The Queensland Chief Entrepreneur pointed to state treasury modelling showing that if female founders were funded at the same rate as their male peers, the state would unlock an additional $1 billion in economic activity.
Scale that nationally, and it’s $44 billion.
Talk is cheap – and measurable
Decades since the Sex Discrimination Act 1984 made it unlawful to discriminate on the basis of sex or gender identity, it’s clear we still aren’t doing enough. On average, the total remuneration for women is 13% lower than their male colleagues. 78% of the top paid positions in private sector agrifood companies are occupied by men. As are 79% of board seats.
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And as Sally-Ann pointed out, it’s echoed “from our smallest workplaces to our largest workplaces.”
“We’ve got to move beyond lip service of ‘I care about inclusion, I care about women, I care about First Nations people, I care about people with disabilities…’”
“We’ve got to actually ask, ‘Are we rewarding and compensating good behaviours, and setting policies and practices in our organisations that support our notion of care to deliver on that promise?”
“WGEA [the Australian Government’s Workplace Gender Equality Agency] reporting tells you every single company that does and doesn’t have those policies. It tells you about the gender pay gap. It tells you where we are falling short.”
Yet such data often sits unused – not raised in board meetings; left out of performance conversations; absent from risk frameworks. And that, Sally-Ann warned, is the real risk: “We leave on the table the opportunity of greatness. Greatness in solving some of the wicked problems that we have in the world. Financial greatness. A more inclusive society. Thriving rural communities and regional communities, where people have full participation.”
“By not holding ourselves accountable to do better, we’re failing ourselves, and we’re failing future generations.”
It’s not just how many, but where
Elders’ Lisa Hewitt noted that increasing female participation means little if women are siloed into low-influence roles. “It’s not about the volume. It’s about our unconscious bias [that shapes] the roles we’re putting those women into,” she said.
Lisa Hewitt in action at evokeAG. 2025.
“What is your unconscious bias when you go to market to hire someone? What is your unconscious bias around what their skill set will be?”
In other words – what stories do we still tell ourselves about who leaders are and what they look like?
Agency starts now
Bias shows up in conversations, decisions, and expectations. Women are still labelled ‘too emotional’ or ‘too direct’ for behaviours seen as confident in men.
Sally-Ann called on women in ag to flip that script. “If you’ve ever been told you’re too direct, take it as a badge of honour. Wear it with pride,” she said. “And remember: ‘No’ is a complete sentence. You don’t need to explain your boundaries.”
Because women have always been in the room – leading, shaping, and sustaining the agrifood system. The question is: is our sector ready to recognise it? To fund female founders? Back women in leadership? Name bias when it shows up?
And not because it feels good, but because it’s smart strategy.
With 65% of Australia’s $5 trillion intergenerational wealth transfer set to go to women, the panel made clear this is no longer just an equality conversation; it’s about future leadership, innovation, and prosperity.
“Everybody has influence,” said Sally-Ann. “But we need to use it to shape the future we want to see.”
“Because wishful thinking doesn’t run the marathon. Hard work and intentionality does.”