Most veterinary students who graduate from university head off in search of an animal husbandry job, usually as a vet nurse or working with cattle, pigs or even horses. Not Colombian-born Giovanna Webb. Instead, she went to the Atlantic coast of Colombia to farm crocodiles, lizards and snakes. She admits that for her first job it was pretty tough, but a challenge she was more than ready to take on.
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“I was 21 years old, just graduated from university, and a city girl. I landed in a ‘red zone’ largely occupied by guerrilla and paramilitary groups. It was a remote, unknown and unfamiliar crocodile area where I was set to implement my animal husbandry knowledge in a real man’s world,” she said.
“A few years later I went to the Amazon to count some of the crocodile populations, which was fascinating but not as risky as many people think. There were many other things far more dangerous in the jungle while we walked from point A to point B (snakes, tarantulas, scorpions, poisonous frogs etc). I absolutely loved the experience but most of all the kindness and resilience of the indigenous people living in the middle of nowhere.”
Fast forward to 2013 and Giovanna is now among some of the most well-known and respected crocodile farmers in Australia. She houses 10,000 crocs a year, hosts research projects in various aspects of wildlife management and her crocodile skins are sold to high-end European fashion houses and later manufactured into handbags fetching prices of up to $US50,000 each. It’s a big achievement for a girl a long way from home.
Giovanna grew up in Bogota, Colombia, and managed reptile farms there for almost a decade before meeting and falling in love with biologist Professor Grahame Webb. As the chairman of the international Crocodile Specialist Group, he had delivered training in her country and she met him again at a forum in Argentina in 1996. Nine months later they decided to “try their luck together” in Darwin, so she migrated to Australia and together they helped run one of Darwin’s most popular tourist attractions, Crocodylus Park (founded by Professor Webb himself).
The couple were kept busy educating 60,000 tourists a year, not only on crocodiles but also big cats, Australian animals and other wildlife. With more than 50 research projects in wildlife conservation, management and trade, they developed a reputation as a public education forum "unrivalled” anywhere in the world.
It was a few years later, however, when a fashion representative from France knocked on their door looking for crocodile skins, that the breeding side of Grahame and Giovanna’s crocodile business took a different turn. There are 23 species of crocodilian in the world and as it turns out, Darwin’s crocodile farms breed the fashion industry’s most valuable species –the Australian saltwater crocodile. Valued for its many rows of scales, lack of bone deposits in the skin and it wide girth - 35-40cm belly widths - the Australian saltwater croc’s skin is considered perfect for European-style handbags and exported to France and Japan for use in products including Hermes, Prada and Gucci.
Giovanna said Saltwater crocodile farming was a costly, risky and highly demanding business. Baby crocs were very fragile and it took three to four years of intensive care to produce first grade skins suitable for the international market.
But demand for these skins was high, with brands like Hermes serving thousands of luxury clients across the world and crocodile skin handbags attracting waiting lists of up to two years.
Having realised that it is a sustainable industry, Giovanna is now seeking to give back by sharing her success with others. Last month she was named the Rural Industries Research and Development Corporation’s women’s award winner for the Northern Territory. With her $10,000 prize, she plans to create a pilot program that trains indigenous Aboriginal women in the crocodile industry in the hope that they might start their own businesses based on crocodile by-products and become leaders in their communities.
Giovanna said her husband already had extensive experience living and working with the Aboriginal people in Arnhem Land and they had always endeavoured to employ indigenous people on their farm. She said the future of the industry was sustainable as demand for the skins was high, despite some green groups considering all forms of animal production unethical.
“I feel disappointed that so many city people have forgotten what nature is all about and how our lives all depend on using nature sustainably, not simply admiring it,” she said in response to their claims.
“Just think about indigenous hunter-gatherers like the Aboriginal people, Eskimos and peoples who have lived on their lands for tens of thousands of years. Are they lesser people
because they hunt? Should not their values and closeness to nature be respected?”
Giovanna said the Aboriginal communities already received direct economic benefits from the crocodile farmers, given that 60 to 70 per cent of crocodile eggs were collected on indigenous lands, but she wanted indigenous rural women to get more benefits from the crocodiles. She hoped the indigenous women of her program would find new uses for the crocodile by-products, including the heads, back straps, teeth, claws and infertile eggs which they could then on-sell in their own businesses.
Giovanna said she wanted to see them sell unique goods in which “people, rather than factories, have contributed” and to hopefully encourage contract production.
“The crocodile industry is not very popular among women but I think it is only due to a lack of inspiration because women have so much to offer. Women are much better at looking after baby hatchlings; they are quieter and pay more attention to detail,” Giovanna said.
“We have worked with indigenous people in the past and even though some have social problems at home, it does not necessarily extend to the workplace. One of our staff, a traditional Aboriginal man, had never had a job in his life before. Today he is one of the most respected employees on our team. That is a great success. I would like to see some Indigenous women follow the same pathway with crocodiles.”
