Meet Werribee’s Telstra Victoria Business Women’s Award finalist.
Food Innovation Australia Limited (FIAL) managing director Mirjana Prica is in the running for the public sector and academia award for her work in improving innovation, productivity and competitiveness across the Australian food and agribusiness industry.
“It’s been a bit of a shock [to be nominated],” she said.
Growing up in Sunshine, Dr Prica said her father brought her up to believe that knowledge opened doors, and as a result she was keen to go to university.
The trained scientist got her doctorate in physical chemistry at Melbourne University and later completed an MBA.
She has spent her career working with companies such as the CSIRO and George Weston Foods before joining FIAL, a not-for-profit organisation established under the federal government’s Industry Growth Centres Initiative, three years ago.
Here, she has worked to provide knowledge, funding assistance, learning workshops, and online tools connecting international buyers with Australian suppliers.
This year, she also released a book that profiled 50 Australian companies that had launched new products in 2014 in celebration of innovation across the industry.
Dr Prica said her work was not about winning awards, but about doing what she believed in and having an input in an industry that means so much to her.
“You’ve got to have a dream, and determination and hard work will make it happen.”
Winners of the 2016 Telstra Victorian Business Women’s Awards were announced at a dinner held last night, after Star Weekly deadlines.
