Privacy Statement

Growth Farms Pty Ltd (GF) takes the privacy of your personal information seriously. We endeavour to act with integrity and transparency in our personal information management practices. We have developed robust internal policies and procedures to ensure your information is collected, used and disclosed only as prescribed by the Privacy Act 1988 (Privacy Act). We do not process or store personal information outside of Australia.

This privacy policy explains how we manage personal information about individuals other than employees. The final paragraph explains the position of employees.

The Privacy Act defines personal information as “… information or an opinion, whether true or not, and whether recorded in a material form or not, about an identified individual, or an individual who is reasonably identifiable.”

What personal information do we collect?

We collect personal details disclosed when contacting us, including name, email and phone.

For employees, contractors, clients, prospect clients/investors, directors, shareholders and other individuals GF may hold;

• Contact details such as name, address, phone number and email
• Tax file number (or tax identification number)
• Superannuation fund details
• Emergency contact details
• Bank details Residency status
• Identification documents such as copies of a passport or licence
• Medical history
• Company role Licences Whether you are a politically exposed person
• Possible conflicts of interest

GF also collects information optionally provided to us though the course of business.

Why do we collect and use personal information?

• For business related contact
• For compliance with government bodies including tax, employer, and workers compensation compliance
• Work, health and safety requirements
• Due diligence, including anti money laundering, as required by the Anti Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorism Financing Act
• For compliance with company policies, such as conflict of interests
• Medical history is only collected where it is necessary for workers compensation insurance or where it is relevant to assess an employee’s ability to do their job. Medical history is classed as sensitive information in the Privacy Act and is handled accordingly
• Marketing and promotion
• To protect the company and clients from potential liabilities, such as insurance claims
• Other purposes related to our business activities

If we did not collect this information, we might not be able to provide our services to you.

How is your personal information collected?

• When shared though contacting us, such as on our website
• Through forms filled out by the individual, face to face meetings, email, messages, telephone conversations or other forms of communication
• Publicly available resources
• Medical history information supplied by you, your doctor or workers compensation insurance

In most cases, you will have to identify yourself when you deal with us. However, in some exceptional circumstances, you may be able to remain anonymous or use a pseudonym.

When would we disclose personal information?

• We will not sell, rent or trade your personal information.
• Personal information may be disclosed as necessary to provide services to you, and on a confidential basis to our service providers and advisors, or prospective purchasers of a business of ours
• Otherwise, we will only disclose your personal information if we have your consent, you would reasonably expect us to or we are required or expressly permitted by law
• We will take reasonable steps to ensure that any overseas recipient will deal with personal information in a way that is consistent with the Australian Privacy Principles (APP’s)

GF will use or disclose your personal information for the primary purpose it was collected or as otherwise outlined by the APP’s and the Privacy Act.

Website

Cookies may be used on some areas of our website to allow the website to recognise a previous user and to observe how a user navigates within the website. If you are concerned about the use of cookies, you can configure your web browser to reject or delete cookies.

Our website may contain links to other websites operated by third parties. We make no representations or warranties in relation to the privacy practices of any third party website and we are not responsible for the privacy policies or the content of any third party website. Third party websites are responsible for informing you about their own privacy practices.

Employee information

We collect information of the kinds described elsewhere in this policy in relation to employees as part of their application and during the course of their employment, either from them or in some cases from third parties such as recruitment agencies. Under the Privacy Act, personal information about a current or former employee may be held, used or disclosed in any way that is directly connected to the employment relationship. We handle employee information in accordance with legal requirements and our applicable policies in force from time to time.

Security of your personal information

We will take all reasonable steps to ensure that your personal information is kept securely and not misused, interfered with or disclosed unless in accordance with this Privacy Policy. We will take reasonable steps to destroy or de-identify your personal information where it is no longer necessary to retain it or to fulfil the purposes for which it was collected or as required by law.

If a breach of your information does occur that is likely to result in an adverse effect, we will comply with Privacy Act obligations to inform you of:

• the nature and extent of the breach, and;
• any remedial actions you can take.

Procedures for access, correction and feedback

If you would like to access or correct your personal information, please contact the Bombala Office.

If you have any further queries relating to our Privacy Policy, or you have a problem or complaint, please contact: info@growthfarms.com.au 

We will acknowledge your complaint and respond to you regarding your complaint, usually within 28 days unless we need more information from you to do so. If you think that we have failed to resolve the complaint satisfactorily, we will provide you with information about the further steps you can take.

Variations and updates

We will review our Privacy Policy regularly and may make changes from time to time. If we do so, we will update the policy on this website to reflect those changes. The updated versions of our Privacy Policy will be effective from the date of posting on our website.

This Privacy Policy was last updated on 18 May 2023.

The Australian Privacy Principals can be found at: www.oaic.gov.au/privacy-law/privacy-act/australian-privacy-principles