Before we dive into the news, here’s some events and things to do that caught our attention this week.

With the imminent closure of the Yallourn coal-fired power station and job losses in the region’s timber industry, the Victorian National Party has unveiled a $20 million plan to attract new opportunities in the Latrobe Valley.

What happened? On Tuesday, Victorian Nationals leader and South Gippsland MP Danny O’Brien announced the party would deliver a $20 million plan aimed at securing new industry development for the region if the Coalition wins Victoria’s November election.

O’Brien was joined by Morwell MP Martin Cameron, who told the Monitor the plan would establish a taskforce within Regional Development Victoria (RDV) to attract, facilitate and deliver new private sector industry development.

“Yallourn is shutting in 2028, Loy Yang is wanting to shut in 2035, so we need to make sure that there are new opportunities on the horizon,” said Cameron.

Cameron pointed to renewable energy manufacturing and maintenance for big batteries, solar farms and wind turbines as potential areas of investment through the scheme.

“If it spins here in the Latrobe Valley in Gippsland, it should get fixed here,” Cameron said.

The scheme will also look at increasing private investment in data centres.

Zoom out: The Victorian Coalition has flagged it may seek to extend the lives of coal-fired power stations in the Latrobe Valley past the planned closure dates set by the companies that operate them as it waits for renewable projects to come online.

Read the full story here.

Protein shampoo and tzatziki are part of the latest supermarket fad increasing the price of whey, which has risen by 470 percent over the last three years. For Gippsland dairy farmers, the financial benefits are yet to come.

What’s happening? Driven by a surge in demand for high-protein foods, the global market for whey - a byproduct of cheese-making - has grown significantly. As a result, internationally the raw component now costs around 4.7 times more than in 2023.

Neerim South dairy farmer Dave Johnson told the Monitor although dairy farmers haven’t seen the benefits of their product increasing in value yet, the news has brought some optimism to an industry badly hit by increasing fertiliser and fuel costs.

Where’s the whey? When farmers sell milk onto manufacturers or producers, the product is often split into two components - milk fat and protein.

“The milk fats go on to make butter and other products that are relatively cheap,” said Johnson, “but the protein component is in high demand now, so it's worth considerably more than what it was 12 months or two years ago.”

Read the full story here.

Put idle hands to work as the weather warms up throughout Gippsland and try to find a favourite new pursuit.

The Monitor has compiled a list of the best places to learn new skills across the patch. 

Check out the full list here.

Polling suggests Opposition Leader Jess Wilson won't need One Nation's support to form government after the Victorian election. But actually getting laws passed could be a challenge.

📊 The numbers: The latest DemosAU poll, published on November 9, has the Coalition on 33 percent of the primary vote, One Nation on 21 percent and Labor on 18 percent.

🗳️ What's changing: From this election, upper house votes only go where the voter sends them.

Under the old system (called group ticket voting), if you voted 1 for a party above the line, that party decided where your preferences went. 

🔮The prediction: Former ABC election analyst Antony Green told the National Account One Nation could win eight to 10 upper house seats, the Greens six to eight, the Liberals around 14 and Labor around eight, which he described as a "very divided upper house".

Read Archie Milligan’s full report here.