From vineyards in Macedonia, through studies in America, to running a dairy risk management project in Melbourne, food and agricultural analyst Vuko Karov is making international markets his focus.
Mr Karov, 31, joined market analysts Freshagenda two years ago and is now a senior consultant, working on the Dairy Trade Simulator (DTS).
The DTS underpinned Freshagenda’s Global Dairy Directions (GDD), which aimed to provide decision makers with time-sensitive information on likely developments in world markets.
And he has some good news for the embattled dairy sector.
“The main project I am focussed on is GDD package for the globally dairy industry - we are able to track biggest globally dairy exporters, on a monthly basis, and identify major trends in international trade and production,” Mr Karov said.
“We are able to add that all up in a single tool.”
He said dairy processing companies, traders and industry bodies had all shown an interest in the GDD package.
“We feel the global market fundamentals are changing to better times ahead, but it’s a slow change,” Mr Karov said.
“The biggest X factor is the European Union, but we are finally getting some signs out of Austria, France and the UK, of slower milk production, so the forward curve on prices definitely goes up – there are definitely positive signs ahead.”
Freshagenda is an Abbotsford based team of specialist consultants and analysts, which focuses on the food industry. Prior to joining Freshagenda, one of the projects Mr Karov was responsible for was evaluating the impact of the 2008 Farm Bill on Arkansas row crop farms - rice, corn, soybeans, cotton and wheat.
He carried out the work for the University of Arkansas, focussing on amendments to commodity and crop insurance safety net programs.
In 2009, he completed a research Master’s thesis at Virginia Tech, on estimating the effects of phytosanitary measures on US imports of fresh fruits and vegetables.
Although he said he did not grow up on a farm, the area in Macedonia were he came from contained the country’s main wine producing region.
“My grandfather had a vineyard, and while I never grew up on a farm, I am familiar with the issues farmers face in processing and marketing of produce.”
He said the field offered economics students significant opportunities.
“You have to be excited about doing economic research on agricultural commodities - it is definitely it is a small field, very few people do this in the world,” he said.
But it was exciting to be able to put data from different sources together, to identify unique trends, customers could use.
“I would encourage students to pursue a career in this field,” Mr Karov said.
