Leading graziers and industry representatives shared their knowledge regarding the long term economic benefits of sustainable land management with beef producers from around the state on Friday.
Over one hundred people including 42 graziers attended the Sustainable Grazing Forum held at the Charters Towers Golf Club hosted by NQ Dry tropics.
AgForce vice president Christine Rolfe, chaired the forum and introduced proceedings. Ms Rolfe and her family run Birrong a trading and backgrounding operation in Springsure. The property was purchased by her family in 1966 and from 2000 onwards has focused solely on grazing.
She said the beef industry in the North revolves around grazing families who have a sense of pride in producing healthy pastures, running quality livestock, and raising successful families.
“The challenge for graziers is achieving these aims under the prevailing climatic, financial and environmental constraints facing the industry,” Ms Rolfe said.
“The forum showcased how some very successful grazing businesses are meeting these challenges,” she said.
She described how they had to destock their own operation in 2002 due to the drought which led them to thinking of more efficient ways of running the business going forward.
“We developed a new business plan and by 2008 we began practicing cell rotation grazing which proved to be beneficial for us,” she said.
“It has now been 13 years since we destocked to a point now were we have natural grass growing in much of the property; the process takes a long time, we have to patient.”
MLA managing director Richard Norton briefed the audience on the ways in which MLA has listened to what levy payers want over the last 12 months, and how the organisation has changed the way it operates to encompass members wants and needs.
“More than $6.5m in fixed cost savings have been achieved in 2014-15 which was channeled back into research, development and marketing,” Mr Norton said.
“I’ve personally hosted 40 MLA forums across Australia and senior staff and myself have also attended many other events to give over 5000 levy payers the opportunity to speak to us face-to-face, so we each have a better understanding of what we are trying to achieve,” he said.
He said a new regional consulation model is being developed to encourage more producers to have their say on the direction of research and development investment by MLA, and highlighted how the new look MLA website now provides a much clearer breakdown of levy income and key investments.
David and Rebecca Comsikey, Melton , Alpha, said the motivation to change the way they run their operation came about after seeing the damage done by the drought’s in 1983 and 2002.
“We were pumping twice a day, the personal stress was unreal, it was just a crap situation,” Mr Comiskey said.
“We agreed that if we were going to continue something had to change,” he said.
“The drought was a great teacher, it highlighted the weaknesses in out operation, and an idea of what we could research and budget for while we developed our business plan.”
Mrs Comiskey said she’d never been exposed to home rural business operations before and decided to undertake a business management course to assist in creating their plan.
“We started off by asking each other what we wanted our business to actually look like; we wrote everything into the plan including our biggest dreams,” she said.
“What we came up with was pretty rough and far from perfect, but it was a plan.”
She said these days the plan is their one stop shop for information on the business.
“It’s invaluable for situations like we had last month when we used it to partake in our voluntary BMP project.
“We also use it to benchmark our performance against ourselves in years past to make sure the business is on the right track.”
The Comsikey’s also took notice of other peoples successes and applied these practices on Melton.
“We are continually striving to improve our business and a highlight of that process came earlier this year when we gained our Grassfed MSA Organic Beef certification.”
David Rankine, Bunaro, Prairie, who detailed how he installed a four paddock rotational grazing program and a more efficient watering system on-property which has improved land condition and production, utilised rainfall; reduced runoff and decreased distance to watering holes for cattle.
“By changing to a rotational grazing system each paddock is now getting 300 days of rest per year which has allowed preferable grasses like bluegrass and buffel propagate,” Mr Rankine said.
Blair and Josie Angus, Angus Pastoral Company, talked about the benefits of branded beef and how they've successfully expanded their "Signature Beef" in the north.
They said knowing your customer is key to getting your mind around what they are trying to achieve and ensure that your product and service delivers that.
“You also need to innovative; know not just what the customer wants but what else you can offer them,” Mr Angus said.
“You need to have a firm commitment to the price you want to achieve and stick to it.
“To arrive at the price you need to understand your cost of production, a margin that you are happy with and ask yourself if it’s sustainable to achieve.
“Commitment to these principles gave us the opportunity to expand into the north.”
ANZ Queensland Agribusiness Manager, Jeffery Schrale, told attendees why producers who are practicing sustainable grazing methods on-property are becoming increasingly favoured when it comes to business dealings with banks.
”People practicing sustainable agricultural practices now, have lower risk management insurance models available to them than those still using conventional methods; advantages are starting to appear,” Mr Schrale said.
Veterinary scientist and QAAFI senior research fellow Geoffry Fordyce gave the crowd his insights on managing the feed-base for maximum productivity in a beef operation.
“To have an productive operation you need to stay on top of what is and isn’t working in your business by regularly recording transactions; undertaking an annual stocktake and keeping clear records of your business costs,” Mr Fordyce said.
”The level of productivity in same area between different graziers can fluctuate by four times the value from one to the next because of weight loss or gain base on nutrition,” he said.
“High live weight production is built on high pasture production and sustainable utilisation, if you don’t have these factors working in your favour your business will suffer.”
Natalie Williams, Granville, Jericho said thanks to a property development plan and by changing the way they managed the operation over the last 10 years, the land and pasture is healthier, and able to carry more stock, for longer.
“In effect, we have turned some fairly average forest country into a high-quality resource,” Ms Williams said.
“For comparison during the 2002 drought we didn’t have any cattle on property, but in the current even drier conditions we can still carry 1000 head due to the changes we made to our management plan,” she said.
Organic beef producer Steve Taylor Wetlands, Augathella, discussed the four keys to sustaining the beef industry: people; natural resources; beef production efficiency and succession planning.
“The responsibility for individual success or failure on-property rests with us,” Mr Taylor said.
“It’s our responsibility to evaluate the condition, potential and limitations of our natural resources,” he said.
“It’s vital that we manage our land assets in a sustainable way if we want to achieve success.
He also said producers need to efficiently build their herds.
“We survive on profit more than production; efficiency should be judged on kilos produced per hectare not kilos produced per beast.”
Mr Taylor said succession planning is also crucial for continued grazing profitability.
“Leaving our families, the environment, the business and your community in a better condition than it was before we commencing your business should always be on your mind.”
In his opening address at the forum NQ Dry Tropics’ CEO Scott Crawford said he’s encouraged by the stories that the graziers were able to tell in the current difficult conditions.
“Our grazing field officers are increasingly working with dynamic and innovative producers who are looking for new ways to run their livestock businesses, it was good to hear about their accomplishments” Dr Crawford said.