Further increases in productivity in sheep meat and wool growing business attracted around 300 delegates to the 2018 Bestwool/Bestlamb conference in Bendigo on Wednesday.
Held against a backdrop of a buoyant industry outlook, the conference heard presentations from 15 speakers across a range of topics.
This year marked the 20th year of the BWBL Network which has a membership of more than 3500 including 1300 producers involved in around 60 groups. There was an additional 2200 associate members.
Networks Advisory Committee Chair, Jason Trompf, said the program challenged producers to ensure that they were always looking for ways to improve and adopting best practice management.
Wrapping up the day was a confidence boosting presentation from Mecardo Managing Director Robert Herrmann.
Mr Herrmann said people were banding together to sold problems, but they also needed to band together to take the opportunities.
After an upbeat assessment of the wool and meat industries prospects, Mr Herrmann challenged wool growers and the industry to do something about wool harvesting.
He said wool harvesting was “the sleeper” for the industry and it was almost too late to do something about it.
He said that when the next idea about alternative woold harvesting methods, “you must support it – embrace it”.
“The industry needs to throw dollars at on-farm research and development while returns are good,” he said.