Murray Muster 2023 at Kialla focused on retaining labour in dairy

Dairy Australia put the spotlight on attracting and retaining staff in the dairy industry at its annual Murray Muster at The Woolshed in Kialla on Wednesday.

The day's events aimed to help farmers learn about current labour demand and ways to ensure efficient hiring processes and staff wellbeing.

The 2023 Murray Muster included two case studies, Mitta Dairies with guest speakers Richard Hamilton and Jerrica McLaren, and Coomboona Dairy with Samantha Biles, Declo Bisimwa, Inocent Byigero and Rose Philipzen.

Mitta Dairies worker Ms McLaren spoke in her presentation about her passion for dairy and gratitude at having the opportunity to work on-farm.

"Since I was 7 I had a love for biology and animals," she said.

"My passion grew bigger and brighter, why should someone who wants to have a career, why should we stop someone's dreams and passions?

"If someone is passionate, they will do the work."

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She said she loved her job and its key positives included flexible work hours, ability to negotiate, competitive pay, good facilities, opportunity for job progression, and strong work-life balance.

"When I applied about 2 years ago I was 20 years old and 20 weeks pregnant, not your ideal employee," she said.

"I'm forever grateful and thankful for being given the opportunity to be able to share my passion.

"If you provide us with a safe environment and interesting things to do, if you provide us with a career path in dairy, if you provide us with flexibility and a fair wage that allows us to have a roof over our head and bread on the table, you will succeed in getting us to work for you."

Mitta Dairies farm manager Mr Hamilton spoke on the important qualities in a leader, strength in empathy, and prioritising staff wellbeing.

Murray Dairy chief executive Jenny Wilson said they aimed to pick a hot topic in the industry, and labour shortages had particularly escalated during the COVID-19 pandemic.

"Since that time we've had Dairy Australia invest a lot of money around actually attracting people to the dairy industry," she said.

"At the same time, we've got a whole lot of resources around trying to help the retailing industry so the topics of today around attracting and retaining retain was very much focused motion."

Coomboona Dairy's Ms Biles, Mr Bisimwa, Mr Byigero and Ms Philipzen spoke on refugees making reliable employees, and working with a culturally-diverse workforce.

Ms Wilson said the guest speakers offered valuable insight and perspective.

"I think the main [takeaways] for me, it doesn't matter whether you're in a dairy, dairy business or in any organisation, the fundamentals of looking after your staff, make sure they've got a safe environment to work in making sure that they've got a good team environment culture is absolutely critical," she said.

"I think for setting up a really great working environment, providing people training and the opportunities to train actually listening to people's needs and being prepared to work around those."