I am very pleased to write that Murray Dairy is getting close to launching its new strategic plan.
I have found this process very satisfying because it’s easy to get caught up in the day-to-day and forget to stop and think about where we are heading and why it matters.
That happens in business too. The work piles up, and we don’t always take a step back to check whether it’s leading us where we want to go.
For the Murray Dairy Board, this has meant asking: what does success for dairy in our region actually look like? And what role should Murray Dairy play in helping achieve it?
We’ve identified five key areas where we think we can make the biggest difference.
But at the heart of it all is the ‘farmer voice’.
We’ve got smart, practical people in this region — with ideas that come from real experience — and it’s important we listen and do what we can to help those ideas take shape.
We’re really looking forward to sharing the new plan with you in the months ahead.
‘Farmer voice’ is also a focus for the Gardiner Foundation.
I had the chance to meet with their board recently in Shepparton, along with 15 other farmers and three members of the Murray Dairy Board.
The Gardiner Foundation Board was spending two days in the region meeting with farmers, industry and service providers, seeing first-hand what’s happening, the impact of their support, and where they can be most useful in the future.
There was great discussion at the lunch I joined and it reinforced to me why we need to do a lot more listening to, and less talking at, farmers.
One of the areas discussed by farmers was the weed and disease burden in fodder crops, which is requiring more management and increased costs.
Murray Dairy is involved in regionally specific research in this area funded by the Gardiner Foundation, as part of a much bigger project involving Dairy Australia, the Queensland Government, Birchip Cropping Group and Irrigation Farmers Network.
If you are interested in learning more, please join the C4Milk roadshow and dinner on August 7, starting in Moama.
There is no cost and it involves a bus trip to visit the trial sites, and a dinner to learn about the research and share ideas.
What we know is that much of the cropping knowledge currently being applied in dairy is being adapted from cereal cropping expertise, which has different dynamics to the dairy industry.
C4Milk is working to understand these differences and the key parameters for sustainable and profitable dairy forage cropping.
It would be great to have you join this conversation on continuous fodder cropping.
– Rachael Napier is the Murray Dairy chair.