8. Drivers Australian Agriculture
• Changing consumer demand
• 80/20 rule fast becoming 90/10
• Adding value
• Climate variability
• Peaks and troughs of the commodity market
• Technology pot-hole
• Policy risks
• New generation of farmers
9. Impact on Family Farms
• Family farms make up 93% of Australian agriculture
• ROA for middle and bottom of each market below bond rate
• Pressure from variable climate
• Increased rate of aggregation
• Increased debt
• Feeling isolated from policy decisions
• Urgent need for new sets of skills (marketing, risk
management, investment management, systems
development, HR management)
• Need for strong business background and education
13. Factoring in Uncertainty
• Predictive capacity – scanning and foresighting – how
porous is your business? What is coming over the
horizon?
• Liquidity – is it sufficient?
• Capital raising capacity (equity, debt) under stress?
• What’s your spread of risks and opportunities?
• Complexity of the system you’re in – how are other
players acting? What is the value chain doing?
• Which lever can you use PRICE X YIELD - COST
15. Family farm – Decision making
processes
• Challenge of getting everyone on the same page and
keeping them there!
• Building dynamic processes that allow entry, exit,
shareholding managed as assets
• Handling leadership transitions
• Continuous renewal of the business model
• Performance management within a family
• Making business decisions, not based on family
dynamic
16. What’s happening to Women?
• Working more on farm
• Working more to managing the farm business
• Working more off farm
• More involved in community and volunteering
activities
• Reduced time with family and reduced leisure
time
Ref: Curtin University Research
17. Factors in Women’s Participation
Confidence
Skills and
capacity
Structural
barriers
Resistance to
change
Cultural
barriers
18. My RIRDC Project
• Develop a decision support tool to enable
commercialisation of the technology on farm.
• Business case development and promotion.
• Look at examples of regional community
anerobic digestors for potential application in
Wheatbelt communities of WA.
• Future – environmentally branded pork
product (market eco-credentials)
19. The future belongs to those that
believe in the beauty of their dreams
Eleanor Roosevelt
20.
21. Thank you for your time!
Sue Middleton
P 08 96711915
M 0427 996 730
E: sue@agcorp.com.au
23. Mark Whitten – Extension Officer Department of
Employment, Economic Development and
Innovation
24. Small Group Challenges
Exploring communication, support,
encouragement and success
parameters......and for the majority
becoming familiarised with the
emotions attached to fear of heights.
33. VALUES JOURNEY
“Personal Leadership is the process of keeping your
vision and values before you and aligning your life
to be congruent with them”
- Stephen R. Covey (Author The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People)
34. Visiting ‘Our
House’
- Question Time in both
the Senate & House of
Representatives
- Meeting with Senator
Gary Humphries (Member
for the ACT)
- Back of House Tour
- Networking with MP’s
and Staff
35. Tools Acquired in the Classroom
Public Speaking
Communication and Body Language
Persuasion & Effective Presentations
Management vs. Leadership
Facilitating effective meetings
Conflict Management and Crucial
Conversations
Understanding Group Dynamics
Pork production fluctuates between being a Cashcow and a dog depending on commodity markets and pricing, and building it into a star is about managing those risks well and improving the market attractiveness.
Our orchard business – is high on market attractiveness but not as high on business strength so its in the wild cats. Wildcats are good but they’re wild so to turn that into a star we need to keep building the business strength. We entered it however because it was a product market, and we wanted to capitalise a water asset.
Grain business has good business strength (this is the core compentency of the Brennan Rural Group) but is highly variable on market attractiveness so it can be a bit of ride. It will always be a ride – but using the market tools is one way of evening it out a bit.
What did we do:
Sustainable Revenue flow (profit and cashflow are equally important)– equity partner, restructuring debt, capital raising process – built our skills in this area
Resources and capabilities - Built HR capacity
Business processes and systems - Built business systems-
Balance – products and commodities - Experiemented with product brands.
Theory is sell dogs! That is not something we have traditionally done but we may have to think about it in the future
