Arable Focus: Personality counts when it comes to growing a successful arable unit

February 26, 2010

How many arable producers would use personality tests to boost their businesses? Australian cereal grower David Brownhill did - as well as making lots of other changes. Emma Penny reports.

If you work for a corporation, chances are you have been on a management course and had to work out what your personality type is, whether you are an energetic, outgoing person or more of an introverted, deep thinker. Doing that sort of thing is something of a rarity in the farming world. Yet, according to New South Wales farmer David Brownhill, it is one of the most useful things he and his farm staff have done.

It was all part of a big change in his farming business, promoted by a Nuffield Scholarship he undertook. The home farm at Merrilong, which has been in the family since 1959, was originally a sheep unit, moving to cattle and cropping in the 1960s. Today, it remains primarily an arable unit, but runs 550 head of cattle, which, while they make up 11 per cent of gross income, occupy 19 per cent of the total farm area - about 835ha (2,063 acres).

And rather than just the one unit they started with, the family now farms five units covering 4,735ha (11,700 acres). The farms are split between 3,000ha (7,413 acres) of dry land farming, 900ha (2,2225 acres) of irrigated land for grain and field vegetable production and the grazed area, all running across soils which can be up to 7.6m (25 feet) deep.

Despite a warm climate and fantastic soils, making the most of the 600mm of rain which falls each year has seen a move to a no-till approach. “In the 1980s we had a conventional approach, but then started to do no-till in the summer crops in the 1990s. Today, we run a full no-till system, and some fields have not been cultivated for 15 years,” says David.

Weed control

The system is not without its issues, which include compaction, weed control and disease. Weed control is the biggest issue, with fleabane, milk thistle, bindweed and ryegrass being the main problems - and a growing threat from glyphosate-resistant rye-grass.

Rotating from summer to winter crops allows some control, but Mr Brownhill is a keen advocate of the Weedseeker - something he discovered when undertaking his Nuffield Scholarship in 1998. The Weedseeker sprayer system, which is fitted on the farm’s 4720 27m self propelled sprayer, works by only spraying green weeds in the fallow, so cutting herbicide use by as much as 80 per cent in some cases.

“We have owned our Weedseeker since October 2003, have sprayed 56,000ha during that time with an average usage of 17 per cent - it has saved us AS$506,000 so far. We’ve also been able to use tank mixes which are uneconomic for broadacre use, which allows us to use the right herbicide, rather than more glyphosate.”

And while the sprayer and Weedseeker system may be a key piece of kit at Merrilong, there’s not much else to sit in the machinery shed alongside it. Current kit across the 4,734ha (11,700 acres) comprises two tractors - a JD8330T and a JD8330 - and one 9660 JD header. “Really, I think we only need 1.3 tractors - we tried to run with one and a bit more, but it didn’t really work, so we have two.”

Drilling is done with an NDF zero till planter for winter crops, with seed, fertiliser and nitrogen all applied in one pass.

Opting for a min-till, min-kit approach is not all that is different about farming at Merrilong. When Mr Brownhill and his brother Gordon decided to run all five units as one business, they asked a consultant to come in to look at the business.

“He really clarified our goals, and we started to implement corporate structures. One of the first things we did as a result was to appoint an independent chairman for the company. We also have two external board members.”

Staff development

Even more unusually for a farming business, they decided to invest in staff training and development. There are only four full-time staff at Merrilong, coupled with some temporary staff, but the board wanted to involve them as fully as they could in the business - and that meant taking an approach that was much more corporate than traditional farming.

The business put everyone through the Briggs Myers test, a system which produces individual results showing how people work, and their strengths and weaknesses. “We found we had six fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants guys and one planner. The significance of that is the planner - who is 26 years old - now organises our meetings and works out what we’re all doing that week.

“The other thing we did was, one at a time, we stood in a corner facing the wall while everyone else talked about us and how we worked. I was the guinea pig for it, and it worked really well. I had to write down the strengths and weaknesses I heard about myself and it was unbelievable - I found it really, really useful. One of my biggest negatives is my inability to suffer idiots!”

The team at Merrilong has scheduled meetings every Monday and Thursday, and while that might sound a bit ‘corporate’, it has helped everyone work more effectively, and make more time for life outside farming. “It has given us our weekends back. We set a finish time for everything, and we look hard at how we can become a five-day-a-week business. For instance, we have replaced our flood irrigation with sprinkler irrigation because it is more manageable,” he says.

In common with other businesses, everything at Merrilong is measured and monitored, which is why there is such a small machinery fleet. “In Australia, a small farm can make as much money as a large one - and you won’t make any money if you have too much gear; you can have too many toys.” Benchmarking against other similar businesses is also used - and action taken where discrepancies are found.

Marketing

The business also makes as much use of market information as it can. Mr Brownhill says he receives about 20 pieces of market information a day, and uses that to make his buying and selling decisions. Wheat and other winter crops which are at risk of weather damage prior to harvest are rarely forward contracted, but he does spread his marketing risks.

“We use all forms of marketing techniques - from the Australian Wheat Board national pool, the cash market, forward cash contracts, hedge to arrive contracts and futures contracts. Marketing is an essential part of our business.”

Approaching his farm like any other business, Mr Brownhill believes there is a positive future, and that the WTO talks will have little effect on what he ultimately grows or sells.

“Here it is all about growing as much as we can. I’m too young to worry about any outcome from WTO - it will never happen. It’s a noise in the background, and I believe no-one will make the rules any better for me.

“Food is essential, agriculture is a good business and we need to promote it for what it is. We need to chuck the terms of trade charts in the tip and focus on the positives.”