26 April 2007

Matt and Amanda Cook have wondered for a few years whether they had the best balance between cropping and livestock on their Condada property near Minnipa, on the Eyre Peninsula, South Australia.

This winter they will be more confident about their decisions, thanks to Farm Profitability Workshops organised by the regional Grain & Graze project and Eyre Peninsula Farming Systems.

The Cooks will work through the computer program Plan2Profit, using its "what if" capability to calculate the most profitable crop and stock options after factoring in the timing and quantity of autumn break rain and the likely prices for grain and sheep.

Matt Cook and his wife Amanda usually crop some 1,300 hectares a year and run a 900 strong Merino ewe flock in which the top ewes maintain the purebred female line for wool production and the remainder are mated to terminal sires for prime lamb production.

Mr Cook said he and Amanda had begun to seriously question the balance between their cropping and sheep enterprises after the difficult season of 2006, with grain yields of 0.2 and 0.4 tonnes to the hectare.

Traditionally they had expected to make around three quarters of their farm income from cropping and one quarter from the stock, but in poor crop income years like 2005 and 2006 returns from the wool and lambs remained about the same as they would be in a good year.

"There has been no arguing that, if you have a significant debt, cropping will pay it off a lot faster, and a lot of people have got right out of stock," Mr Cook said.

"But livestock are more stable, and people sticking with them often work on the basis of splitting their land area 50/50 between cropping and sheep. We've normally been on a 65/35 per cent split

"We've done our sums for 2007 and, as long as wheat prices continue to look good at the beginning of the season, we will keep up our cropping area.

"We are reasonably well-hedged at the moment anyway, but do have the capacity to change quickly, reacting to the season or if wheat prices go down and cropping looks like being less profitable.

"In that scenario we would go more into sheep, possibly buying some in. Livestock requires so little capital investment, while in cropping large equipment is a necessary evil.

"Once you are set up, with good fences, yards, piping and troughing, livestock are a lot easier to manage."

Mr Cook said he and Amanda had only completed the second Farm Profitability Workshop on February 24 and ideally they would have appreciated more time to run and check different "what if" scenarios.

Eyre Peninsula Grain & Graze coordinator Alison Frischke said the Farm Profitability Workshops were developed in response to requests from the annual grower meetings, with a survey of growers in 2005 identifying that they wanted to know the right mix of enterprises for their farms as the key to profitable growth in the future.

Grain & Graze is a collaborative partnership between Meat & Livestock Australia (MLA), Australian Wool Innovation (AWI), the Grains Research and Development Corporation (GRDC) and Land & Water Australia (LWA) aiming to help mixed farmers increase their profitability and simultaneously better manage natural resources.

For further information about Grain & Graze in the Eyre Peninsula Region, contact Regional Coordinator, Alison Frischke on 08 8680 6223 or visit www.grainandgraze.com.au. Also contact Alison Frischke for your free copy of the Eyre Peninsula Farming Systems Summary 2006 which includes up to date information about risk management, grazing cereals, controlled traffic, plant available water, suppressive soils, livestock management and more.

Grain & Graze Regional Coordinators
Avon Region - Linda Leonard - 08 9690 2191
Border Rivers Region - Rachel Charles - 07 4671 7900
Central West/Lachlan Region - Jodie Dean - 02 6895 1015
Corangamite/Glenelg-Hopkins Region - Cam Nicholson - 03 5258 3860
Eyre Peninsula Region - Alison Frischke - 08 8680 6223
Mallee Region - Zubair Shahzad - 03 50 219 103
Maranoa/Balonne Region - Stephen Ginns - 07 4620 8122
Murrumbidgee Region - Katrina Sait - 02 6924 4633
Northern Agricultural Region - Philip Barrett-Lennard - 08 94750753