Focus Farms

Background

The Focus Farm project has been running in Gippsland for the last 10 years.  The project focuses on a farming family or enterprise and aims to improve operating surplus through improved understanding of operational costs and by maximising home grown feed and reducing fixed costs.  This is achieved by close monitoring of farm activities and expenditure.  The Focus Farm gets support from an experienced farm consultant, who acts as a group facilitator, and a support group made up of farmers and local service providers.

Sponsorship for the project has come from  Dairy Australia and GippsDairy. This will enable the GippsDairy Board to initiate four Focus Farms in early 2012. 

Expressions of interest are sought from dairy farmers and mentees who would like to participate in this found of Focus Farms.

A feature of past Focus Farm projects has been the openness of the data provided and the wide opportunity for the Focus Farm families, support groups and facilitator to deal with the issues being faced on that farm. That same situation applies across these new Focus Farms. There is a wide diversity of climate, soil type, farm financial and management issues, and a diverse list of farm family goals. Information about these Focus Farms and their activities will continue to appear in How Now Gippy Cow. There will also be opportunities for farm walks and field days to inspect the farms and their progress. Items will appear in local papers, and the weekly reports in rural newspapers will continue. There is also an opportunity for people to be placed on the mailing list for a particular farm that they are interested in following. They can receive the regular meeting notes coming from that farm.

For more information about the project contact John Gallienne on 0407 863 493.