Farmers face-to-face

By Alex Dalziel (The Wimmera Mail Times)

Organisers were pleased with the turn-out at Farm Trade Australia’s inaugural agribusiness forum, held at the Horsham Golf Club last week.

Farm Trade Australia director David Matthews said the forum was a fantastic opportunity for farmers and industry to get together in lieu of the cancelled Wimmera Machinery Field Days.

“We were really pleased with today. It was really our first chance in a long time to have a face-to-face meeting with farmers and talk more about Farm Trade Australia and what we are seeking to build with that,” he said.

“Also, just to demonstrate some of the projects we are working on.”

The day featured several presentations including Rural Bank’s Andrew Smith, Malteurop’s Elle Hentschke and Australian Grain Technologies Tristan Coram.

Topics ranged from new high fibre wheat and malting barley varieties and agricultural data collection to the effects of climate change and rising land values.

Meteorologist and Seven News weather presenter Jane Bunn also made an appearance to promote her new weather app Jane’s Weather and provide the forum with a seasonal outlook.

Mr Matthews said he was happy with the engagement the presentations received.

“I think farmers were particularly interested in the malt barley supply project into Malteurop and the high fibre wheat project into Japanese flour mills,” he said.

“I think this is a really interesting technology where customers are not just seeking ordinary wheat for milling or noodle making, but they are seeking food characteristics so in this case a high fibre function in the wheat.

“That starts to change the way we think about marketing wheat from a commodity basis to something targeted to consumer needs. There was a whole lot of things where farmers have knowledge but don’t quite yet have the platform to utilise that in a collective way.”

AG FORUM: Farm Trade Australia’s Director David Matthews (left), with Denise McLellan, Susan Findlay Tickner, Tracy Dart, Kate Cowan and Andrew Smith. Picture: Alex Dalziel

reprinted from the Wimmera Mail Times