Held in Melbourne, the two-day event featured a range of guest speakers covering a variety of topics in the areas of leadership, sustainability and tech and innovation.
ADC board member and conference chair Ella Credlin said the theme ‘more than milk’ referred to a complex and exciting industry, legacy and the human side of farming.
“Dairy today is about more than what we produce,” she said.
“It’s about how we lead, how we treat people, how we care for animals and the land and how we earn trust — milk is what we produce, trust is what we earn and legacy is what we leave behind.”
Dairy business consultant Fiona Smith spoke about the characteristics she saw in the top 25 per cent of farmers, drawing from Dairy Farm Monitor Project data.
She said profitability wasn’t actually defined by size or how many cows milked, but rather the system in place and how well it was resourced and implemented.
She said successful farmers knew and managed every aspect of their business, were at least two weeks ahead of others in their decision-making and were always focused on productivity.
Jana Hocken from the LeanFarm project in New Zealand spoke about the principles of Lean farming and how it enabled her family business to move from a $500,000 overdraft and a 11.2 working fortnight to no overdraft, a 5.2 working week and purchasing a new farm last year.
NFF interim chief executive Su McCluskey spoke about leadership, stating you either won or learnt, and you had two ears and one mouth for a reason.
Horefield dairy farmer Deanne Hore said attending the conference enabled her to catch up and network with people involved and interested in the dairy industry.
This was her third conference.
“The conference is great for areas like professional development — I find we don’t always seek that out because we are busy running the farm and you can get stale at home, you can always learn little bits and pieces and refresh yourself,” Mrs Hore said.
She said it was a great initiative this year to follow up with guest speakers in the trade hall via a question-and-answer session.
“The conference is a nice social outing and a great way to find out what is happening in the industry,” she said.
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