West Vic Dairy focus farm sheds light on dairy practices

Bostocks Creek, Vic, dairy farmers Peter and Marnie Kerr run an operation with about 300 milking cows.

They recently welcomed visitors to their farm to share information about their profits, losses and the challenges they face on their small dairy, as well as how they work through investing and improving infrastructure.

WestVic Dairy lead regional extension officer Libby Swayn said the idea behind the focus farm projects was to open up real expertise, and allow farmers to see the whole picture and compare what was happening throughout the industry.

As part of the project, participants are supplied with an expert farm consultant and a support network of other farmers and those from the industry to help with advice and difficult decisions.

"It's about helping them take those next steps on what direction they want their business to take," Ms Swayn said.

She said each farm involved in the program analysed the current way the farm was run as a business and set unique goals and a plan to achieve them.

"Each farm has its unique goals that it sets at the start of the project and we always start the project with sort of like a strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats analysis of where they are and what their goals are," she said.

"For Peter and Marnie theirs was a little bit easier in the terms that they did [Dairy Australia's] Our Farm, Our Plan program.

"They sort of mapped out what their goals and their values were in terms of being involved in the industry.

"So then we've been able to work in with that while looking at what we can achieve over the two-year project."

Mr and Mrs Kerr's farm was previously owned by their family, and after gradually increasing their shareholding, they now run their herd entirely by themselves as the new generation.

They faced an undersized dairy for the herd size they ran and now intend to upgrade it with the guidance of the program.

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