The farmers include Pania and Eugene King, winners of the 2019 Ahuwhenua Trophy for excellence in Maori farming.
The Action Network model supports small groups of seven to nine farm businesses to work together to explore ideas and share expert resources to help them to make positive on-farm changes.
Kick-start funding of $4000 a farm business is pooled to fund facilitation and expertise.
“All the farm businesses involved in our group are already top operators,” Pania said.
“We all have quite different farms but it is good hearing about different farms and experiences and we all wanted to look at business planning, environmental issues and management, farm business transition and learn a bit of stuff from outside the farm gate.
“Eugene and I have learned quite a lot from it, not least the amount of support you get from being part of a group of farmers.
“You can feel quite alone farming and we are a husband and wife team working on our own, surrounded by large stations with staff teams.
“The more Eugene has participated in the group the more confident he is to step up and speak and share his knowledge too. I really feel there is real value to be gained from membership of an Action Group in terms of farmer wellbeing as well as the sharing and providing of knowledge.”
Eugene and Pania farm the 483ha (357ha effective) Kiriroa Station sheep and beef property in the Motu Valley near Gisborne. They bought the farm in 2013 after 12 years farming in a whanau partnership. They trade cattle and finish all stock on-farm, wintering 3800 stock units with a mix of 40% cattle and 60% sheep.
The group was launched about a year ago and is facilitated by Steven Thomson, who was then an agricultural consultant for AgFirst in Gisborne.
“We heard about the Action Groups from various sources – from Steven, our accountant and our bank,” Pania said.
“A number of the farmers in the group are also in the farm discussion group for our area, which is run by AgFirst.
“The choices about speakers and activities are very much group-led. We decide the topics but Steven has very broad knowledge and is very good at getting the right people to speak about the right things at our meetings.
“For instance, we all wanted to learn more about horticulture so he organised a meeting with several experts on issues ranging from soil types and water through to growing kiwifruit, apples and grapes.
“We squeezed a lot into that day and covered a lot of topics.
“We also had a meeting where we discussed and shared ideas around the issue of pine tree planting in the region, including the impact on farm communities of farmland being turned over to pine blocks.”
Group members are also keen to know more about diversifying.
“As a group we are interested to learn about opportunities to invest outside the farm gate – to not have all your eggs in one basket.
“So that is one of the areas we are looking at. Steven has already brought in an expert speaker to talk to us about commercial property – and that was a really impressive session.”
Pania is confident the group will continue beyond the life of the initial funding.
“The funding is a very valuable part of the project but when the group was set up we all agreed we would be happy to contribute to fund it into the future. I think we are all committed to continuing long-term, with Steven as our facilitator.”
Beef + Lamb lead extension manager Mark Harris said “Eugene and Pania King are top operators and the great thing we can learn from top operators is that they are always looking at opportunities to achieve their dreams and goals.
“Eugene and Pania have recognised that being part of an RMPP Action Network Group is another opportunity to add value to their business.”
