Producing the best wheat crop in the country was not what Syd and Earl Worsfold set out to achieve when they planted their crops last season.
The fifth and sixth generation Canterbury cropping farmers just wanted to grow the best they could for their own bottom line.
“We were trying a new variety and with the weather on our side most of the time it came up pretty well,” Earl said.
With Syd’s 30-year involvement in United Wheatgrowers it seems appropriate to support the organisation’s annual awards.
The contest, sponsored by Canterbury farmer co-operative Ruralco, is a highlight on the arable farming calendar, providing a chance for the industry’s best operators to pitch their best cropping efforts against their peers.
The family partnership won the feed wheat section of the competition and went on to claim the champion of champions award.
The self-confessed boy around the farm these days, Syd said while it was a thrill to win it was as much about highlighting excellence in the arable sector.
“And feed wheat is something that Earl introduced. While I’ve gown a bit of feed wheat over the years, milling has been more my thing.”
Feed or milling it’s a champion partnership and a welcome award for the family that has not only been growing crops in the Greendale area for six generations but for Syd personally who has for most of his farming career been involved at an industry level striving to better arable farming for everyone.
“This year things seemed to line up well for us in what was quite a difficult start,” Earl said.
“The crop got away well but we lost a lot of sunlight over December, which set things back a bit.
“We picked it up going into January and surprisingly took off the winning crop.”
Ironically, the winning crop was new to the Worsfold soils and despite irrigation on half of the farm it was on the dryland.
Coming off at 13 tonnes to the hectare the Graham hybrid feed wheat variety more than proved its worth.
“We just looked at the Foundation for Arable Research trial results when selecting and this was one that definitely stood out.
“It’s been pretty exceptional for us in this first year,” Earl said.
Recognised for his leadership and contribution in the sector last year as the 2018 arable farmer of the year, Syd said it’s times like this he feels the benefits of his and many others’ commitment to bettering the industry for everyone is all worthwhile.
His industry leadership started in Federated Farmers and progressed into FAR, of which he was a member of the organisation’s establishment committee.
He has represented farmers on the Arable Food Industry Council (AFIC) helping to set industry research agendas and he was a key driver of the arable industry marketing initiative.
Through it all he has remained involved with United Wheatgrowers as a director, taken his turn as chairman and 30 years down the track still has his hand in as vice-chairman.
“It is a thrill and an honour as a family to win this competition but it’s also equally thrilling to see the progress and excellence that these industry organisations have made to enable us as farmers to get the best out of what we do – growing food.”
Much has changed with technology and irrigation development playing a big part in the yields achieved today.
“Back in the day I used to put a paddock in, shut the gate and walk away. We’d get five tonnes to the hectare and we’d be happy.
“Now you need to be getting eight tonnes a hectare to make money.”
The milling industry has become more sophisticated with a range of quality specifications for different types of wheat depending on the end-user requirements.
The trend to grow wheat for stock feed is another big change with two-thirds of the wheat grown in NZ now higher-quality, stock-feed varieties.
“How well you do is a lot about being willing to adapt to satisfy end-user demand – the need to experiment and willingness to diversify.”
While feed varieties are a bit simpler to grow Syd still likes his milling varieties.
“Earl is more into the feed wheat. I still like the milling even though it’s a lot harder to grow in big tonnage and meet the grades.
“It’s a passion I’ve always had and I have dealt with the two Christchurch flour mills, Champion and Mauri (formerly Weston), all my farming life and I still supply them both.”
Syd said the mills do like locally grown grain and that’s been proven now with the likes of Countdown’s commitment to NZ grown grain.
In turn NZ growers have committed to milling wheat self-sufficiency by 2025.
Not outwardly seeking any accolade, Syd says he’s, out of desperation, the poster-boy for Countdown supermarkets’ commitment to use 10,000 tonnes a year of Canterbury grain for all in-store baked bread and rolls.
“I just happened to be the one around when they came looking for a photo.
“It was harvest time, you know what a dusty time that can be on the header. With camera in hand she looked at me and suggested I might like to clean my face up a bit. I said ‘you’ve got the real farmer here’.”
And it is exactly the form of stakeholder supply chain commitment Syd has striven to achieve.
“It is pretty damn exciting and we have a challenge to meet now.
“When I first started it was five shots each way at each other. I quickly realised that was not the way anything was going to work. We needed to sit down as an industry and work together.
“It was no point in sitting on the tractor and saying we want paid more – we had to be in this together and now we have three strategic partnerships done with millers over the past three decades.”
Finding a cost-effective way to freight South Island grain across Cook Strait is another challenge.
“We’ll conquer this one day. We have a lot more reason to now.”
While wheat is a speciality in the Worsfolds’ farming partnership they also grow a variety of other crops including barley, grass seed, clover, peas, canola and radish on their 400ha operation.
They finish up to 3000 lambs over winter and also take in dairy grazers.
While the farm has been 50% irrigated and more water coming from Central Plains Water, Earl, expects he will be able to consider growing more valuable seed crops.
They also continue to run the family’s harvest contracting business started by Syd’s grandfather with a threshing mill and traction engine in the 1920s.
Meanwhile, Syd is taking a back seat in the business, admitting he struggles with the technology these days.
“We have the new header but no matter how I try to set it up it argues with me. I’ll keep driving the old header and be the tractor driver and I guess when we get the driverless tractor it’ll be time for me to properly retire.”
