Neroli Brennan: This is Seeds for Success, a show where we have
Neroli Brennan: a good yarn about ag life with producers who are
Neroli Brennan: having a go. On the show you'll hear from farmers
Neroli Brennan: in New South Wales who are out there battling the
Neroli Brennan: elements, making tough calls and getting the job done. You'll
Neroli Brennan: get a laugh out of some of their stories and
Neroli Brennan: also pick up some know- how along the way. I'm
Neroli Brennan: your host Neroli Brennan. Today we're chatting with Greg Wynn,
Neroli Brennan: or Wynny, as he's known to his mates. Greg is a
Neroli Brennan: Cropping Manager for AAM Investment Group, overseeing Sunshine Farms Aggregation
Neroli Brennan: around Corinella, near Forbes. In this episode, Greg talks to
Neroli Brennan: us about his experience with corporate agriculture and his background
Neroli Brennan: in the agricultural industry. He discusses how this background has
Neroli Brennan: given him valuable experience when it comes to making big
Neroli Brennan: decisions on farm, with cost benefit analysis and budgets a
Neroli Brennan: huge part of his strategy since starting at Sunshine Farms
Neroli Brennan: in 2019. Local Land Services Mixed Farming Advisor, Rohan Leach,
Neroli Brennan: traveled to Corinella on a rainy June morning to bring
Neroli Brennan: you this chat with Greg.
Rohan Leach: G'day listeners. Today I'm here with Greg Wynn, a good mate,
Rohan Leach: and someone who taught me a thing or two in
Rohan Leach: my first few years as an agronomist. Wynny, welcome to
Rohan Leach: the Seeds for Success podcast.
Greg Wynn: Thanks Leachy, thanks for having me.
Rohan Leach: Can you start by giving the listeners a bit of
Rohan Leach: a run through, what you do with your job and
Rohan Leach: who you work for?
Greg Wynn: Yeah, sure. 2019 I started with a company called AAM Investment
Greg Wynn: Group. They're a family owned Australian investment company who, as
Greg Wynn: part of their expansion, was looking for a diverse portfolio
Greg Wynn: across the agricultural sector. They're already in chickens and timber
Greg Wynn: and the cattle stations in the Northern Territory, and then
Greg Wynn: part of their expansion and diversity was to purchase five
Greg Wynn: farms in and around the Corinella district, which is geographically
Greg Wynn: around Condobolin, Forbes, in West Wyalong, and I was brought upon to manage
Greg Wynn: those farms.
Rohan Leach: And so what does your day- to- day look like
Rohan Leach: in that role?
Greg Wynn: They're a mixed farming operation, so what that originally comprised
Greg Wynn: of was a self- replacing Marino flock and both dryland
Greg Wynn: and irrigated cropping. So, my day- to- day would mostly
Greg Wynn: comprise of managing up to, we would range depend on
Greg Wynn: seasonality, from 12 to 18 staff across the aggregation, and then another
Greg Wynn: asset that we added on later. So between that, running
Greg Wynn: staff, we'd also obviously run the business and maintain all
Greg Wynn: operations from the cropping stage, obviously right through to all
Greg Wynn: the ongoings that happens in a self- replacing Merino flock, so
Greg Wynn: yeah, lots of moving parts. Also, another part of the
Greg Wynn: AAM story is to invest capital to improve assets, so
Greg Wynn: as part of that we also undertake quite a large
Greg Wynn: irrigation development as well as other capital expenditure such as
Greg Wynn: infrastructure like sheep yards and fencing. So all those things
Greg Wynn: combined would certainly seem to be able to fill a
Greg Wynn: day in.
Rohan Leach: And so is that operation run by itself or as part of
Rohan Leach: the larger thing, is it pretty self contained?
Greg Wynn: So, I guess each asset's run individually, so it has
Greg Wynn: its own P& L and own set of books, but
Greg Wynn: it all falls, our asset, like Sunshine Farms, would fall
Greg Wynn: under one of AAMs investment portfolios called the Diversified Agricultural
Greg Wynn: Fund, which is shortened to DAF. So, under DAF there
Greg Wynn: is chickens, some timber assets, a large place up at
Greg Wynn: Blackall called Terrick Terrick, and ourselves. Sunshine Farms is the aggregation that I
Greg Wynn: manage, but it's made up of an aggregation of five
Greg Wynn: other farms, there's Bergen Park, Round Cowal, Sunshine, Warili and Glencoe.
Rohan Leach: And how does Burrawang fit into that operation?
Greg Wynn: So Burrowing was a later acquisition, I think we're about
Greg Wynn: 12 months into that asset. So it's its own investment
Greg Wynn: and own P& L sheet as well, so it's part of
Greg Wynn: the vertical integration in the diversified ag fund, so our
Greg Wynn: large farm up at Blackall is quite a large one,
Greg Wynn: up to 60,000 ewes, and then once that asset came
Greg Wynn: on board, Sunshine Farms moved from a self- replacing Merino flock
Greg Wynn: to a Dorper lamb fattening enterprise. Then to further integrate that
Greg Wynn: investment, Burrowing Dorper Stud was purchased, so it'll be maintained
Greg Wynn: as a seed stock business, but there'll be the opportunity
Greg Wynn: to expand that with some of the genetics being able
Greg Wynn: to be moved up to our Blackall business and improve the
Greg Wynn: flock up there. Which in turn, Sunshine Farms will see
Greg Wynn: the benefit of better genetics and hopefully better output from
Greg Wynn: our lambs.
Rohan Leach: Yeah, so it sort of sounds like that they're working self
Rohan Leach: contained, but to an overall arching goal in mind for the land.
Greg Wynn: Yeah exactly. So, all part of the one family, but
Greg Wynn: all required to be standalone and be profitable in their
Greg Wynn: own right.
Rohan Leach: Mate, we might just get onto maybe some of the
Rohan Leach: specifics of the Corinella Sunshine Farm, so what are the soil
Rohan Leach: types there and what do you do there?
Greg Wynn: So, like a lot of soils in the Central West
Greg Wynn: of New South Wales we've got some variation, but predominantly
Greg Wynn: all the farms ultimately lie on a flood plain. So
Greg Wynn: most the soils are heavier in nature, you'd say, and deposited
Greg Wynn: by a couple hundred thousand years of floods, so, our
Greg Wynn: soils really range from red sandy clay loams through to
Greg Wynn: sort of heavy gray vertisols. So, very well suited to
Greg Wynn: irrigation, very well suited to dry land cropping and moisture
Greg Wynn: retention because they have the ability to store a reasonable
Greg Wynn: amount of water, and the last couple of years they've
Greg Wynn: stored plenty of water, in excess. But yeah, so ranging
Greg Wynn: in soil types, and we do have a fair bit of
Greg Wynn: variations, which we are as we further down our timeline,
Greg Wynn: we initially started treating the farms as larger operation units
Greg Wynn: I guess, and then now as we are improving things
Greg Wynn: slowly we can start to drill down on some variations
Greg Wynn: that they're seeing across the paddocks that's showing up in
Greg Wynn: yield maps and NDVIs. Typically, a lot of those soils
Greg Wynn: in our region where the soil type is heavier, we
Greg Wynn: have had some issues with sodacity, which is higher levels,
Greg Wynn: as you know Rohan, higher levels of sodium in the soil,
Greg Wynn: which leads to poorer soil structure. And that's the sort
Greg Wynn: of variation we're seeing now where we're looking to sort
Greg Wynn: of try and alleviate some of that with some soil
Greg Wynn: ameliorations programs, lime and gypsum and controlled traffic.
Rohan Leach: Is there any plans to suit pastures to those in
Rohan Leach: the long term or is it...
Greg Wynn: Yep. So when we got there, we sort of, we'd sit
Greg Wynn: down I guess, and look at each farm in its
Greg Wynn: own right and would do a best land use capability
Greg Wynn: on each farm. So depending on the infrastructure, levels of
Greg Wynn: fencing, the soil type, elevation, shade, nutritional weed burden, we'd
Greg Wynn: sort of try and say, righto, well these parts of the
Greg Wynn: farms are going to be better suited to livestock for
Greg Wynn: certain reasons and these parts of the farms are going
Greg Wynn: to be better suited to a cropping phase. So yeah,
Greg Wynn: we typically use five or six different factors to determined
Greg Wynn: what's the best use of land while still maintaining an
Greg Wynn: overarching goal, which is a mixed farm.
Rohan Leach: I think that's a really important step that a lot
Rohan Leach: of farmers that are maybe purchasing a new farm probably
Rohan Leach: don't take. Obviously they probably don't have the resources that
Rohan Leach: you guys have got available, but everyone can sit down
Rohan Leach: and have a look at probably their current land and
Rohan Leach: future purchases and just do like a reconciliation and see
Rohan Leach: what's best.
Greg Wynn: Yeah absolutely. It's where a mixed farm works, I guess,
Greg Wynn: in that, if say we were just solely a cropping
Greg Wynn: enterprise and no livestock interaction, there's going to be parts
Greg Wynn: of those farms that are going to be poor performing
Greg Wynn: cropping paddocks. And then transversely, there's parts that are going
Greg Wynn: to be, if you're only livestock, is not going to
Greg Wynn: be that conducive to growing good pasture or got good
Greg Wynn: shelter for livestock. So, I think that's where the mixed
Greg Wynn: farming thing is really cool and probably what got me
Greg Wynn: most excited about the role and coming down, in that
Greg Wynn: it's what I would do myself, is what AAM were
Greg Wynn: doing. Whilst mixed farms can be difficult because there's lots
Greg Wynn: of moving parts and interactions, it's also exciting, and I
Greg Wynn: believe the best use of land in this region.
Rohan Leach: You've hinted at it there, but you are also now running your
Rohan Leach: own farming business, can you give us a little brief look at that?
Greg Wynn: Yeah, sure. So, it's my wife's family farm, an old
Greg Wynn: soldier settlement block just south of Condobolin. And due to
Greg Wynn: some tragic family circumstances, there's been an opportunity for Margot
Greg Wynn: and myself, my wife and myself, to run the family
Greg Wynn: farm, which is a positive in a dark time, I
Greg Wynn: guess. So, my background and career has in some ways really
Greg Wynn: set ourselves up for hopefully success in our own enterprise.
Greg Wynn: We've been able to pick the things that we've learned
Greg Wynn: from lots of different people and lots of different enterprises
Greg Wynn: that I've had access to over the years, and interestingly
Greg Wynn: it's probably following that AAM strategy as well of a
Greg Wynn: mixed farm. So we are doing our own self- replacing Dorper
Greg Wynn: flock as well as cropping part of the farm. And
Greg Wynn: Margo and I sat down when we started and looked
Greg Wynn: at the farm map and went for a drive and
Greg Wynn: worked out which paddocks we thought were going to be
Greg Wynn: better suited for livestock and which paddocks we believe were
Greg Wynn: going to be better suited to cropping, and we wanted
Greg Wynn: to make that roughly 50/50 in terms of land area.
Greg Wynn: And then we sort of worked backwards from that to say, righto, well
Greg Wynn: we've got X amount of hectares and this is how
Greg Wynn: many animals we think we can manage relatively risk- free
Greg Wynn: on this area, and then in a better year we'll
Greg Wynn: trade livestock if required or fatten the offspring. We're probably
Greg Wynn: replicating what we're doing on a bigger scale at work,
Greg Wynn: at home, on weekends essentially, yeah.
Rohan Leach: Like you've said, you're working a fair bit on your
Rohan Leach: weekends there, you'd be pretty flat out. How are you making it work?
Rohan Leach: That work- life balance, and basically you got two full-
Rohan Leach: time jobs.
Greg Wynn: Yeah, it certainly was a challenge and will continue to
Greg Wynn: be, but we've got some good understanding bosses at AAM,
Greg Wynn: and they've allowed me to change my employment status with
Greg Wynn: AAM where I'm able to back off a little bit
Greg Wynn: from there. They've replaced me in my business management role,
Greg Wynn: so now I'm an assistant manager overseeing the cropping side of
Greg Wynn: the business, which allows me to be a bit more
Greg Wynn: flexible with my time and spend a few days a
Greg Wynn: week on the farm here, instead of burning the candle
Greg Wynn: both ends, was inevitably going to happen if we didn't
Greg Wynn: make a change.
Rohan Leach: That's really good. Yeah, I guess corporate agriculture sometimes gets
Rohan Leach: a bad rap, but the fact that you've been able
Rohan Leach: to do that is probably a pretty good relationship that you
Rohan Leach: formed there.
Greg Wynn: Absolutely, yep. And AAM would definitely fall under the corporate banner, but we
Greg Wynn: certainly as a business, don't see ourselves as a corporate.
Greg Wynn: See AAM certainly as much more of a family owned
Greg Wynn: business, and you can jump on the phone and talk
Greg Wynn: to the general manager tomorrow, certainly been a very good company
Greg Wynn: to work for and been very understanding with what we
Greg Wynn: want to do in our own little world, yeah.
Rohan Leach: Mate, you've hinted at it previously, but you've had a
Rohan Leach: long and illustrious career in agriculture. Can you just maybe
Rohan Leach: talk us through a bit of your background?
Greg Wynn: Yeah, sure. Grew up in Glen Innes in the Northern
Greg Wynn: Tablelands, and finished year 12, and like a lot of
Greg Wynn: kids at that stage, probably lots of pressure on to make your
Greg Wynn: decision of what you're going to do, and I wasn't
Greg Wynn: a hundred percent sure. But spent a bit of time
Greg Wynn: working for family friends on a farm over that period
Greg Wynn: and thought, I love being outside, I love farming, I
Greg Wynn: love cropping, so decided to do agronomy at UNE up
Greg Wynn: in Armidale. Enjoyed myself there, turned a three year degree
Greg Wynn: into a couple more than three, but certainly made a
Greg Wynn: lot of friends and learned a lot of skills, built a
Greg Wynn: really good network from my time up there. And then
Greg Wynn: when I finished uni there, went on the job search,
Greg Wynn: and as is such in agriculture you typically find a
Greg Wynn: job through your network, which is what happened in this
Greg Wynn: case and was able to get a job with AGnVET
Greg Wynn: services out in Narromine as a trainee agronomist. So I
Greg Wynn: spent 11 years at Narromine with AGnVET and moved up
Greg Wynn: from trainee to an agronomist under my own steam and
Greg Wynn: then built a book of fee for service clients and
Greg Wynn: then took on a customer service manager role, which is
Greg Wynn: like the store manager, and then also took on a
Greg Wynn: role as a regional manager for an agronomy team. So
Greg Wynn: that was a really important part of my formative years, I guess,
Greg Wynn: being able to work with such a range of good
Greg Wynn: growers in that Narromine district and learn a lot from
Greg Wynn: them. And AGnVET had a really good internal training program,
Greg Wynn: so we spent a lot of time with other agronomists from
Greg Wynn: different regions and we did lots of tours and that
Greg Wynn: sort of stuff. So, to be able to do the
Greg Wynn: business management side of things towards the end as well,
Greg Wynn: added that layer to my learning.
Rohan Leach: I think that working with farmers and obviously working with
Rohan Leach: some pretty handy farmers, you can learn so much from them.
Greg Wynn: Oh mate, absolutely. During that time, I guess it went
Greg Wynn: from a job to a passion, you got really interested and
Greg Wynn: really invested in your customers and seeing good results and
Greg Wynn: success and go on the journey with them, and loved
Greg Wynn: my time there. We'd done that and wanted to spend
Greg Wynn: a bit of time with my family who were still
Greg Wynn: up in the Northern Tableland, so we actually packed up
Greg Wynn: and moved up to Armidale. Spent some time up there
Greg Wynn: for a couple of years and was lucky enough to
Greg Wynn: get a role with a family farm up there managing
Greg Wynn: a Merino place. So obviously with AGnVET, my time as an
Greg Wynn: agronomist was very agronomy focused and didn't do a lot
Greg Wynn: of livestock, so yeah, was pretty fortunate to be able to get a
Greg Wynn: role where I didn't have a lot of sheep experience,
Greg Wynn: but my boss at the time really wanted that agronomy
Greg Wynn: input into his farm and improve his pastures and nutrition,
Greg Wynn: and that's how that came about and that was a great couple
Greg Wynn: of years learning a hell of a lot.
Rohan Leach: Yeah. What was that bit of a change of pace
Rohan Leach: like from agronomy and probably really busy at certain times
Rohan Leach: of year going into farm management?
Greg Wynn: So I think yeah, it was probably the biggest difference most people will
Greg Wynn: attest to I'd say is, when you're in agronomy you're
Greg Wynn: living in town and it isn't a nine- to- five,
Greg Wynn: but in your brain it's nearly a nine- to- five
Greg Wynn: because you're not in it when you knock off. Whereas when you're
Greg Wynn: living on the farm and moving on the farm, you're there,
Greg Wynn: and you live it and you breathe it, and work becomes a lot more
Greg Wynn: part of your life and your family then becomes involved
Greg Wynn: in your work. So yeah, probably the change I saw
Greg Wynn: was certainly more hours, but it was enjoyable hours where
Greg Wynn: you take the kids mustering sheep and land marking and
Greg Wynn: all that sort of stuff where it actually became part
Greg Wynn: of our lifestyle, I guess, our work became part of
Greg Wynn: our lifestyle and a passion, so yeah, that was good.
Greg Wynn: And physically, it was a lot more fencing, a lot
Greg Wynn: more walking up and down hills, so physically more demanding.
Greg Wynn: But yeah, certainly loved it, it was great. And then
Greg Wynn: the drought actually hit up there, like it did everywhere
Greg Wynn: at the end of '19, and it was pretty terrible
Greg Wynn: everywhere, but the Tablelands in particular were probably less accustomed to
Greg Wynn: such a severe drought and it was pretty challenging for
Greg Wynn: everybody up there at that stage.
Rohan Leach: High stocking rates, it's all relative isn't it?
Greg Wynn: Yeah. And I just think the prolonged, they have lots of
Greg Wynn: short droughts in the New England, but it was so
Greg Wynn: prolonged and certainly not downplaying it for anybody else, it
Greg Wynn: was a shocker everywhere, but it was particularly difficult up
Greg Wynn: there. And when another one of the network reached out
Greg Wynn: with the opportunity to move down to Forbes, Condo region,
Greg Wynn: all the ducks sort of aligned and it was pretty
Greg Wynn: much, I sort of felt like it was a role
Greg Wynn: that I'd been working towards for the last 10 or 15 years,
Greg Wynn: so sort of accumulated or brought together all the skills
Greg Wynn: I'd picked up over the different jobs I'd had.
Rohan Leach: So, have you got any tips for maybe young people just
Rohan Leach: entering the ag industry on what they should be doing
Rohan Leach: in their careers?
Greg Wynn: It is such an exciting time to be a young person
Greg Wynn: in ag at the moment, I think, because the world's
Greg Wynn: your oyster. Probably a couple big things is just, you
Greg Wynn: got to start at the bottom, and everyone comes out,
Greg Wynn: not everybody, but I think we all want to rush
Greg Wynn: our career and it's great to want to progress and
Greg Wynn: that's awesome, but you also just got to do the
Greg Wynn: time too, I believe. And especially in ag, you can
Greg Wynn: learn a lot about a crop in 12 months, but
Greg Wynn: that crop will act differently the following year because it's
Greg Wynn: gone from a wet year to a dry year, and every year is different.
Greg Wynn: And I think it's only that once you've got a
Greg Wynn: few years under your belt and you've seen a dry
Greg Wynn: year and a wet year or a late break, an early break, that's when
Greg Wynn: you actually start building really good intellectual property. So, one
Greg Wynn: word of advice would be, don't rush it, enjoy the
Greg Wynn: process, enjoy the learning, and you don't have to be the manager
Greg Wynn: today, there's time for that. Probably another one is, as
Greg Wynn: alluded to before, get your network. So there's lots of
Greg Wynn: ways of doing that nowadays, but make sure you get
Greg Wynn: around like- minded people and create your network, because in
Greg Wynn: my experience, that's where most of my really good opportunities
Greg Wynn: have come from. Yeah, good things happen to good people,
Greg Wynn: and if you work hard, I think you make your
Greg Wynn: own luck. And yeah, certainly it's an exciting time to
Greg Wynn: be a young person in ag.
Rohan Leach: That comment about getting your network, you were probably starting
Rohan Leach: in the industry, and I just have a very vivid memory
Rohan Leach: riding around the back of a four wheeler with you
Rohan Leach: and you absolutely putting the wind up me about using
Rohan Leach: ACHIEVE, and to this day I don't think I've ever used it.
Greg Wynn: No? And that's the thing about doing your time, because
Greg Wynn: you have to sometimes have those experiences, then maybe-
Rohan Leach: Those horror stories.
Greg Wynn: Yeah. And if you don't either surround yourself with a good network
Greg Wynn: and learn from them, unfortunately you're going to have to
Greg Wynn: make your own mistakes. It scared a lot of people,
Greg Wynn: that ACHIEVE, they reckon you used to have to go on holidays for
Greg Wynn: two weeks after you sprayed it because it would make your crop
Greg Wynn: look pretty ordinary.
Rohan Leach: So getting back to your role now, more specifically, so
Rohan Leach: are you in the paddock much day- to- day anymore,
Rohan Leach: or are you now sort of making higher level decisions?
Greg Wynn: So, I'm probably going backwards, but in my mind, in a good
Greg Wynn: way. I reckon I was probably 75% in the office
Greg Wynn: when I was doing the business management role, and 25%
Greg Wynn: outside, and that's the function of lots of different things.
Greg Wynn: That's the function of so many moving parts in a
Greg Wynn: fast progressing asset, but also in that investment space there's
Greg Wynn: lots of compliance and stuff, which is all very necessary,
Greg Wynn: compliance and reporting. So there's a lot of time involved
Greg Wynn: in that in the office doing up reports and whatnot,
Greg Wynn: which I really quite enjoyed that part of it as
Greg Wynn: well. And then also running multiple staff has a fair
Greg Wynn: bit of a HR component. So I would've said, yeah,
Greg Wynn: 70 odd percent of my time in the office and
Greg Wynn: then 25% out. Now with this shift, I would say it's the other way, which,
Greg Wynn: it has been a nice change up.
Rohan Leach: In that management position, how were you making some of
Rohan Leach: your decisions? Like you did word me up before with
Rohan Leach: your sort of ROI and IRR, I think I've heard
Rohan Leach: of ROI before, but...
Greg Wynn: In that corporate world there's delegations of authority, I guess.
Greg Wynn: Without getting bogged down and technical, all that means is
Greg Wynn: there's different people within the management hierarchy that are responsible
Greg Wynn: or can approve decisions. So, once you know where you
Greg Wynn: can operate, and for me what that meant was if
Greg Wynn: anything was budgeted... We'd spend a lot of time to
Greg Wynn: try and get really good and accurate budgets that would
Greg Wynn: try and incorporate so much detail, the reason being, lots
Greg Wynn: of reasons, everyone should run to a budget, it's just
Greg Wynn: good management. Everyone should, whether you're a farmer or you're
Greg Wynn: a kid getting pocket money, I think budget's a great
Greg Wynn: thing. So the more detail I could get in my
Greg Wynn: budget, the more opportunity I had to make decisions. And
Greg Wynn: what that means is, if I budgeted to use X
Greg Wynn: amount of kilos of Urea per hectare, and your budget's
Greg Wynn: been approved by all the appropriate people right up to
Greg Wynn: the board level, then I can go and make a decision
Greg Wynn: based on all my agronomic expertise. So, how much soil
Greg Wynn: moisture do we have, the seasonal outlook, the crop stage,
Greg Wynn: soil test analysis. So, I would spend a lot of time getting my budgets
Greg Wynn: as accurate as we could from cropping right through to
Greg Wynn: the sheep, and then once all that's approved, you're solely
Greg Wynn: making really good on the ground decisions. Where that gets
Greg Wynn: a bit difficult I guess, is where it's unbudgeted, and
Greg Wynn: that can happen for lots of reasons, climate is obviously
Greg Wynn: the biggest driver for unbudgeted costs. So, in that process
Greg Wynn: in a corporate world, you go through a layer of
Greg Wynn: approvals, which would often, say if it was the floods
Greg Wynn: wiped out a fence and we got to replace it,
Greg Wynn: and if it was unbudgeted, then we'd do a cost
Greg Wynn: benefit analysis. That's quite a simple one, but we'd say, righto,
Greg Wynn: well for this amount of investment we're going to get
Greg Wynn: this much improvement on our capital, as well as an
Greg Wynn: operating benefit, be able to run more sheep or run
Greg Wynn: it more effectively. So, whilst that might, I hope it doesn't,
Greg Wynn: but it might sound a little bit tedious or boring,
Greg Wynn: it's a really valuable exercise to go through to actually understand
Greg Wynn: what you're doing and what impact your decision is going
Greg Wynn: to have on the business, both now and in the
Greg Wynn: future. So yeah, that would be the process of any
Greg Wynn: decision, I guess. And all of those things are falling under
Greg Wynn: our overarching strategy, which is a mixed farm in the
Greg Wynn: Forbes area with a level of capital development.
Rohan Leach: I think you've explained that really well, that's good, yeah.
Rohan Leach: Have you got any little nifty tools or tricks or
Rohan Leach: just is Excel your friend?
Greg Wynn: Excel, mate, is such a powerful program with so many functionalities
Greg Wynn: that, I know enough to be dangerous on Excel, I
Greg Wynn: reckon, is how I'd put it, I can make columns,
Greg Wynn: add up, and average and that sort of stuff. We
Greg Wynn: luckily have some resources internally that are really, really good,
Greg Wynn: some of our business analysts up in Brisbane are just amazing what
Greg Wynn: they can get spreadsheets to do. We use other tools, Agworld and
Greg Wynn: AgriWebd, commercial online products, and they're great. I guess how
Greg Wynn: we see them, is they're our data capture, but then
Greg Wynn: we still use big Excel spreadsheets. They're just so powerful
Greg Wynn: and there's just no really... We just haven't found too
Greg Wynn: many products on the shelf that can manage the levels
Greg Wynn: of complexity that we have. The cost benefit analysis, as I
Greg Wynn: alluded to, that's the crux of all of our decisions
Greg Wynn: essentially, and it's such a valuable process to go through,
Greg Wynn: whether that's a set of sheep yards, or whether it's a new tractor,
Greg Wynn: whether it's a new fence. Essentially anything that we do
Greg Wynn: from a capital expenditure, so any improvements or any machinery
Greg Wynn: goes through that process, and it's really powerful. Sometimes it's
Greg Wynn: really nice to have stuff, but when you actually sit
Greg Wynn: down and run the cost benefit analysis and work out
Greg Wynn: the interest and the depreciation that that's going to have
Greg Wynn: and the repayments and then you compare it to what
Greg Wynn: you're already doing, and sometimes it's not that exciting, unfortunately.
Greg Wynn: So that process, I'd encourage everyone to learn to do
Greg Wynn: that. Sometimes it's hard to manage the cost benefit will
Greg Wynn: be, how do you say, putting a new set of
Greg Wynn: sheep yards is going to save you money, but you
Greg Wynn: try your best and say, well, we think it'll mean
Greg Wynn: one less FTE, which is a full- time equivalent, so by
Greg Wynn: having a better set of yards, if we can run
Greg Wynn: half a staff less and that staff can go and
Greg Wynn: do something else that's better use of their time instead
Greg Wynn: of pushing sheep up that won't go around a bad
Greg Wynn: bugle or something, that's how we try and do a cost benefit, and
Greg Wynn: it's a good process to go through to make sure you're
Greg Wynn: spending your money wisely. And it's so important in a
Greg Wynn: corporate thing to make sure we're spending other people's money wisely.
Rohan Leach: I actually did a very much smaller scale cost benefit
Rohan Leach: analysis of, as you know, the cattle job has turned
Rohan Leach: off a bit and I've got some of my own
Rohan Leach: little weaners at the moment thinking, should I feed them or
Rohan Leach: should I ramp them? And after nutting out the Excel
Rohan Leach: spreadsheet and adding up the columns, I've worked out that
Rohan Leach: I was going to be a dollar a head better
Rohan Leach: off if I fed them, so I think they're on
Rohan Leach: the truck next Monday. So what's been your experience overall
Rohan Leach: in corporate agriculture?
Greg Wynn: Oh look, my experience is, it's been wonderful. But what
Greg Wynn: corporates and what AAM has certainly done in my region is, or in
Greg Wynn: our region here is, we've bought family farms that due
Greg Wynn: to their succession, for whatever reason, there wasn't a path
Greg Wynn: forward. I think most people could relate to that, there's
Greg Wynn: been lots of family farms sold unfortunately. But what a AAM
Greg Wynn: has done is been able to purchase those family farms
Greg Wynn: and then be able to inject capital into them, which
Greg Wynn: is probably what most of those families wanted to do
Greg Wynn: for the last 20 years and were unable to. So,
Greg Wynn: it's really exciting to be able to start with a
Greg Wynn: farm and have a goal in sight to where you
Greg Wynn: want it to get to and then go on that
Greg Wynn: journey and actually see the change. And that's something that,
Greg Wynn: particularly in the last six months, we've really started to see
Greg Wynn: a lot of that change come to fruition. It's really
Greg Wynn: rewarding to be able to drive around and see that
Greg Wynn: you've actually had a positive impact on not only a
Greg Wynn: farm or a paddock or a crop, but in our
Greg Wynn: case, we hope we've had a positive impact on the
Greg Wynn: region as well.
Rohan Leach: And the community, yeah.
Greg Wynn: And the community. So we've replaced some of the family farms that
Greg Wynn: were probably, their kids had grown up and gone, so
Greg Wynn: they weren't putting kids on the school bus anymore, and
Greg Wynn: we've replaced, in a lot of cases, with young families. So
Greg Wynn: kids, we hope we've put more kids in the school
Greg Wynn: and we hope we've invested some capital in the local
Greg Wynn: business. We try employ all of our contractors and service providers
Greg Wynn: and everything local, so we're hoping we're having a positive
Greg Wynn: legacy, I guess, on the community. And being part of
Greg Wynn: that's been fantastic.
Rohan Leach: Cool mate, I think that's a really good answer. Thanks
Rohan Leach: for your time on that one.
Neroli Brennan: Thanks for listening to part one of this two- part
Neroli Brennan: chat with Greg Wynn. Join us next episode as we
Neroli Brennan: continue our conversation and learn more about how the recent
Neroli Brennan: flooding along the Lachlan River has led Greg to a
Neroli Brennan: new approach to managing for future floods and drought. Thanks
Neroli Brennan: for listening. This podcast was brought to you by Central
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