The Farmers Club Newsletter

The “Club Notes” for Thursday the 25th of January 2024.

By Dwain Duxson

If you can, please get your family, friends and colleagues to sign up. See the website link here.

Loyalty undervalued

Farming is a very local pursuit. Many start-ups and manufacturers of products have looked to go direct to the Farmer, but it doesn’t work. Farmers are very loyal to their Local businesses. The only way to penetrate is to team up with or enhance what the local service provider is doing. Local Rural stores are a great example of that. The model works. Farmers are loyal, even to shit companies that couldn’t give a rats. However, these days, you won’t get too many chances if you are a continuous no performer. But loyalty from a Farmer is worth a lot to an Ag service provider because they keep coming back. That’s provided you are doing the right thing. It’s measurable but undervalued, I think. When I was on the Farm, 5 generations of our Family dealt with the one Livestock Agent who recently passed away. For sheer ability to get the best result possible, you would give him a pass, but for his attention to detail and making sure everything was done properly, that’s where his skill lay. Plus, you get loyalty in return. And he was a funny man and a mate too. Are you a loyal Farmer to your service providers? Reply to [email protected]

Don’t get caught up in it all…..

I was talking to a guy who is a marketer in the Ag space, and he said the words El Nino and La Nina are actually brand names, and we only associated one thing with each word. El Nino = Drought, and La Nina = Floods. Therefore, he said when we hear those words, we instantly think of the 2 associated words when actually it’s not necessarily so. He said what we have to do is train ourselves not to focus on one word and think to ourselves that El Nino and La Nina mean so much more and are not to be feared. We also have to train ourselves not to listen to the media headlines. Those headlines are designed for clickbait and reactions. Many of you have trained yourself not to listen, watch, or read anything that ABC serves up or the free-to-air television news because it is all negative and messes with our brains. So, take the negative stuff with a grain of salt and look beyond the headlines. In WA, a few are stressed because it’s so dry in the Farming areas. But it normally is at this time of year, and they usually get their break in May, so there is plenty of time for that to happen. Going into panic mode is not good for anyone. Have you stopped consuming things like the ABC, News and Alamist Headlines? Reply to [email protected]

The Gypsum run

Many of the Cropping guys would be gearing up for this year’s Gypsum run. That thankless but necessary job you either love or hate. Gypsum is a staple now with lots of Grain Growers, and most have to travel a fair way to access it. Also, the Gypsum mines are usually in out-of-the-way places, so the road to these mines is usually pretty rough. You can certainly do some wear and tear on the Truck. The Farmers that enjoy the Gypsum run are usually the busy types but use this time to think and plan out the year ahead. It’s like a great little follow-up break after the holiday break. It’s usually done on your own, and you can get a lot of thinking done. For others, the Gypsum run is a chore. Who does the Gypsum run at your place? Reply to [email protected]

Australia Day edition

We will do an Australia Day edition with an Australian Day theme. Reply to [email protected]

Your replies

Below are snippets from some of the replies you sent in. All quotes will remain nameless. See a few current ones below:

• “The only thing this sort of bullshit achieves is to pull the joint apart at the seams. It’s very worrying”. - A Farming spelling out his displeasure at MLA.

• “But who gave the staff at MLA the right to make arbitrary decisions on social engineering policy? They should bloody well just get on with the job of selling meat and leave the politics to the electorate. I’m going to contact MLA and ask for my money back”. - Aimed at MLA.

• “The abolition of diazinon for Plunge Dipping, the only product that would completely eradicate lice and give 4 weeks flystrike prevention. All the backliners slowed the lice down but failed to eradicate them completely”. - A Farmer talking about one of the products that has disappeared from the shelf.

• “Sadly, things changed, and it does not seem to have the clarity and vibrancy it once possessed”. - A Farmer talking about the new MLA compared to the old one that got things done.

• “MLA is controlled by the Corporate Farms, Agribusiness, Meat Processors and Consultants”. - One Farmers opinion.

• “Actually, how dare they! As a levy-paying Livestock producer, I wasn’t consulted regarding this course of action”. - In regard to MLA and their anti-Australia Day stance.

• “Yes, payment terms are better now. 30 years I had a Grain buyer who would come in his Truck, pick up the Grain and then give me a blank cheque to fill in once he had weighed later; this wouldn't happen now”. - In reply to our “Payment Terms” Note.

• “If MLA would like to go that way, I would suggest that we refuse to pay the MLA Levies. To my way of thinking, they no longer represent us”. - On MLA again.

• “The very deliberate aim of all of these measures is to alienate fair dinkum Australians so they begin to feel like strangers in their own land”. - MLA again.

• “But so much policy and spin seems to conveniently forget social and economic impacts in pursuit of an environmental utopia”. - On our Farm Tender Daily story about the need for profit in any so-called sustainable pursuit.

End of message.

Dwain Duxson
0427 011 900

Random and associated Ag articles and images.