New farm game unveiled at recent GAPP meetings

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On-farm costs and risk management was the focus of the last round of young farmer discussion group meetings held in Birchip, Managatang, Hopetoun and Rupanyup recently.

At the second meeting of the GAPP groups (Growth, Adoption, Productivity, Profit) this year, members were introduced to an electronic ‘Farming for Dollars’ game developed by BCG’s Tim McClelland for the Grain and Graze 3 project.

“This was a great exercise to get growers thinking about input costs, risk management and decision making,” GAPP co-ordinator Linda Walters said.

“Each participant bought along their own laptop and downloaded the game to ‘play’ after Tim set out the rules.”

The game involved a hypothetical paddock which players could base on their own farm, inputting paddock history, crop type and weed burden. The players then had to make tactical decisions, month-by-month, based on randomly selected weather and pest and disease events. Participants had to consider their soil test results and cost of production along the way.

The winner was the person with the highest gross margin.

“The game helped bring together some of the topics we have discussed in previous meetings about cost of production, timing of applications and risk management in a fun and interactive way,” Ms Walters said.

Participants identified a number of key take home messages, including:

  • The number of decisions farmers actually have to make through the growing season
  • The importance of questioning every input, and thinking about the costs and benefits in not only the short term but long term too
  • The tools available to help with decision-making and to assess risk levels
  • The cost associated with every input
  • Ways to overcome losses, ie. increase income or reduce costs
  • The fact that the cost of production is increasing but the returns aren’t, and increasing risk
  • If return on investment isn’t high, change something

Mr McClelland also introduced two new support tools for growers to use.

Yield Prophet Lite is a free tool that lets you estimate potential yield values for your crop given different rainfall amounts and fertiliser application rates and Farm4Prophet enables users to test ideas about their farm and how changes to business structure will impact.

The GAPP initiative is run by BCG in partnership with the State Government with the objective to increase on-farm production in ways that maintain or increase profitability for farmers in the grains sector. For more information, contact the BCG Office on 03 5492 2787.

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