Small farms exports

2 posts

Member for

8 years 10 months
Last seen: 05/20/2015 - 16:20
Joined: 05/17/2015 - 12:04

Small farms exports

Hi All,

 

I'm a University student, and while not a farmer, I am tasked with developing an innovation that would assist the agricultural industry.

 

I need some feedback on my idea, and given I’m only a city slicker (although I don’t intend to be forever) I don’t have the country connections I require! As such, I figured this lovely community is a great place to connect and get some feedback!

 

So basically I've done some research and found that smaller farms will have a more difficult time exporting, due to their size and resources. As such, these small farms miss out on the profits lucrative markets such as Asia, offer.

 

I thought perhaps having a website that consolidates the supply chain may be the way to solve this. So, the site connects farmers, distributors, and supermarkets in Asia. First, farmers would be granted membership to the site once the necessary export regulations and inspections were performed. Farmers then offer their produce online, for supermarkets in Asia to peruse, and these supermarkets post ads for what they wish to purchase. Farmers also have the option to connect with distributors, and perhaps garner discounts if a system can be worked out whereby produce is transported along with other farmer’s produce from the local area.

 

It’s very much a rough idea, but it would be absolutely fantastic if you could provide any feedback on:

How relevant/useful this would be to you as a farmer

How it may be developed further

Any problems that may arise

 

Also, feel free to post about any experiences you had with exporting, or your opinions on Australia’s agricultural exports.

 

Thank you so much for your help, it’s much appreciated! 

Last seen: 02/29/2024 - 14:20
Joined: 09/13/2013 - 18:57

Hi,

 

Great Idea and Project.

 

I'll wear my MBA hat rather than that of just a farmer. The farm has an intrinsic value to me over and above income.  Bear in mind though that I'm pretty pofit motivated with my business. 

 

The big issue you have here is the number of transactions to get to an exportable size as far as cattle (or sheep) go. There are exceptions such as Wagyu where a samll herd may be enough. I'm sure you have seen the size of the live export ships. One of these would require many many small farm transactions, consolidation and movement. On top of the variable price you would need to pay for the individual herds you would have additional transaction costs for each transaction such as transporting to a single point before moving the larger herd forward etc etc. This would be opposed to say a transaction of a shipload off a single cattle station which would be one transaction and probably one average price across the herd.

 

With smaller farmers there tends to be more competition across the indiviidual herds and hence transactions.  It is also a case that they may not want to see a particular herd discounted down to an average price because of another herd. The more transactions and managment of the process the less competative you become.

 

I am sure with some hard thinking you could come up with an inovative solution. 

 

Good luck with it.

 

kind regards

 

 

Terry

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