B.GBP.0061 - NB2: Barkly Breeding Group

Summary

This project supported a group of corporate pastoral company business units to benchmark their businesses and engage in peer-learning. Key achievements of the group included increasing confidence and skills in managing human resources, feedbase and herd management.

Objectives

The objectives of this project were to engage a group of beef breeding business units around the Barkly Tablelands to benchmark, undertake training activities and facilitate peer-to-peer learning.

Key findings

The group consisted of 12 stations from six companies, managing more than 250,000 breeders. The group activities provided an opportunity for the group to share and build knowledge on many aspects of pastoral business management, including people, landscapes and profit.

Benefits to industry

This project increased the knowledge and skills of managers of enterprises responsible for large areas of land that involve numbers of people and cattle.

MLA action

MLA continues to support the NB2 program through new facilitated peer groups.

Future research

There is an opportunity to further build knowledge on optimising the performance of large pastoral stations through building on and sharing the existing knowledge of the managers of these stations (at station and company level), with these discussions underpinned by business analysis.

The standardisation of carrying capacity estimates was a key outcome of the project. Extending this across the pastoral estate would be of enormous benefit to the industry, allowing a better understanding of the sustainable carrying capacity of the resource base.