ELDERS has developed its technical offering to include an independent service offering under the banner Thomas Elder Consulting (TEC) and the good news is, its services are open to all agricultural participants, not just Elders clients.
While the name sentimentally harks back to the 180-year-old company's heritage, being named after founder Sir Thomas Elder, its ultra-modern services are a smart mix of new age thinking, grounded with practical proven methods.
It is hailed as the first national consultancy covering all agricultural sectors and specialities providing independent advice.
TEC comprises a team of seven specialist consultants managed by Elders head of technical services Graham Page with one of them, livestock production specialist Pip Houghton, based in Perth.
When she was a child, Ms Houghton's family owned a sheep property at Brewarrina, in New South Wales, running a 7000-head Merino self-replacing flock and 200 Hereford breeders.
Today her father is in the process of retiring on his farm at Violet Town, Victoria, which ran sheep and cattle as well as cropping and her mother runs cattle at Pittsworth near Toowoomba, Queensland.
Thanks to her WA connections (her mother was born in WA) Ms Houghton studied a double degree in animal health and animal science at Murdoch University and joined TEC as a well credentialed team member four months ago.
She said TEC operates as a fee-for-service business, fully independent of Elders retail and agency network, meaning its advice comes with no commitment to farm supplies purchases or livestock marketing commitment.
"This set-up affords TEC consultants the freedom and time to provide dedicated services and advice focusing completely on farm profitability and sustainability," she said.
And in keeping with the access-to-all status, TEC's fees are standardised to ensure all customers, including Elders clients, have equal access to their premium services.
While TEC is fully independent, it does have one alignment to Elders through the parent company's research and development arm, the Thomas Elder Institute (TEI), headed up by Dr John Evans.
TEI is Elders' commitment to improved adoption of research, innovation and technology with strategic collaboration and partnership across public sector institutions and global R&D based businesses.
Ms Houghton said the main function of TEC was to advise on how to best use research and technology to improve producers' decision making for enhanced productivity and profitability.
In her case the focus was on expertise relative to livestock production planning, animal health advice, livestock monitoring, genetic improvement, pasture surveillance including satellite imaging to determine Food on Offer, feed ration design, technical trials, farm management system software and time saving technology implementation, such as automatic drafting gates and water point sensors.
"We certainly utilise the information provided by animal health companies and the like and assess and adapt that information to each client's particular situation," she said.
"A lot of it is about having a progressive mindset, using data for benchmarking and forward planning to mitigate against seasonal variances.
"We advocate making a plan early, so that decisive action can be taken without the influence of emotions inherent in a crisis."
The other members of the TEC team are agribusiness and livestock specialist Bruce Creek, ruminant production consultant Michael Wilkes, viticulture specialist Pete Breugem, horticulture agronomy and business management authority Roop Sandhu, agriculture cropping specialist Neal Stevenson and precision agriculture expert Dan Gall.
- More information: contact Pip Houghton on 0429 051 485 or pip.houghton@thomaselderconsulting.com.au or visit thomaselderconsulting.com.au