Rugby titan tackles tough side of farming

BY JON MORGAN

The muscular 191cm (6ft 3in) frame that once led the fearsome All Black pack in their 1960s heyday is stretched out on a worn leather sofa, the trousers and shirt faintly redolent of the greasy-woolled ewes he has just been crutching.

Not surprisingly, at 69, Sir Brian Lochore is not the man he once was, not physically – a few extra kilograms have been added around the girth and chiselled planes and deep creases are taking over the familiar features.

But there is still an imposing presence and a steely determination behind the ready smile and you get the impression that if the call came again – as it did once after his retirement – he would love nothing more than to don the black jersey and run out to do battle again.

And the mind that had to make a thousand decisions on and off the field over arduous, six-month tours is still as sharp as ever. He is a self-described "odd-jobs man" for the New Zealand Rugby Union, regularly called in over the years to advise and mediate.

It is not rugby that occupies his thoughts on this day, but farming. He and his wife Pam have put their three farms into a family trust and farm in partnership with son David and his wife Virginia, at Porangahau, and daughter Joanne and her husband Mark Mossman, at Blairlogie.

"The last three years of drought have been the most difficult I've ever experienced in a lifetime farming," he says.

"It's been really rugged. Normally, we would be able to shift stock around the three farms to avoid the worst, but we've all been in the same situation, bare and dry.

"Contrary to the view of most people in the cities, we do care about our stock and when you haven't got enough feed for them and it's hurting them and it's hurting you, it's not very nice."

The farms, covering 1300 hectares and, in a normal year, 12,000 stock units, are looking good again after a kind summer, but the stock are not there to take advantage of it. David had to sell almost all his 150 beef cows and lambing percentages have fallen.

"My estimation is that most farms on this coast would be down a third on stock numbers. Few would have made any money. We were at break-even last year, which our accountant got quite excited about, but we took a big hit the year before."

Brought up on the family farm near Masterton, Sir Brian was given a 5000 start by his father to help him buy his first farm at Hastwell at the age of 20. It was a tough 141ha farm, barely economic with 900 romney ewes and 60 cattle.

When the time came to re-finance five years later his All Black fame counted for nothing and he had to fight hard to get the money from reluctant insurance companies. It meant assertively stating his farming attributes and recalls it was a valuable lesson.

"I don't like pushing my barrow, but when you've got your back to the wall you have to push your barrow, otherwise you're going to fall over the cliff," he says in a flurry of metaphors.

THE farm performed well with the addition of lease land and was sold only four years ago to finance the acquisition of the Blairlogie farm. In the 80s he ventured into dairying, adding a neighbouring sheep farm to a small runoff inherited from his father and converting to a 300-cow dairy unit. "It was an opportunity to make a bit more money," he says.

But sheep were his first love and he sold the dairy farm in 1991 to buy 800ha at Porangahau. With 60ha close to Masterton, supplemented by 160ha lease land, the partners run the three properties as one farm. Romneys are the breed of choice, dating back to the first stud ewes presented to him at 16, and the flock is recovering well from the droughts.

He has been called away from farming many times over the years and not always for rugby.

He has been chairman of the Hillary Commission, on the board of the Sports Foundation, chairman of Wairarapa College and was asked to take over as commissioner of Kuranui College, Greytown, when it got into difficulties.

Currently, his two biggest interests are as chairman of the QEII Trust, an independent statutory organisation that protects farm bush reserves and wetlands, and as a member of Wool Grower Holdings, a company set up by Meat & Wool New Zealand to eventually become a farmer co-operative with wool industry investments.

He is reluctant to talk in detail about Wool Grower Holdings, a part-owner of Wool Partners International, one of two farmer-related companies setting themselves up as wool marketers. The other is Elders Primary Wool. However, it is clear he feels the frustration of farmers who are waiting for Wool Grower Holdings to release a prospectus.

That two organisations are competing to buy farmers' wool is welcomed, but he is concerned more with how wool is marketed overseas.

"It must go out under one marketing group," he says. "We should expend all our energies in getting a funnel organised that can suck all the wool out to overseas markets. For too long we've been pushing it out. We need to get out there to promote it and build up a demand."

The industry has suffered for too long with no promotion, he says. This has allowed the synthetics industry to get away with telling lies. "We now have a great opportunity to sell the values of wool, particularly its environmental story.

"If we can get wool to $5 a kilogram we'll all make a profit. It's not that big a jump."

He looks back 10 years to when he was part of a drive by Romney NZ to market wool, and wishes now that the organisation had ignored the obstructions thrown up by the Wool Board and carried on regardless.

"We had 28,000 bales promised to us and we should have stitched something together and just done the thing. When we went back a few years later for another go with Growerco we got half that."

Driven by a strong personal code of warm honesty and sincerity, remarked on by his former coach Fred Allen as typifying the New Zealand farmer, Sir Brian laments that such integrity is no longer prevalent.

"There are more promises broken now than there used to be," is his way of putting it. He sees a lack of commitment. "People feel there might be something better coming round the corner."

It is obviously a source of frustration for a man who as a captain and coach was renowned for his ability to convince players to lift themselves and follow a game plan to success.

"If we all committed to doing something as farmers we'd get it done. If every farmer said we're going to flog this wool, or lamb, and we're going to fix this, it would be fixed tomorrow."

The chairmanship of the QEII Trust was accepted reluctantly seven years ago.

"I've enjoyed it more year by year. What really impresses me is the number of generous New Zealanders out there, putting pristine places into covenant for perpetuity. Some, if they put the land on the open market, would be worth millions, and they've given up that to do something really great for New Zealand."

Although he is ranked among this country's greatest sporting leaders, he insists he is "quite shy".

"You mightn't think so, but I'm quite a retiring person. I don't like the limelight."

He notes two types of leaders, those who talk a lot and those who lead by their actions.

"I've tried to be the second but I've gradually learnt the other a little bit. It's something I've had to work at."

This leads him to muse on those people who tend to make too much noise. "In farming, the squeaky wheel gets the oil, and that annoys me, it annoys me immensely."

He confides he has no ambition to be the best farmer in the country, "but I'd like to be in the top third. I might have been there from time to time, but at the moment I'm probably not," he says with a laugh.

"I've always believed the best farmer in the district is the best farm adviser you can get. If a young guy wanted to learn he could go to those guys and get it for nothing. But we don't do that, we're individual. We'd rather pay for it. If a young guy came to me I'd be bloody delighted."

He has never had to apply for a position on any of the many boards and committees on which he has served, in and out of farming and sport.

"People have always come to me and I have rarely turned them down. I care about New Zealand, I care about New Zealanders. If you can help somebody or you can help the country as a whole I think you should.

"The question I sometimes ask myself is, `If I hadn't done all these things would I have been a better farmer?' It's one I cannot answer. I just don't know."

- © Fairfax NZ News