Dairy women open the books

Women know more about the dynamics of dairy farm finances than most of them realise, says Rebecca Rowe, a former rural banking manager and ex-farm consultant.

She was talking to about 30 women who were at Woodville's Dairy Women's Network day that aimed at empowering dairy women by giving them budgeting tools to take charge of their farm financial planning.

"You can do it without anyone else," she said. It means they become empowered, rather than have financial incomings and outgoings just happening to them, Ms Rowe explained.

About half of the women said they had done farm budgets, but many were uninitiated and she estimated less than half were doing farm budgets every year – let alone updating them every two months to keep them valid, as advised.

"It is important, because if you do a budget, you have control and understanding over the money coming in and going out and you don't miss opportunities. You are more likely to meet your financial needs."

The dairy women were keen to exchange information and were happy to talk to each other about budgeting every chance they had. That included a very busy lunchtime, and in between Ms Rowe's budgeting advice.

Ms Rowe, a sheep and beef farmer, told the dairy women she envied all the information they had access to on their farm's finances.

It included a lot of information sent to the farm by the dairy company they were providing milk to.

"And that DairyNZ website is amazing. There is an amazing set of resources on there. "

It included budgeting advice and ready-to-use budgets.

Ms Rowe said budgeting for dairy farms was simpler than for sheep and beef systems.

"Measuring milk in the vat makes it a simple structure and you are only dealing with one or two classes of stock on a dairy farm. Fewer stock classes and a focus on just milk. "

A sheep and beef farmer was dealing with multiple sheep and cattle classes, and different products going out the gate, making budgeting more complex, she said.

"It does mean for dairy, the structures are simpler and the resources are available. If sheep and beef farmers had vats that would be very empowering."

She laughed and said imagine if you could put your lambs in a paddock, and the magic vat would tell you whether they were growing each day.

"That would make life easier," Ms Rowe said.

She told the women at the seminar to have a go at producing a farm budget and to revise it often.

The women might not be out on the farm fixing fences, milking or shifting cows, but they still had access to the production information, she said.

"Sometimes women are working off-farm, they feel they are not close enough, but they can always find the information. Finding time isn't always as easy as I make it sound, but doing a farm budget, I would prioritise this."

- © Fairfax NZ News