A new partnership between Meat & Livestock Australia (MLA) and Elders will co-develop new ways to gather feedback and share targeted research information with red meat producers across Queensland to improve on-farm productivity.
The three-year pilot will utilise Elders’ network of 75 Queensland-based livestock agents and senior managers to co-develop, establish and evaluate a new research adoption and co-innovation model. The program aims to better identify producer needs, as well as new research and development ideas, increase adoption and better engage with innovative producers across Queensland.
The program will utilise the Elders’ online community research portal, known as Elders Insiders, to gather, record and feedback information. This portal has the capacity to deliver questions, research outcomes and case studies to specific groups online – and allows producers to view and comment on information relevant to their business.
Elders will appoint a Livestock Research, Development and Adoption (RD&A) Manager for the Company’s north zone to oversee the pilot – helping to co-ordinate the Elders agents and facilitate the flow of information between producers, MLA and Elders.
Elders’ North Zone General Manager, Greg Dunne said the pilot will take advantage of the strong relationships Elders has with Queensland red meat producers and, through these interactions, develop an effective two-way flow of information about business needs and innovative solutions.
“Nationally, Elders has around 200 agents along with 280 livestock sales staff in the field who collectively have in excess of 10,800 one-on-one contact hours each week with producers,” Mr Dunne said.
“Having both MLA and Elders support each other by developing new research and innovative ideas alongside producers, and more importantly how best to apply that research on-farm will ultimately have a great benefit for our industry.”
MLA Managing Director, Richard Norton said MLA continues to develop new models to solicit innovative ideas and needs from producers and to disseminate regional and business specific innovative solutions.
“As well as enabling MLA to gather further advice and feedback from producers to guide our work, this pilot offers a unique opportunity to share those MLA R&D outcomes that are specific to Queensland producers through the Elders network,” Mr Norton said.
“For MLA, it is another direct means to collect targeted and near real-time information to even better inform us on producers’ R&D, market intelligence, communication and adoption needs. Ultimately, that means MLA can better assist producers to improve productivity and profitability.”
The pilot program is co-funded by Elders through the MLA Donor Company (MDC), with no producer levies being used.
Picture The MLA and Elders Co-innovation & Adoption Pilot program will be officially launched by Elders’ North Zone General Manager, Greg Dunne and MLA Managing Director, Richard Norton at Beef
Australia 2018 in Rockhampton at Elders’ client event on Wednesday, 9 May with over 400 clients in attendance.
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