Farm Planning Takes Innovation Approach

Landholders in the Southern New England are set to take advantage of farm planning with an agro-ecology focus and a twist of innovation at the end of April.

“This particular opportunity has emerged out of feedback from participants at an event with David Hardwick run by the Northern Tablelands Local Land Services at Kentucky last year,” said Karen Zirkler, Landcare Coordinator with Southern New England Landcare.

Sought-after presenter, David Hardwick from Soil, Land Food will run the four-day “Farming with Agroecology” program, which begins in Armidale at the end of April.

“We are very much looking forward to hosting this training because it will enable participants to access the latest thinking on many farm management innovations all in one place,” said Karen.

“David’s programs are always very well attended and leave people wanting more,” she said.

The program will offer participants innovative, hands-on skills to manage farm landscapes for productivity, profit and the environment. It will cover soils, water, pastures, vegetation and animals; and explore how it all fits together as a landscape.

David Hardwick is an agroecologist with more than twenty years extension and agricultural experience running workshops in soils, farming, grazing, and land management Australia-wide.

“During the program, we will work with participants to identify sustainability issues, assess and map their farm’s natural resources and landscape, explore ecology-based, innovative approaches such as planned grazing, diversity-cropping, self-herding, stress-free stockmanship and ecological soil strategies,” said David.

Additional trainers in the program include Bruce Maynard, an innovative Narromine farmer who developed No-Kill Cropping and Stress-Free Stockmanship and co-developed the Self-Herding approach with scientist Dean Revell; and Kristy Youman, a farming systems extension specialist working with soils, grazing and land management around Australia.

Anyone interested in attending the program will find more information at https://snelandcare.org.au/group-events.html. Registrations close Monday 16^th April and enquiries can be made at {local landline prefix}2 9123.

This project is supported by NENW Landcare Network Chairs Inc. and Northern Tablelands Local Land Services, through funding from the Australian Government’s National Landcare Program.