Wednesday 18 May 2022

Producers are invited to join the Farm Business Resilience Program to discuss and look at different infrastructure projects installed by local landholders as part of their strategies to manage seasonal risks. Producers can join for the full tour and presentations or drop in and join us for the session that meets their needs.

8.30am - 9.00am
Registration

9.00am – 10.00am
‘Pedal to the metal or let the good times roll?’ with John Francis

10.00am – 10.30am
Morning Tea

10.30am – 11.30am
Farm Business & Finance with Brad Sewell

11.30am – 12.30pm
Lunch

Travel to 'Paling Yards' (0.5 hr)

1.00pm – 3.30pm
Farm Tour at 'Paling Yards', Taralga NSW with Charlie Bell

Exclusion fence
Droughtlot
Silos

Guest Speaker Bio's:

Brad Sewell

Founding Director Agribusiness: Robinson & Sewell

Brad’s professional career in rural and business finance has spanned 30 years. He held senior agribusiness roles with prominent banks and specialist rural lenders for 20 years before co-founding Robinson Sewell Partners in 2010.

Brad’s rural finance and banking experience is grounded by a lifetime association with agriculture, initially via an upbringing in the dairying district of Berry NSW, followed by employment on beef, sheep and cropping enterprises in the pastoral zones of western NSW and northern QLD.

Brad and his wife Jodie own 8,500 acres of farming and grazing country at Nyngan NSW, and have active business interests in the technology sector; property development; and commercial property. Brad offers his clients a depth of experience in finance and other business sectors.

Brad’s tertiary qualifications include a Bachelor of Business (Hawkesbury Ag); a Graduate Diploma in Agribusiness (Monash University); and an Associate Diploma in Farm Management (Orange Ag). Brad is an accredited member of the Mortgage & Finance Association of Australia (MFAA), and previously held formal NSW registration as a real estate valuer and stock and station agent.

John Francis

Director and consultant: Agrista

John Francis is farm business management consultant with over seventeen years’ experience in agricultural consultancy and a further fifteen years’ experience in production agriculture (agronomy).

John has a background in production agronomy and livestock production and is a competent business manager with a proven understanding of the drivers of profitability in agriculture. John works at a strategic and tactical level with corporate and family farm asset owners and managers to improve productivity and profitability. He is also involved in a number of industry projects and farm benchmarking groups and has developed a series of workshops aimed at improving the financial skills of farm managers when acquiring additional farmland or growing the business internally.