Farmer Focus: Farm jobs and industry roles tricky to balance
© Tim Scrivener “Make sure you’ve got a farm to go back to.” It was 2019 at the British Charolais annual general meeting, and I had just been voted in as chairman.
That warning was a stark reminder to me to keep my eye firmly on the business at home.
These extra “jobs” that we do – quote marks there, as a job would normally involve getting paid – can swallow your time, and probably should, if we give them our all.
See also: How to prioritise everyday livestock tasks and be more productive
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My warning continued: “One day it’ll be in the rearview mirror, and you’ll be back at home counting the cost of real jobs not done.”
Now, with this being my last Farmer Focus article before I move on to something new, I can reflect on that advice and wonder if I ever have the balance right.
Since I have started writing these columns, jobs – and “jobs” – have multiplied.
In no particular order, I have become chairman of the National Beef Association and industry body Checs, an AHDB council member, a Red Tractor board member, and have accepted numerous roles at organisations with varying acronyms.
Added to that, Steakholders, a new podcast with beef industry friends, is in pre-production.
What about the home fires? I will be first to admit that there are jobs not done at home as well, or with the timeliness that they should have been.
Yet, with no help from the banks, which I and others are finding increasingly un-cooperative, the business has grown.
In what can only be seen as a hostile political and geopolitical environment, the farm has increased in size by more than 40% and the herd by more than 25%.
If it were a school report, I’d give myself a solid B (“could do better”).
Meanwhile, back in the present, the grass is finally growing, forage stocks look adequate to get me through a normal winter (whatever that might be), and the wheat is drilled and roaring away.
My biggest concern is that I haven’t managed to replace my invaluable farmhand, Daisy.
With about 70 days spent away from the farm so far this year, I need someone to keep the home fires burning, but only for a few hours each day.
Unlike the acorns, which seem to be raining out of the oaks in this mast year, people like Daisy don’t seem to grow on trees.