Back

Benchmarking: Its Place in Planning

Benchmarking is part of the planning process in understanding how your business can meet your future family needs.

Like the majority of farmers you are probably someone who is so committed to the daily tasks of growing, handling and marketing that there are never enough hours in the day to work on the business, rather than work in the business.

Benchmarking is a learning process, which involves looking at a few key indicators of performance and seeing how you compare with others. It is important because it helps you gain an understanding of how your business is performing, and is an important step in business planning and making decisions.

Our experience in benchmarking with a wide range of agricultural industries shows that farming families will get enormous benefit from benchmarking if it is kept simple and is used to answer the important questions: Should we buy the block next door? Can we bring other family members into the business? Should we replant with new varieties?

Team

Charles Thompson

Charles Thompson

Senior Fellow

B.Sci. (Ag.) (Hons), CPAg.

Charles has 20 years consulting experience and over 25 years’ experience in farm business and natural resource management. This includes water quality, salinity, irrigation, drainage, horticulture, community consultation and extension. His special fields of competence technical resource assessment; extension and advisory services to horticulture and agriculture; nutrients and water quality; and benchmarking horticultural enterprise management.

0428 179 701
Clinton Muller

Clinton Muller

Senior Consultant

M.Sust.Ag., B.Bus. (Hons), B.A.

Clinton has extensive experience in sustainable agriculture, with a specialist focus on horticulture and intensive production systems. With a strong agricultural industry focus, Clinton has worked across a range of agricultural commodities and natural resource management issues in Australia and internationally.  Clinton’s diverse range of capacities including program design and management, stakeholder engagement, partnership management, monitoring evaluation and reporting, extension, facilitation, action research and science communication.

0498 192 596

Related Articles

Hort growers to benefit from industry benchmarking programs

16 NOV 2023

Participating in an industry benchmarking program is a simple way to take stock of your business performance, identify opportunities to improve your bottom line and ensure your business is operating a...

Read More

A plan for plastic waste in agriculture

26 MAY 2023

The National Agricultural Plastics Stewardship Scheme was one of 24 projects funded under the National Product Stewardship Investment Fund (NPSIF) and a key initiative of the National Waste Policy...

Read More

National roadmap launched to guide waste management in ag, fisheries and forestry

08 MAY 2023

Developed by RMCG, the National Waste and Resource Recovery Roadmap is one initiative developed through AgriFutures Australia’s Pre-Farm Gate Waste Program. Since 2021, the program has worked to al...

Read More

Contact