Leadership comes packaged in many ways and in the right environment it can be learned. Successful leadership is being able to inspire others to create and achieve shared visions. In an organisational setting, vision at the top is essential for success. Leadership is much more than managing; leadership is essentially inspirational with empowerment, respect and excellent communication at its core. The manager's role is to coach and teach, but for leadership to be successful a culture where the truth can be heard and is welcome, needs to be created. Effective visionary leadership is the key element for ideas to be shared and solidified and creative solutions arrived at. Vision is the synthesis of instinct and knowledge and in effect is creative problem-solving.
* The influential leaders who I met were:
* Passionate and it showed!
* Put the needs of the organisation before themselves.
* Were extraordinarily disciplined and hardworking.
* Were flexible and listened.
* Had integrity, were trusted and were sincere.
* Trusted others to make mistakes and allowed people to grow.
* Recognised and acknowledged other's achievements.
* Ensured they enjoyed personal leisure time.
It is little wonder that Britain's agricultural industry is paranoid about the press. Front page headlines, and broadcast media leads on farming and food issues over the past 15 years have highlighted a sorry saga of bad practice, disease and death, human as well as animal. The uncomfortable truth for the industry, however, is that it has largely deserved the press it has received.
It is a generalisation, but important to understand that just as agriculture has broadly undergone a radical shake-up from small family farms employing numerous staff supplying countless outlets with produce, to a system of large-scale, one-man units largely dependent on powerful supermarkets, so too has the media undergone a major transformation.
It can be argued that animal welfare legislation passed in the EU often finds its way south to Australia and New Zealand some 2-3 years later. With this in mind, I set out to take a look at how both these countries viewed the EU animal welfare model.
One of my favourite questions during meetings was "what trade associations would have/should have done differently with the benefit of hindsight?"
My tour of New Zealand included meetings with the egg and poultry industry trade association, Egg Producers Federation of New Zealand (EPFNZ), Federated Farmers (FF), the NFU equivalent, the government's National Animal Welfare Advisory Committee (NAWAC), and others.
The aims of the study tour
+To investigate different cooperative organisational structures in the United States, Canada and Europe to understand how and why these models have developed.
+Focus on the New Generation Cooperative - a model developed in the United States to provide capital orientated attributes to attract farmer investors whilst still adhering to cooperative principles.
+Assess the impact of different organisational structures on member ownership, control and benefit.
+Assess whether the organisational structures from other parts of the world can or should be implemented in the UK.
The expansion of the EU provides an extended market for existing members and a larger free trading area, thus revealing many opportunities for British industry. However this also provides the new member states a larger market and therefore presenting many threats to UK industry, especially agriculture which has a prominent role within their economies.
This report clearly examines the egg industry in many Central European countries on criteria ranging from the supply chains to the legislation and production techniques. This is then linked to the UK industry by concluding whether each country poses a threat or provides an opportunity for British businesses operating in the egg industry. Various conclusions are drawn such as the fact that Poland will represent little threat to the UK because of its poor infrastructure increasing its logistical costs, whilst there is potential for investment in egg processing in Central Europe as currently there is a lack of processors and those that do exist do not operate with efficient technology.
The author travelled to Poland, Ukraine, Slovakia, the Czech Republic and Hungary to enable the compilation of this report.
There is a general belief amongst a large proportion of UK farmers that they are a bit more independent minded than their overseas counterparts and that co-operation is not for them.
This report attempts to answer whether farmers in mainland Europe are more co-operative minded than those in the UK. The history of agricultural co-operatives in Europe is described where they seem to be more popular, namely France. The author develops a clear understanding of agricultural co-operatives and identifies the features of a successful one, such as effective decision making. The report highlights that in times of financial hardship farmers inevitably review the options available to them. Therefore co-operatives are able to present the advantages of mutuality to a UK audience that is perhaps more open to change than at any other time. It is demonstrated that co-operatives would improve the market position of farmers, but yet not all co-operatives are successful and the difficulties experienced in New Zealand are likely to limit their further adoption within the UK.
The author visited New Zealand and travelled across many Northern European countries to complete this report.
The impact of a strong pound on UK exports and decreasing aid payments has meant that many farm businesses are a lot less comfortable than in the past. To allow adjustment to the required levels of margin, red tape and world wide market pressure some growers must work together and divest responsibility to others, if they are to survive into the future.
This report clearly identifies the need to co-operate through explanation of all the factors leading to this decision. Many of the structural options that are available to joint ventures are outlined such as share farming agreements or farm business tenancies. Case studies of a number of different joint ventures around the world are analysed including machinery sharing agreements. The issues of flexibility of each are considered alongside important consequences when handling succession. The author effectively concludes the findings emphasising that those who are willing to share information will learn and consequently succeed but need to pay careful attention to business management and planning issues, rather than simply farming skill.
The author visited France, Germany, Poland, Canada, the USA and Brazil to produce this report.
As agriculture changes and the number of farmers continue to decrease, it is vital that farmers have effective representation to maintain some sort of political clout. However their representative organisations also experience challenges which must be addressed.
After a brief analysis of some of the issues faced by farmer organisations home and abroad, this report examines farmers' unions financing such as through membership fees and other commercial activities that are undertaken. The services that they provide are also outlined alongside the organisation and structures of these bodies. This is linked to the way in which they communicate with their members and more importantly with outside parties such as the government and other organisations such as the countryside alliance. However the overriding challenge that farmers' unions will face in the future is to establish a fair price for primary food producers in return for environmentally responsible and high quality food production.
The author travelled to Australia, the USA, France, New Zealand and the UK to compile this report.
The Irish dairy co-operative industry is a very difficult environment in which to generate wealth for the farmer shareholder and needs to recognise the need for change to enable improvements in efficiency to be made so that there is less reliance on EU support payments which will soon be phased out.
This report identifies changes that Irish dairy co-operatives must make to ensure a strong and successful business that can reward its owners in such a way that may not be achievable without its formation. This is conducted by analysing the New Zealand and Australian system recommending the need to further consolidate and improve farmer representation within these co-operatives. Further consideration is given to the Danish dairy co-operative industry using Arla Foods Plc as an example, comparing production costs and likely future milk prices. The ultimate aim for the Irish dairy co-operative industry is to be able to compete with the best in the world firstly by addressing the ownership issues that are evident.
The author visited New Zealand, Australia and Europe including Denmark, as well as travelling through Ireland.
The global economy is becoming more and more controlled by legislation and paperwork plays as much of an important role as the activities of the business itself. However as agriculture undertakes significant changes, it seems evident that the industry must adhere to more policies than some other sectors of the economy.
This report coherently presents why government organisations propose and implement the certain legislation that they do and the influence that non-government organisations, such as Compassion in World Farming, pressure groups and stakeholders have on any of these decisions using CAP reform and subsidy decoupling as a focus. The pressure that these policies cause the farmers of the countries concerned is discussed with specific reference to differences in legislation between nations, such as cattle identification. However, the report concludes emphasising the important role that other organisation splay in addition to national governments such as the WTO and national newspapers. It is therefore recommended to improve communication between farming groups to better influence the policies affecting their industry.
The author visited Germany, New Zealand and USA to enable the compilation of this report.
The political framework used in agriculture through the CAP, was distorting market requirements and demand, therefore leading to oversupply of many agricultural commodities because of the subsidy system prior to the recent CAP reform. Therefore the CAP faces fundamental changes in attempt to meet budgetary restraints of the EU and also to fulfil the requirements of the World Trade Organisation.
This report outlines how the CAP must be changed, to enable all countries to effectively compete with one another and more importantly allow producers to respond to the market therefore producing what the customer demands. The CAP should therefore not be a social policy to protect incomes but an opportunity to satisfy growing markets such as non-food production, higher value added markets, such as for local farm shops and organic production, and farming for the environment. Further recommendations to maintain incomes is to continue traditional production but by reducing costs as is demonstrated through reducing the number of passes to establish a crop.
The author visited the USA, New Zealand, Wales and parts of the South West of England as part of this report.
The EU expansion on the 1st May 2004 created an EU with 25 member states bringing 75 million more consumers into our tariff free zone. This creates considerable opportunities and threats for many industries. However the greater importance of agriculture to their economies presents a much greater issue to the farmers of the rest of the EU.
This report clearly identifies opportunities for the food industry in Central Europe as the UK's agri-food sector will become more reliant on exports to Europe and further east. The author demonstrates that CAP reform will force income to come from the market place and therefore prompting the need to capitalise on opportunities to export to these accession nations. The end of the BSE crisis and abolition of the OTMS will enable further exports of quality beef where grass fed red meat will earn a premium. However there is a requirement by the UK agri-food industry to improve its cohesion and co-ordination in its exporting efforts to capitalise on these new opportunities, otherwise investment here will not be possible.
The author visited Hungary, Poland, Czech Republic and Slovenia to produce this detailed report.
There are significant distortions in UK farming because of the ongoing debate over the future of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) and the ever changing regime of agricultural taxation.
This report effectively reviews other systems in place in the developed world and recommends some changes for the future of the UK and more importantly the EU, prior to the recent CAP reform. The author studies the system currently operating within New Zealand with reference to the budget of 1984, where all price support was phased out, subsidies abolished and tax reliefs ended. This is presented in contrast to the Canadian agriculture where systems of subsidisation remain, despite disparities between particular sectors. The Curry report is discussed and the decoupling of support from production, that is evident today, accurately predicted. The farming economy and the effect of the current policy on succession is analysed within both countries, before recommending that UK industry must restructure as a whole and not as disjointed parts.
The author travelled to New Zealand and Canada to conduct research for the production of this report.
Rapid and major change within the UK agricultural industry also affects other support industries. One of which is the agricultural contracting industry which perhaps needs to adapt to serve the new requirements of customers and to survive in such times.
This report identifies key areas that contribute to a successful contracting business including quality staff whilst investigating new opportunities and establishing the future direction for the UK contracting industry through assessment of operations abroad. The author reviews contracting in Europe and in the USA, focusing on specific business case studies such as Ty Nunes custom baling of alfalfa on a huge scale. Also incorporated into the report are the roles of the national contractor organisations such as NAAC in the UK and the importance of non-agricultural services within many businesses. The author effectively concludes the findings with recommendations to diversify to utilise men and machinery during quieter months and the opportunity of whole farm agreements as more non-farming people purchase land.
The author travelled to Denmark, Sweden, Poland, the Czech Republic, Belgium, Holland, France, Germany and the USA to complete this report.
The UK farming industry is always presenting evidence of how other farming enterprises in other countries are much better represented and supported through government bodies and other lobbying organisations.
This report explains why the power of the farming lobbies varies around the world and what elements make an agricultural industry in one country more politically influential than its counterpart somewhere else. This is conducted through firstly identifying and discussing the role of the various organisations representing farmers' interests in various countries across the world. Furthermore this is outlined in relation to the operating environment of each country clearly identifying the different attitudes of society and governments (political systems) towards agriculture and the effect that this has upon agricultural influence, proposing whether greater levels of regional government would better serve agriculture. This is developed to demonstrate that UK agriculture has little influence compared to other nations such as New Zealand potentially because of the relative importance it has to the economy. Numerous recommendations are finally made to build agriculture's political credibility.
The author travelled to Canada, USA, New Zealand, Belgium, Holland, France, Ireland and visited London to assemble this report.
