SINCE World War II, dairy farm numbers have been shrinking and today, Australia has slightly more than 6000, milking an average of 300 cows a herd.
Compare that to 60,000 dairy farmers milking an average of 22 cows in 1970, it is easy to calculate that 90 per cent of those involved less than 40 years ago have ceased milking cows.
Why has this happened? One can only surmise, but there are plenty of reasons.
Currently, farmers are producing two billion litres more milk than in 1970, with a million cows less, so they are definitely doing plenty of things right.
But there is still a need to plan for the future, as there will be one, despite the doomsayers shouting for handouts to study their particular "thing" rather than agriculture.
The climate will continue to change, as it has done for thousands of years. Coal and iron ore will endure, but it cannot be eaten, hence the need for "agriculture" thinking from our leaders.
The world population continues to grow, and in countries such as India and China, there are more affluent people each week consuming more dairy produce.
Dairy production here will increase, coming from larger herds and more dairy farms.
Who will fund and manage these changes? Superannuation funds have already started to be invested in this area and now, with the other finance areas failing, money will be available to invest in well-managed dairy farms.
There are trillions of dollars looking to earn interest. Money lenders thought housing was the go, so they loaned half a million dollars to people who had no money, no job and no assets.
They did not care as the house could be reprocessed and sold again, but they ran out of buyers.
Let us speculate and say 7000 farms milking an average of 500 cows will be required for Australia to sustain a profitable industry. Farms will have both a herd and pasture manager and 500 more advisers will be required for both farms and service industries.
Where are these important people to be educated?
Today, farmers, governments, universities and TAFE all seem to have forgotten how vital agricultural education is, so there a very few students.
Yet this current thinking jeopardises the future world population, export industry and domestic markets.
Farmers are pouring millions of dollars into so-called "research", yet in far too many cases none of those controlling the funds seem to see further than their noses, especially when strategic planning is involved.
So farmers need to demand that their research funds be spent on relevant issues. For example, in the future, another 1.5 million cows will be required, but what breed? Maybe half will prove to be crossbred, because of the poor fertility of Holstein cows, but we will never know without the research.
