A FOCUS on production has paid off for Wayne and Angela Huisman, writes SIMONE SMITH

Winning comes second to getting it right for Wayne and Angela Huisman, the most successful farmers in this year's Tasmanian Dairy Business of the Year Award.

The Huismans' win in the highly-regarded competition was mostly because of their impressive 18 per cent return on assets last year.

But their motivation for entering was to ensure their operation was on the right track.

"The main reason we did it is to benchmark how we're going," Wayne said.

The couple, from Togari at Circular Head, in northwest Tasmania, took out the state's Share Dairy Farmer of the Year Award last year, when they first entered the competition after a long break.

This year is their third sharefarming at Hatfield Dairies. When the dairy was sold in 2007 they became 20 per cent equity partners.

"For us it's not about winning," Wayne said. "We just want to make sure we're up there at least in the top half of farms.

"For us, it's a really good opportunity to see how we're travelling."

A strong focus on pasture and production was the key to their business' strong performance.

Pasture management skills, developed during previous share-farming positions, where they were restricted with the amount of grain they could feed, have been put to good use at Hatfield.

The 640 cross-bred milking herd utilises about 13.5 tonne of dryland pasture combined with 1.8 tonnes of wheat and a 25-30 per cent protein mix.

Each year, 8 per cent of the farm's pasture is renovated.

Nitrogen is used strategically to boost the couple's ryegrass and perennial growth, however, managing pasture during the winter proved to be a challenge.

Most of the Togari region is reclaimed swamp land and cows sometimes need to be removed from paddocks to prevent pugging.

The wet conditions mean surplus pasture at the end of the winter cannot be cut for hay. Instead, the 93ha dairy farm and 200ha run-off block gets cut for silage.

Hay is cut from the run-off block later in the season.

Last year, 800 round bales of silage were cut off the dairy farm and 400 off the run-off block. Silage is fed to the young stock and used as a winter feed source for the milkers.

For the Huismans, cross-bred cows have always been the best option, particularly when they were not feeding grain. Their majority spring-calving herd was built slowly over 18 years from a base of seven Jersey calves.

"Cross-bred calves were cheaper," Wayne said.

But their farm change has prompted a switch in breeding direction.

With the ability to feed grain, they have started converting their herd to Holstein, but a little cross-bred vigour remains.

All the changes have reaped rewards.

A comparison of butterfat, for example, sees a 100kg difference between their last year at the previous farm and their first at Hatfield.

This year, butterfat production was 290kg/cow.

The herd average is about 529kg milk solids per cow.

Wayne puts these gains down to "a balanced diet" achieved by maintaining the stocking rate while feeding grain.

During the competition, production remained high.

"We had a really good spring and a fairly good autumn so the cows produced pretty well right through," Wayne said.

Purchasing a share in the property has ensured the Fonterra suppliers have "a foot in both camps" as sharefarmers and owners.

While the cross-over complicates business decisions, they would not have it any other way.

"We are not building up someone else's asset anymore," Wayne said.

"At the moment we are building our assets as well as doing a good job with our cows."

Assessing their business performance has been important for the Huismans.

Wayne said dairy farmers should assess how their business performs compared to other industries.

"You need to know what sort of return you're getting on your investment," he said.

"It's good to compare that to the returns you could be getting for investing in shares or other things like that."