Soil extension needs: lessons learnt from Grain and Graze II in Northern NSW

Soil extension needs: lessons learnt from Grain and Graze II in Northern NSW

Lisa Lobry de Bruyn

School of Environmental and Rural Science, University of New England, Armidale, NSW, 2351 Email llobryde@une.edu.au

Abstract
Working in a mixed farming development and extension programme we offered a space that allowed for non-
linear discussion of research findings and the potential for farmer experimentation/expressionism of acquired
soil knowledge and its application. The ability to transform scientific knowledge to specific contexts is often
highly dependent on willingness of farmers to co-operate, to take an idea on and place it into action. Our
role was to mediate between accepted soil knowledge and local knowledge systems to improve the level of
practice change for a more resilient farming system. We were also evaluating whether we met farmers’ soil
knowledge needs and preferences for knowledge interaction especially in terms of maintaining soil fertility.
We analysed 12 field days (about on-farm research) and 2 forums with a total of 339 participants (57%
farmers, 10% agribusiness, 10% researchers, 10% NRM, 9% other, 4% government) to examine what we had
learnt about farmers’ soil knowledge needs and ways of knowing.
Key Words
Soil knowledge, resilience, farmer experimentation, local knowledge, scientific knowledge, interaction

Introduction
The recognition by land managers of a decline in soil fertility is paramount as it is a critical slow variable
that can affect the resilience of a farming system and its ability to adapt to future shocks and perturbations.
It is well accepted amongst scientists that maintaining soil fertility for agricultural production is important,
and it is also widely known that Australian soils are inherently infertile. Yet, this accepted knowledge
of Australian soils is not reflected in land management practices when in 2009-10, 39% of 32 680 farm
businesses across Australia did not apply any form of fertiliser, with the study region close to the national
average (ABS 2011). In addition, for those farmers in the study region who did apply fertiliser, less than
half did so based on soil testing (ABS 2011). In this paper we examine the soil extension needs, ways of
knowing and awareness of risks to the mixed farming business of a National R&D programme (operational
between 2011 and 2013) – Grain and Graze II. Grain and Graze II’s overall aim was to make a significant
contribution to “increasing knowledge, capability, respect and confidence of mixed farming communities,
thus enabling them to manage a more viable and environmentally sustainable mixed farming system that can
adapt quickly to changing climatic, market and policy conditions” (Project Specification Document DEEDI/
GRDC DAQ00162, p2 unpublished). The northern New South Wales component planned to deliver on
practice change by increasing farmer adoption in: planting perennial species; maintaining ground cover at
40% (cropping) and 60% (grazing systems); diversifying crops/pastures and forages; planting of ley pastures
and use of reduced/zero tillage, largely in priority sub-catchments of the Border Rivers-Gwydir Catchment
Management Authority (BR-G CMA). The evaluation data presented here is from 12 field days and 2
forums over 2.5 years, and was used to measure our effectiveness in promoting the above land management
activities, forming local networks with local farmers, building knowledge and capacity, and co-operating
with farmers in conducting on-farm research.

Methods
Data Collection
The monitoring and evaluation approach and survey was approved by the University of New England’s Human
Ethics Committee (approval code HE10-212). The research team designed an entry and exit survey that was
used repeatedly at all field days and forums to address the key objectives of the Grain and Graze II programme.
The monitoring and evaluation examined 4 key questions through a combination of likert questions and
accompanying follow-up open-ended questions with a written response. Several responses to likert questions
were combined to address the 4 key monitoring and evaluation questions which are shown in Table 2. These
questions were in one sense evaluating the immediate impacts of the event on awareness, and knowledge, and
potentially further down the track behaviour change and the adoption of certain land management practices
promoted at the field days and forums. The likert scale was from 1 to 5 with a value of 1 suggested low level
of agreement with the statement whereas a value of 5 indicated high level of agreement with the statement.

To reflect on the meaning of the likert responses the follow-up open-ended question allowed for farmers to
clarify their response. A number of field days and forums were held over 2011-2013 that collected both entry
and exit data from participants and attendance is summarised in Figure 1. All of the field days were focussed
on a co-operator (farmer) who was conducting paddock-scale experiments of particular practices that address
the sustainability of the mixed farming enterprise. In some of the field days the attendance was too low to
be worthwhile in terms of analysis, and the other difficulty we had was that some people still returned an
incomplete form, while others make no attempt to provide written feedback. In future field days we made
more certain that evaluation surveys were returned complete to reduce the incomplete survey percentage and
increase the level of written feedback. Overall the response rate to the entry survey was 85% (nentry =161), and
the exit survey response rate was lower at 70% (nexit=156).

Figure 1. Field day and forum attendance at Grain and Graze II events in Northern region of New South Wales
over 2.5 years, and during different times of the year (n=334).

Study area and area of field day impact
The BR-G CMA covers the entire Gwydir Catchment (approx 26,500km2) and the NSW portion of the
Border Rivers Catchment (approx 24,000km2). Both of these catchments are located within the Murray-
Darling Basin, in south-eastern Australia. They are bounded by the Queensland border in the north and west,
the Great Dividing Range in the east, and the Namoi Catchment in the south. The area covered by the field
days approximated 138 954 hectares of farming land, and the percentage of cropped land on average was
36% (10-50%) and the percentage used for grazing averaging 73% (67- 100%). Hence there is a dominance
of graziers attending our field days and forums. Farmers indicated the areas of interest for future field days
were mostly soil issues (59%, nexit=156) which included soil fertility, nutrient management, soil carbon and
land capability, pasture (51%, nexit =156), and pasture-crop transitions (29%, nexit =156).

Results and Discussion
The analysis is from 12 field days (about on-farm research) and 2 forums with a total of 339 participants
(57% farmers, 10% agribusiness, 10% researchers, 10% NRM, 9% other, 4% government) to examine
what we had learnt from the Grain and Graze II programme, especially in terms of practice change and
extension needs of farmers in the region. The composition of field day attendance also reflected that there
was a genuine ‘space’ where farmers, scientists and agronomists could interact and debate the merits of
what they are hearing at these events. The mixture of participants at such events also could be influential
in farmers’ future plans and decisions as Bennett and Cattle (2013a, b) suggested in the adoption of a Soil
Health Management (SHM) plan that agronomists (65%, n=143), neighbours and friends (61%, n=140), and
extension agency efforts (60%, n=142) were considered influential, but cost of soil analysis and not enough
freely available support from agencies and extension groups were mentioned most frequently as “large
impediment” to a SHM plan becoming a reality.
The entry survey enables us to examine what segment of the farming community we were attracting to these
activities, how they learnt of the event, why they attended and how best to continue communication with
the farming community once they left the activity. From our entry survey the majority of farmers attending
are over 50 yrs old (51%, n=115), which closely aligns with the average age from the ARMS 2009-10 of 55

yrs old for the BR-G CMA (ABS, 2011). The majority of the attendees had heard of the field days through
the post (47%), or by word-of-mouth (28%) and far fewer had learnt of the event through the internet
(16%) (nexit =156). This seemingly low use of the internet contrasts with the ARMS 2009-10 which reported
38% of farmers in the BR-G CMA used the internet for information and advice, but the question did not
allow elaboration on specific use (ABS 2011). When asked why they attended the field day; 80% said the
“topic”, 45% said “location”, 11% said “social opportunity”, and 11% said “other” (nentry=161). Our survey
respondents confirm a recent national survey of farm managers that highlights 57% of respondents attend
field days and 34% attend training courses or workshops for land management practice advice (Ecker et al.
2011). When farmers were asked how they would like to receive information for future Grain and Graze II
events there was a much higher preference for email (59%) or mail (32%), with very few farmers indicating
telephone (8%) or fax (2%) (nexit =156).
The Grain and Graze II programme sought to highlight through the entry survey the areas of risk and
uncertainty as identified by farmers as well as the perceived difficulties in implementing the practices
demonstrated in the field days or discussed at the forum and as a counterpoint to identify how willing
they were to undertake the practices demonstrated at the field days. Content analysis of the entry surveys
(nentry =161) with 72% of farmers answering this particular question indicated that only a fifth of farmer
participants consider nutrient loss or depletion or poor soils (19% of the 115 farmers who responded to
this item) a risk to their farm business. Most farmers nominated more than one risk, and they were equally
focussed on fast variables including cost of production (21%, n=115) and commodity prices (20%, n=115),
which were often lumped together in the phrase “cost-price squeeze”. However, it is the slow critical
variables, like soil fertility, that farmers can manage to improve farming system resilience, rather than
focusing on fast variables which are often beyond their control. Other natural resource variables that farmers
could also manage that were nominated as risks to the farm business were weeds (11%, n=115), and soil
erosion (9%, n=115). As with the identification of a number of risks to the farm business the majority of
farmers in response to the question: “What are you trying to achieve in your farm business?” were more
likely to nominate: achieve whole farm sustainability (70%, n entry =161) than a single-issue focus like
improve production per hectare (55%, nentry =161) or optimise profit (52%, nentry =161) which indicates a
more multi-dimensional approach to farming.
Table 1 summarises the four key questions targeted by the evaluation survey from the past 12 field days
and 2 forums. In brief, there was strong agreement with questions 1 to 4 (Table 2), and even when there
was not strong agreement it was not necessarily a criticism of the event, but that the participant was already
aware of the practice and therefore did not rate question 3 highly (Table 2). However, what these types of
evaluation questions (likert questions with limited opportunity for written responses) find difficult to capture
is the potential for these days to provide a “space” for discussion and interaction, and this was confirmed by a
number of farmers who commented in open-ended section of the survey along the lines of:
   great discussion environment,
   locally based studies very pertinent to our style/methods of farming, hard to find such targeted information
   anywhere else,
   because it is very informative and it provides the opportunity to discuss issues with people who know solu-
   tions,
   a good way to exchange ideas, and keep up with new developments,
   it was interesting and allowed everyone to talk and give their opinion,
   good to get such great local knowledge appropriate to our climate and soil,
   exchange of expertise with locals,
   good learning environment,
   the best part was being able to see theories in action and hear speakers explaining their trials,
   conversation with the other farmers very informative
Images taken of farmers gathered in small groups over lunch or a break between presenters are commonplace
at field days, and despite our best attempts to document the impact of our field days through entry and exit
surveys it is the one-on-one conversations that occur in the paddock, at morning tea or lunch and serendipitous
meetings and exchange of ideas between attendees that we cannot necessarily capture in these evaluations,
even though we have observed they are occurring or even been part of one. Work by Bruce Gardiner and
Nicole Gammie with participating farmers on the Grain and Graze II programme resulted in 50% (69 of the
139) of farmers fencing to land capability (105 635 hectares), which is a key land management practice that
recognises the variability in soil condition/quality, and seeks to improve soil protection.

Overall farmers gave a likert response which was on average 3.9 out of 5 (2.8-4.4) indicating that they strongly
agreed with the statement they had learnt something new at the field day or forum (nexit=156). When farmers
were asked in the exit survey, “What was the most significant thing that you learnt out of the day? or What
was the new information you would like to know more about?”, content analysis revealed that those farmers
who commented (n= 85) indicated they felt they learnt most about or would like to know more about were:
fertiliser requirements or soil nutrition, especially for P, and S (46%), dual purpose cropping (18%), pasture
and grazing management (16%), and that you can graze black soils without causing structural damage (9%).
Topics mentioned by farmers, but in far smaller percentages, were economics, legume variety choices and use
of gypsum for controlling Coolatai grass. Specific comments made by famers indicated the value of showcasing
on-farm research at field days and forums to demonstrate change will work in the local environment such as:
Trials should convince, Just increase in overall knowledge, A lot, So much to learn, but I feel I have walked
away with more knowledge and that I need to do more learning. Where the likert response did not suggest a
strong agreement with the question, farmers who responded this way indicated the field day was “re-affirming”
their current management or understanding so they felt it made little difference in relation to question two, three
or four (Table 1). Most farmers who made this comment suggested they were already making “good progress”
and I basically know where I should be going - gained more information to help. We can identify from the
survey responses (Table 1) that those farmers who attended the field days found the experience a positive
one, and 96% (nexit=156) would recommend the field day to others. The success of a programme that seeks
to use extension activities for the purpose of interaction, discussion and promoting practice and behavioural
change needs to recognise that sustained effort over multiple occasions is required to gradually build trust
and attendance numbers (Figure 1). Figure 1 also shows that field day and forum attendance was highest in
September and October, followed by April to May. Our own experience has recorded repeat attendance by
individuals, with 26% attending more than one event, which is a positive sign that trust is being built. The
ARMS 2009-10 (ABS 2011) also recorded for those who participated in programmes/initiatives for the BRG
CMA, that there were multiple benefits including: new skills/information (67%), implementation of on-ground
works (52%), improved understanding of land management and environmental issues (45%), and improved
community interactions and networks (22%). However, without any monitoring and evaluation survey data
our understanding of the impact of such field days and forums would be an unknown and the value of the
programme would not be documented, and learnt from.

Table 1. Likert responses to the 4 key evaluation questions from Grain and Graze II field days and
forums in 2011-2013 (nexit=156 evaluations from 14 events).
 Field day /Forum               Q1. Did the event         Q2. Was the event useful   Q3. Did it contain new   Q4. Likelihood of
                                achieve its objectives?   for participants?          information?             implementation
                                (rate from 1 to 5)        (rate from 1 to 5)         (rate from 1 to 5)       and potential for practice
                                                                                                              change (rate from 1 to 5)
 Weegowrie, Inverell            4.1                       4.0                        3.7                      4.7
 Weegowrie, Elsmore and         3.7                       4.1                        4.0                      4.0
 Gravesend Field days (n=3)
 McMaster Field day             4.1                       3.6                        4.4                      3.1
 Nullamanna, Inverell           4.5                       4.2                        4.0                      4.0
 Forest Hill, Inverell          4.0                       4.1                        4.1                      4.7
 Utah, Delungra                 4.3                       4.0                        3.4                      3.9
 Delungra Forum                 4.4                       4.1                        4.1                      4.5
 Inverell Forum                 4.3                       4.0                        4.2                      NA
 Delungra Field day             4.1                       3.8                        4.1                      4.2
 Warialda Field day             3.8                       3.8                        3.9                      3.6
 Forest Hill Field day          3.7                       3.5                        2.8                      3.5
 Warialda Harvest day*          4.3                       4.2                        4.2                      4.0
 TOTAL                          4.1                       4.0                        3.9                      3.8

*Final event of Grain and Graze II in 2013

Acknowledgements
I would like to acknowledge the project team of Dr Chris Guppy, Mr Bruce Gardiner, Ms Nicole Gammie
and Mr Simon Jasper, the attendees of the field days and those farmers with OFR, as well as GRDC/DAFF
for the project funding.

References
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