Silver Fern Chief "walking the talk"

The culture at NZ's biggest meat company seems to have changed from the days of the hard nosed "us verse them" attitude of management with PPCS, to the more open, innovative and communicative style of Silver Fern Farms that Keith Cooper leads.

And maybe this article in the ODT gives us an understanding as to why.

Communication with producers seems to have improved with many farmers receiving emails from the CEO updating them on market news and industry issues.

Viewing farming from the other side as he has done has made him appreciate the producers perspective and appears the company is taking more of an industry partnership approach in the processors future.

Owning a farm will give Keith Cooper a much better understanding of the increasing cost pressures farmers are under and the need to generate sustainable returns for livestock that will allow production to improve.

This site  appreciates Silver Fern Farms transparency in publishing weekly schedules that give farmers valuable market information to make informed livestock buying or selling decisions. The historic hiding of pricing schedules builds a mistrust between parties that should instead be both looking to improve the profitability of their product. Unfortunately too many of our processors still work this way.

Meet Keith Cooper, farmer.

While Mr Cooper is best known for his role as chief executive of meat company Silver Fern Farms, it is perhaps lesser known that he owns a 245ha sheep and beef finishing farm on the Strath Taieri. He might not manage the property on a day-to-day basis - that responsibility falls on the shoulders of young farm manager Charles Millward - but the move to farm ownership has proven very beneficial reports The ODT.

Mr Cooper described the purchase of Littlebrook Farm, on State Highway 87, near Middlemarch, as highly relevant, enabling him to "complete the circle" in the red meat sector.

While it goes without saying that he knew all about processing and marketing meat and procuring livestock, he acknowledged that before he bought the farm in May last year, he "could not honestly stand in front of farmers and have an informed discussion about farming".

Now, as a farm owner, he better understood farmers' problems and challenges and could use that knowledge to help shape Silver Fern Farms to meet those needs. He admitted the company sometimes used to do things that "clearly were pretty dumb" and wondered why farmers got so aggrieved. Now he could put himself in the boots of farmers, he saw things from a different perspective and, hopefully, had made some improvements.

Littlebrook Farm appealed to him as it was only a 45-minute drive from his Dunedin home. He was very clear about his vision for Littlebrook. It was to be an exemplar farm, demonstrating best practice, adopting the latest technology, trialling things, and meeting high levels of environmental standards and sustainability.

So in his other role, as boss of Silver Fern Farms, he was not only "talking the talk" but "walking the talk". When it came to employing a farm manager, Mr Cooper wanted someone who was adaptive of technology, would give things a go and was not "locked and loaded" in customs and practices. Enter Charles Millward, originally from Auckland, where his parents had a lifestyle block, and a graduate of Telford, in South Otago.

The farm abounded with opportunities and there was a "blank canvas" which enabled Mr Cooper and Mr Millward to develop the property in the way they wanted, Mr Cooper said.FarmIQ - an initiative with a vision to create a demand-driven integrated value chain for red meat that delivered sustainable benefits to all participants, including farmers, processors and marketers - had been very useful in the development process, Mr Cooper said.