Wellington
The concept of rotational grazing has been around for so long now (but only about 60 yearsreally) that we take it for granted.
It is ‘just’ the way we do things at the on farm level, and there’s no question that thisis the best way to manage the ryegrass/clover mix that makes up a majority of our pastures.
However, the ‘just’ hides a hell of a lot of applied science, andincremental increases in knowledge that resulted in a graze, rest, graze, rest….. method ofmanagement, and as importantly, tying it all in in a systemised approach.
(As an aside, this is how wild animals/nature manages the Serengeti Plains. Lush new grazing isinundated with animals, which move onto new grazing as it grows, allowing the old growth time toreplenish).
Rotational grazing, as opposed to set-stocking, was a big breakthrough.
So, imagine if back in the 1950s, as our extremely talented (and nationally known) agriculturalscientists were getting their heads around the ‘graze, rest’ style of pasture management, theyrealised what it was going to mean.
Do you think for a moment they would’ve hesitated to give it a name if they’d realised themulti-dimensional beast they were creating?
If, landing from another planet they’d descended straight into the technology, they would’vebeen sure to have done so.
But, much as a frog placed in a pot of water with an ever increasing temperature doesn’t jumpout, being so tied up in tweaking and re-tweaking the pastoral system, nobody thought to give it ahandle.
There was a time when our grazing (including extensive use of greater paddock subdivision) wasknown as the McMeeken Method. Those in farming knew exactly what this meant.
With time, this moniker faded away.
However, it still doesn’t get around the fact that, especially and most importantly, there isno descriptor from a CONSUMER point of view . As the people who ultimately pay ouragriculture’s way, they are who we need to engage with.
The story of how a lamb chop or steak (or even mince) is nurtured into life is a fantastic one(and for many people, especially those with discretionary income, several cuts above a feedlotyarn).
But, we’ve never named that story.
Until we do we’re undifferentiated.
The moment we did call our pastoral method (= responsible pastoralism) something, then an entirelinkage from R&D, to the entire and wider agribusiness sector to the consumer would have a placeto start.
We would give ourselves a common strategy – that mythical beast that has been talked about asbeing required for the past 40 years, but never cracked.
Sounds too simple…..which is probably why some people think it is impossible or crazy.
Or maybe not.