Monitor Farm meeting: Taunton

Meeting agenda

Farm machinery to buy and to maintain is a costly item in farm budgets. Farm soils are a priceless farm resource needing careful management for efficient and profitable crop growing, and for environmental resilience. From a background in machinery manufacturing, Philip Wright is now a soil management specialist and well equipped to advise on how to get the best out of machinery – for soils, for machine efficiency (wear, tear and fuel use) and for the farm account ‘bottom line’.

About the farm

Richard Payne farms 280 ha at Manor Farm, Heathfield, near Taunton. The mostly arable farm has been in min-till for more than 15 years. Farming on silty clay loam, his rotation includes winter wheat, oilseed rape and beans. He grows primarily for the animal feed market, selling forward and into pools to spread risk. Richard’s main challenges are consistent profitability, succession and knowing which investments to make for the future. By the end of the Monitor Farm programme Richard wants to have a better understanding of all his costs of production, particularly on the fixed cost side, and to benchmark himself against others.