Prophet has farmers dancing to new tune

By PHILIPPA STEVENSON

Andrew Grant wants to teach New Zealand dinosaurs to dance.

The head of the New Zealand branch of the McKinsey global management consultancy has a nice turn of phrase, and a bevy of anecdotes to illustrate or make a point.

Grant has used them most recently in a gruelling 34 meetings in 22 days explaining to the nation's woolgrowers his far-reaching and, in some cases, harsh recommendations for change to their industry.

Surprisingly few farmers baulked at the $3 million report and few disagreed with its overall thrust to axe the Wool Board, reduce levies, and replace the promotion-focused Wool of NZ and Merino NZ with commercial companies.

In the conservative industry, which usually gets only a quarter of farmers taking part in related referendums, an unprecedented 58 per cent voted 91 per cent in favour of the report's suggestions.

Grant described the result as "only the end of the beginning" which, in a sector that has commissioned and ignored up to 20 reforming reports, is entirely apt.

Still, for McKinsey it was a comforting endorsement after dairying's failure to implement key concepts suggested in a report the company did for that industry.

The reports, and McKinsey's transtasman involvement in new agriculture e-commerce ventures in New Zealand with Kiwi Dairies in Fencepost.com and in Australia with another agricultural internet portal - mean the consultancy has huge influence on industries of major economic importance to New Zealand.

The 32-year-old Grant, who established McKinsey here, is the face, the voice and a large part of the consultancy's brainpower.

His ability to articulate economic arguments in an almost evangelical way inevitably draws comparison with his television preacher father, Ian Grant. He jokes that there may be "something genetic" in his style but whatever it is, Grant has swayed hardbitten farmers nationwide. They have questioned his youth, knowledge and theories but largely bought the package. At one meeting he got about the worst introduction a city- slicker could get in a parochial South Island town when he was described as "a lawyer from Auckland."

"How hard is that to come back from? An Australian got a better reception."

He admits to a passion for his job, and declares one for his country.

Grant left Onehunga High School to become a civil engineer and then won a Rhodes Scholarship to Oxford University where he studied "an unusual combination" of industrial economics and moral philosophy.

After eight years at McKinsey he returned as a partner to establish an office here.

Grant intends paying back the investment New Zealand made in him through the Rhodes Scholarship.

"I deeply, without getting teary- eyed, deeply love New Zealand and feel a sense of civic responsibility in terms of making a contribution here. I also get this enormous frustration at the moment [because we have] this incredible sense of potential but we never quite get there. We always do it half as well as we could."

New Zealand failed to understand sufficiently what had driven the new economy and given the US, for example, its extraordinary growth.

The key was that "dinosaurs learned to dance," he said.

Huge companies like General Electric moved emphasis from manufacturing to service industries.

Agriculture was New Zealand's General Electric equivalent because it already formed the base of the economy. "In agriculture we are the lowest cost producers of meat and dairy and that provides a huge platform to build off.

"If we don't find a way to bring the new economy to agriculture, we are in real trouble."

Grant outlined five steps essential to agriculture dancing to success:

Productivity improvements.

Five per cent for wool, and 4 per cent for dairy are "just your ticket to exist."

Participation in the new economy including biotechnology and e-commerce.

"Farmers should get as comfortable with those tools as they are with the quad bike and the sheep dog."

Winning the talent war.

Thirty years ago the best and brightest went into agriculture but now "we are losing that war quite dramatically."

Taking ownership downstream. Farmers could no longer wash their hands of their products as soon as they left the farm.

Embrace the entrepreneur.

"Agriculture has been good at killing off the new idea which seemed to be at the fringe. We've got to find a way to nurture them."

Grant is worried the present boom in farmers' returns will dull their appetite for change which would see them through the next bust, and beyond.

" Farmers are approaching the most dynamic, exciting 10 years we have ever seen in agriculture but if they don't embrace it the wealth creation will pass them by."