Study smooths entry into dairy

Evan Billington has found that having a formal qualification helps when seeking financial backing.

Qualifications have helped detective swap police work for farming and honed his business and financial skills

A former Detective and Armed Offenders Squad member, 47-year-old Evan Billington, left the rush of the police force for life as a sharemilker -- a new career which he finds can have just as many challenges.

Thrown into farming with no prior experience, Evan needed to quickly learn the ropes and enrolled in Primary ITO qualifications to help him gain farming knowledge. His most recent achievement has been enrolling in the Diploma in Agribusiness Management.

So far, his learning has helped him mitigate risks and show prospective employers that he's serious about achieving business success.

After spending 18 years in the police force, Evan, along with his wife Jan, decided to give farming a try when an opportunity came up to work on a dairy farm. The farm was owned by friends of the couple in Tirau. It wasn't long before they could see the potential of a career in dairying, with rapid progression. Seven years later, the couple are 50/50 sharemilkers in their fourth season of sharemilking 680 cows across two farms, in Ngatea.

The biggest change for Evan is having less time off. As a detective, he worked on enquiries that took him away from home. Finding the balance with farming is just as difficult, as he tries to find time to spend with his family.

Time pressures aside, Evan rose to the challenge of enrolling in the Diploma in Agribusiness Management. "I wanted to build my business knowledge. You get pretty busy working on the farm and need to put time into the financial side, as well as business planning. The diploma gives you the tools to do that."

Having completed two of the five modules that make up the diploma -- Evan has finished his Business and Finance, and Tax and Investment modules -- he's found the qualification relevant to the business, and an important part of future-proofing: "The qualification is relevant to what we're doing now, and to future employers," he says.

"We want to show we're successful farmers, which should help our career prospects as sharemilkers. Financial backers are also interested -- having a formal qualification carries a lot of weight with the banks, in terms of deciding whether to extend finance. If someone has committed time and money to getting a qualification, that falls on the positive side of the risk spectrum for the banks."

So far, Evan has completed a business plan, focusing on the couple's short- and medium-term goals, and is making better use of annual budgets. At an uncertain time for dairy farmers, with the forecast milk solid payout drop, having business plans and budgets helps to mitigate risks.

What's next for Evan? "I've enrolled in the human resources module which started in October. It's really topical in the industry at the moment. Being up with current legislation is really important now and in the future. Coming from another industry into farming, I think it's time the dairy industry became more professional and there's a need to look after staff well."

"We started farming in our 40s, and we want to focus on building our equity so that we can take advantage of any opportunities in the dairy farming industry in future."

• Enrolments are now being taken for Agribusiness Diploma modules starting in November, and in early 2015, across the country. The diploma suits agribusiness decision makers or those looking to take that next step up, and is the focus of an initiative involving Primary ITO, DairyNZ, Beef + Lamb New Zealand, and HortNZ.

• To talk to a Primary ITO adviser about whether the diploma is right for you, call 0800 20 80 20, or visit www.primaryito.ac.nz/diploma