Daily surf becomes part of life for farming couple

By PETER GRIFFIN

The barometer that hangs in the living room of dairy farmers Ray and Bev Harris has guided the couple through more haymaking seasons than they care to remember.

This "ancient but honest" device still commands the couple's faith, but that trust is facing an unusual competitor - the internet.

As the sun rises over the rolling hills of Te Awamutu these days, you are more likely to find Bev closely scrutinising a weather map on the farming website RD1.com than studying the silver hands of her grandmother's barometer.

"It's strange. There'll be no depression and the weather will be fine. Then you'll turn on the computer and find this big red spot on the weather map staring out at you," says Bev.

It's been more than six months since the Harrises were invited by the New Zealand Dairy Group (NZDG) to join a trial of its new web portal, developed at considerable cost to provide industry news and advice to farmers and allow them to buy farm supplies online.

Bev says their reaction to going online was initially less than enthusiastic.

"The dairy company asked us if we'd like to join an internet trial. I said 'not really, you want farmers more experienced with using computers than we are.' But they said we were exactly the sort of people they were looking for. As far as we're concerned, RD1.com was the beginning of the internet for us."

The couple were persuaded to take part and a computer kindly provided by their daughter gave them the means to log on. For a couple who had never set hands on a PC, computing, let alone surfing the web, was a whole new concept.

Six months on and the Harrises are comfortable with the internet - well, at least one site on the internet. You won't find them scanning the bestseller list at Amazon.com or using RealPlayer software to download MP3s, but for Ray and Bev, RD1.com has included them in a business, social and commercial experiment that is working well - when they get a decent connection anyway.

They use the members-only site on a daily basis, logging on to check weather conditions, keep up with dairy industry news and glean tips on how to avoid cattle ailments such as facial eczema and ryegrass staggers. It is this sort of information that can influence important farming decisions.

The couple's favourite feature on the site is a daily report on their milk production. Ray says they can check the yield of their herd hours after the dairy tanker has driven away. Traditionally there would have been a two-day wait for this information to arrive, printed on a dog-eared tanker docket.

"We could have a cow with mastitis. By using the site straight away we can see if the cow's cell count has shot up. We find out if we have a crook cow two days in advance," he explains.

Surprisingly perhaps, the pair have swiftly joined the minority of internet users in making a purchase online - a pair of gumboots.

The NZDG has integrated a substantial merchandising operation with the website, providing "hot deals" on the site. Farmers can order farm equipment and tools online and have the cost added to their account at AnchorMart, the retail arm of the NZDG.

While the co-op's dairy portal has opened up a world of farming information, the so-called "digital divide" that denies rural parts of New Zealand a good connection to the internet means the online experience can often be more frustrating than informative.

"I've got really frustrated with what Bev calls 'falling off'," says Ray. The Harris' connection to their chosen internet provider, Xtra, is not reliable. The couple missed a much-anticipated farming chat-session recently because they couldn't dial-in. The day the Herald visited, the Harris' connection went down twice, slowing progress through the picture-rich RD1.com site.

For Dannevirke dairy farmers Lydia and Shane Read, the experience is similar. The Reads log on daily to fencepost.com, another major farming portal, owned by the other big dairy company - Kiwi Dairies.

"You can't compare our download speed to what you'd receive in the urban environment but we've never known anything else. My connection speed is around the 38kbps (kilobits per second) mark but people who are less than 1km down the road are sometimes connecting at 11kbps. That's not uncommon for rural areas," says Lydia.

Progress online takes patience for those on the backblocks but the Reads, like the Harrises, work long hours and the net is providing an alternative to wading through newspapers, trade publications and company newsletters to get information.

"For three hundred days of the year my husband gets up at 4 o'clock in the morning and he's lucky to get to bed before 10 o'clock at night. If he can log on to a site when he has the time and get all the information he needs, that's got to be assisting us in our business," adds Lydia.

The memberships of both RD1.com and fencepost.com are rising quickly, indicating that dairy farmers are willing to give the online experience a go.

Ray, a suppliers' representative for the farmers in his area, says only four of the thirty-odd farmers he meets regularly are "web-enabled" - something that needs to change if some of the issues facing farmers are to be tackled effectively.

"I went to one of these meetings one night and there was a lot of moaning about lack of communication with the dairy company. I thought that's where it could be really useful," says Ray.

The dairy mega-merger on the cards for New Zealand dairy farmers will likely see the websites combine their activities as well. For the Harrises and the Reeds the dairy merger will have different implications but the online access will remain vital to farm life for both families.

As Lydia says: "Farming isn't the whole straw out the side of your mouth thing any more. If we are going to run competitive businesses we need to adapt new techniques."

Links:

A sample of the online resources that exist for farmers.

www.fencepost.com

www.RD1.com

www.wrightsons.co.nz

www.dairy.co.nz

www.nzfd.co.nz

www.massey.org.nz/research

www.maf.govt.nz

www.farmindex.co.nz

www.greenfields.co.nz

www.woolnet.co.nz

www.smallfarmer.org.nz

www.dairy.co.nz

www.rural.stuff.co.nz"