And Cathy said there was a real passion within the dairy industry to get people trained. "When you are in a real tight corner such as dairy farmers are experiencing at the moment, training is vital," she said.
"The Primary ITO and DairyNZ are working really hard to understand how farmers are feeling. I'm going up driveways to check how farmers are coping and what support we can wrap around them.
"But at the moment I've noticed people are more upbeat about the future."
Cathy said there had been great success stories of people entering the dairy industry. "Sometimes when school isn't working for them, getting into dairying unlocks their potential."
For farmers, information and training were the secret weapons to surviving the dairy downturn, said Dr Adam Barker, director of primary sector consultants Scarlatti.
"Farm businesses have to cut costs in a downturn, but it takes training and knowledge to make the right cost-cutting decisions and the key to New Zealand dairy farmers surviving and even prospering in the milk price downturn is information and the knowledge of how to use that information to make better decisions.
"There is a growing body of evidence that the difference between farms which just get by and those that thrive irrespective of conditions comes down to the quality of farm management," he said.
Dr Barker said work done by Scarlatti demonstrated vocational skill level training for farm staff would return $2 to $3 for every dollar invested, while management training yielded between 10 and 20 times that.
"Taking an average-sized farm as an example, profitability can vary by up to $200,000 and most of that difference is down to the skills of management running that farm. It's not just soil and rainfall, but the people.
"Many factors determine profitability, but training is a very large part of it," he said.
"Arguably, training is the single most valuable investment you can make and skilled people make smarter decisions."
Dairy Together training:
* Primary ITO enrolment cut-off dates for Dairy Together training offers are at the end of June. Go to www.dairytogether.co.nz for more information.
* Primary ITO and DairyNZ have partnered up to fund a study grant to help retain dairy employees in training during the challenging times.
* The grant will cover the full amount of the training fee paid by trainees and is available on a first in-first served basis until December or until the fund is exhausted.
