FOR RETIRING FARMERS AND THEIR FAMILIES
Three small farms, one farmer. How neighbours can give a farmer a full living
By Sam Marwood
Picture three neighbouring farms in the Riverina. The first belongs to a couple in their seventies who've been easing off for years, and the second to a man whose kids live in the city. The third belongs to a family who still farm, but only just, around off-farm jobs.
None of the three is big enough to give a farmer a full living, which is the real reason none of them has a farmer lined up.
The conversation over the fence
It starts at the local footy, when someone mentions they've been talking to Cultivate Farms about a sharefarmer and someone else says their place is too small for that. What if all three were farmed as one?
Cultivate Farms sit down with each landholder separately, then with all three together, and agree what a good farmer for these farms looks like. They find one: an aspiring farmer and his partner, both raised on farms, both working for other people for a decade.
Step one: one farmer across three farms
Each landholder signs their own share farming agreement with the farmer and keeps their own title, so nothing is pooled. The farmer works the three as one operation, with one set of machinery instead of three, so the costs come down and the living goes up.
The farmer can build a stake in the farming business over time, separate from the land, so it grows with the whole operation. Cultivate Farms write a farm plan with each landholder, oversee the lot and report to each of them on their own farm.
A few seasons in, the farmer is making a full living and the three farms look better than they have in years. The neighbours are talking too, and a fourth landholder down the road asks if their place could come in.
Step two: one of them decides to give
After a few seasons, the man whose kids live in the city decides to go on. There is a way to step back from the farm without selling it.
With his advisers' work done, his farm would move into the Cultivate Trust, which runs it on his behalf, with the right farmer on it, and his gift would go to a charity he chooses, a community foundation that funds local causes and the district's young people.
His farm would keep its place in the operation, with the same farmer and the same plan.
The couple in their seventies are thinking about it. The family who still farm aren't ready and might never be, which is fine, because the farming carries on either way.
What it could change
A farmer who could never have bought a farm would be building a stake in the farming business across all of them, while the farms that aren't given stay with the people who hold them. The district would have one more family at the school, one more player at the footy, and a gift doing good in the district.
And the next generation could farm here and build something of their own.
Could this be your district?
If your farm is too small to carry a farmer on its own, talk to your neighbours. A few farms worked as one can make a full living, and each of you still decides what comes next.
The full guide, The Farm That Keeps Giving, is free at cultivatefarms.com/resources.
You can build your own plan at cultivatefarms.com/plan.
This story is an illustration. It's drawn from situations we see often, and it isn't any one district, farmer or family. It's general information, not legal or tax advice.