Marc Johnston arrived in Australia in October 2015 on working holiday … and never left.
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Marc has progressed through the ranks from farm hand to low-level equity sharefarmer and he sees a good future Down Under.
“The plan was to come over to Australia for a 417-working holiday …it turned into a bit longer than that, and 10 years later, I’m still here,” he said.
Marc had completed a degree in agriculture in Ireland and worked for a few months before following in the footsteps of so many young budding Irish farmers.
“I came for the opportunities over here compared to back in Ireland,” he said.
“If you’re born on a reasonable size holding you have a good chance, but I grew up with a suburban background with farming ties, which is where I picked up the interest.
“I think there’s more opportunity here in Australia to keep stepping up.”
After deciding to stay in Australia, Marc went to a 187 visa, which granted him permanent residency and following that applied for citizenship.
He now holds Irish an Australian citizenship.
Marc’s father owns a 28 hectare plot of land where he raises F1 cows and calves, but he wasn’t ready to hand over the reins, and it was too small for a full-time dairy farm.
The farm in the Westmeath area in central Ireland is landlocked and farming land is tightly held in Ireland.
“There was never going to be 200 acres next door come up at an affordable price,” Marc said.
His uncle also ran a beef farm.
“I had a suburban background, but I didn’t spend much time there. I was on farms if ever I could be.”
While Ireland is renowned for good dairy farming country and great dairy farms, Marc said the industry faced challenges with regulations controlling things such as nitrogen use and stocking rates.
“The EU has a pretty good grip on farmers over there,” he said.
“It’s a big headache for farmers. I know they’re wanting to make farms efficient, but I think they went too far one way and it has become quite difficult.
“I’ve got a few farming friends at home, and you hear all the things, and you think, thank God I don’t have to put up with this.”
Marc is in an equity partnership as a lower order sharefarmer with David and Michael Noy near Cobden.
“I’m on a share of the milk cheque, along with building equity each year through young stock.
“I’ve got heifer calves accumulated each year, and I will have heifers due to enter the herd in 2027, all going well,” he said.
Marc was recently supported by DemoDAIRY Foundation to join an LIC dairy study tour to Tasmania.
One of the highlights was learning more about pathways into dairy.
His current arrangement is similar to the Circular Head equity/sharefarming model, bringing people into farming and help them to build equity with the farmer by starting to lease cows off the sharefarmer and build up to third and 50-50 shares.
Prior to moving to this partnership, Marc held a 2IC position north of Colac and bought land to raise beef animals, though he has transitioned out of beef, and now might use the land to raise his Holstein heifers, unless a closer option comes up.
Marc had been thinking about getting into sharefarming, but struggled to find an opportunity.
“I had money saved and was going to use that to buy into a herd, but kept hitting brick walls,” he said.
“The land came up, so I bought that, and thought that would be fulfilling enough, but I kept getting more itchy feet.
“I had heard this farm was looking into an equity option in the future, but when a manager resigned, they fast-forwarded it.”
The well-established farm has a seasonal calving herd and they plan to milk 650 this coming year.
The herd is 95 per cent Holsteins, with a few cross-breeds.
The focus is on home-grown feed, particularly directly grazed.
“We conserve quite a lot of fodder on the farm, and use almond hulls to fill in the gaps; a large amount of the total grain fed to the herd and young stock is bought off the header at harvest time and crushed here on-farm,” he said.
Marc is effectively operations manager, though David and Michael are still present and focus on out paddocks, maintenance, helping to rear young stock, and will jump in where needed if there is a shortfall of people
“With myself and four other staff, we look after all the milkers and the dry cows and calves under 12 months, once they’re over 12 months, David and Michael look after them,” Marc said.
He is keen to learn more about different dairy farming operations, and said the Tasmanian study tour was beneficial.
“Tassie is similar to New Zealand and Ireland grazing-style farms, so that was a big thing to look at different cows to what we’re milking,” he said.
They also saw Halter virtual fencing technology in action, and while Marc thinks it could be a game changer for some farms, he can’t see it being used on his farm.
“We put a lot of effort into our grazing management, so it’s probably as not as much a selling point, but it’s interesting technology.”
After a decade, Marc sees his future in Australia.
“Never say never, but I don’t think I can see myself returning to Ireland,” he said.
“I wouldn’t be eager to go back on the wage system there. There’s a much stronger case for me to stay in Australia.”
Regardless of the location, he will continue to grow his expertise.
“I think getting the basics right is a good backbone to it,” Marc said.
“Be good at growing feed, feed cows fully, produce quality milk and keeps costs under control.
“If you get the basics right, then it’s just the finer details to get into the top percentage.
“Every dairy farmer has their days, and it’s not the easiest life, but I still enjoy the challenge.”