Farmers helping Farmers

Guest host Joel Williams talks to Michael Gooden and Dan Fox about the evolution of this grassroots farming group over the past 24 years, and the announcement of its new name - Farmers helping Farmers.
NEW NAME | SAME PRINCIPLES | SAME SUPPORT| SAME FARMERS HELPING FARMERS
In 2002 a group of innovative broadacre cropping farmers formed the Victorian No Till Farmers Association as an independent, practical, grassroots group of ‘farmers helping farmers’. Fast forward through 24 years of droughts, floods, fires, hail, frost and amazing seasons and a lot has changed in Australian agriculture.
The group has also changed – membership has extended beyond state borders, the core focus has gone well beyond no-till farming systems, and the knowledge and experience that comes out of member paddocks is teaching everyone something new every day.
One thing that has never changed though is the reason for being.
Farmers helping Farmers.
"We welcome all farmers, no matter what system they are in, to join us as we launch Farmers helping Farmers Australia.
Together we will continue to strive to regenerate agriculture for future generations. From the ground down, and the ground up."
Go to our new website to find out more and get involved.

In this episode, Michael Gooden catches up with board member Carol Fitzpatrick and her husband Brian to delve deeper into their on-farm brewing set-up which is providing nutrition to their family's combined 6000-hectares of broadacre crops in one of Australia's harshest farming environments - the Mallee.
Carol attended her first VicNoTill conference in 2022, just one year into being full-time on the farm. Although she felt like a fish out of water at first, VicNoTill has taken her knowledge to the next level. She joined the board in 2024 and has never looked back.
“You've got to talk to farmers for that knowledge if you don’t know yourself. You need to speak to other farmers to find out when to apply, when it's worked and when it hasn’t.
“The theory is all great and it's good to keep that in the back of your mind, but the practical implementation is just as difficult sometimes. Listening to other farmers tell you how they do it and how they've spent their money and time is more valuable in the long run.”
If you enjoy listening to this podcast episode with Carol and Brian, they will be at the Farmers Helping Farmers Conference in Yarrawonga on September 2-3, 2026. They would be more than happy to answer your questions and share their knowledge. Farmers helping Farmers is what we are all about.

"I didn't get to Dad's until 12:30am Friday. I’ll never forget coming over the hill I’ve been coming over my whole life to home and seeing the area glowing. The whole horizon wasred. It was like an apocalypse."
VicNoTill board member Callum Lawson and his partner, large-animal veterinarian Lyndall Barwick, were on the frontline of the Longwood bushfire in Victoria that started on January 7, 2026. This fire burnt over 140,000 hectares.
Callum manages ‘Allanvale’ at Avenel and his family farm is at Highlands, about 45 minutes southeast. Callum and Lyndall did everything they could to create firebreaks and protect livestock at ‘Allanvale’ in catastrophic conditions before making an emergency dash to Highlands to help save the family farm.
Seven months on, Michael Gooden catches up with Callum about the steps he's taken to restore and repair burnt soils, and rebuild his regenerative grazing system using tools such as natural sequence farming, virtual fencing, applying foliars, stimulating his underground biology and just sitting back patiently letting his landscape rest and recover as his soils rebuild themselves.
A huge thank you to Callum for his generosity in sharing his story and for the time he's put into sharing his knowledge and experience to help others. Farmers helping farmers is what it's all about.

We are re-releasing our very first Farmers Helping Farmers podcast episode with former VicNoTill president and sixth generation Lockington farmer Grant Sims. This conversationwith Dan Fox was recorded way back in 2022 is our most highly listened to episode of all time.
Grant joined the VicNoTill board in 2015 and was president until 2020. Landline Australia featured Grant and the benefits of regenerative farming system on its May 10, 2026 episode. It is exciting to see regenerative agriculture finally get the airplay it deserves. It might have taken a world war and a global fueland fertiliser crisis to get this attention, but the reality is that VicNoTill farmers like Grant have been successfully farming regeneratively in large-scale broadacre cropping and livestock systems for over 10 years.
Grant has long been at the forefront of innovation and was president of VicNoTill when our farmer-based, grassroots organisation started testing and trialling regenerative tools. Grant credits VicNoTill as taking his passion and vision for better soils, better livestock and better, more profitable and sustainable farming systems to the next level.
“Farmers helping farmers is a powerful way to lead change, and I don’t know any other organisation out there who does this as well as VicNoTill does,” he says.
Grant’s excitement and passion for a new approach to how farmers feed the world is contagious, as you will discover in this episode of Farmers Helping Farmers - soil health, soil function and grassroots agriculture.
Grant is also the founder of DownUnder AG. You can find out more about Grant on the ⁠VicNoTill website ⁠– he’s a wealth of knowledge and is generously sharing that knowledge around the world.

Farmers Helping Farmers, The Podcast is dropping into your ears with a paddock chat between VicNoTill president Michael Gooden and board member James Manning around how they're managing budgets, future plans and other farm activities during the current fuel and fertiliser shortage.
James manages 'Northwood Park' at Seymour for one of three farms in a 10,000 acre thoroughbred stud owned by Sheik Mohammed of Dubai. James, his wife Lisa and their two young children also run a small regenerative beef block near Eurora.
When it comes to breeding race horses, James' focus is on improving the nutritional value of pastures to give the horses the best possible opportunity to be the best athlete in the stable. He's not saying it will make them run any faster, but if they can improve their overall health, fertility and longevity, that's a good thing.
We've also included an off-topic paddock chat between Michael and James to give you an insight into the grass roots conversations that are happening every single day in the VicNoTill network.
Farmers Helping Farmers since 2002. All welcome.