Profitable Farmer

What if the best investment you could make on your farm costs nothing extra to feed, never needs a day off, and compounds in value every single year? 

That's the case Dr Mark Ferguson has been making for 30 years. And the numbers back him up. 

Mark is a sheep geneticist turned ag tech founder who grew up on a family farm in the Victorian Mallee. After completing his PhD in Merino genetics, he founded neXtgen Agri to help sheep and beef producers across Australia and New Zealand breed better and build more profitable enterprises. He also heads up Genesmith, an AI-powered sheep facial recognition platform and hosts the Head Shepherd podcast. 

In this episode, we reconnect to talk genetics, entrepreneurship and what it really takes to build a business that compounds in value over time. 

We explore: 

The research behind the modern Merino, how fat and muscle selection transformed lamb survival and what that means for your flock today 

How to make genuinely objective breeding decisions and break free from the emotional, vision-driven choices that quietly hold most operations back 

The kitchen table origins of neXtgen Agri, what a trip to Stanford University sparked, and the lessons Ferg learned building a 19-person trans-Tasman business 

Genesmith: the AI-powered facial recognition platform trying to solve one of the sheep industry's oldest problems, dam-lamb matching at commercial scale, and what it needs to get there 

How to attract and retain great people in ag, give them the freedom to grow and build a team that performs beyond any individual 

To connect with Dr Mark Ferguson, visit www.nextgenagri.com or email mark@nextgenagri.com. The Genetic Plan and other resources are available at thehub.nextgenagri.com. If you are interested in Genesmith, whether as a supporter, partner or someone who wants to help drive the project forward, get in touch via the details above. And if you haven't already, search Head Shepherd wherever you listen to podcasts. 

Ferg, thanks for your time, your openness and your complete dedication to helping farming families get more from their genetics. The industry is better for it. 

It was great to re-connect again.

Some friendships change your life. This one changed Australia. 

When Tracy Bevan met Jane McGrath at an airport café in 1996, they were simply two British women far from home, trying to find their place in a new country while their husbands travelled the world playing cricket. 

What neither of them knew was that a friendship forged over cups of tea, loneliness, laughter and life's challenges would go on to impact hundreds of thousands of Australian families. 

Tracy co-founded the McGrath Foundation with Jane in 2005. Two cricket wives, a kitchen table, no roadmap. Before Jane passed away in June 2008, Tracy made her a promise: to keep going, to honour what they had started together and to ensure no family would ever face cancer alone. She has spent nearly two decades since keeping that promise. 

Today, 367 McGrath Cancer Care Nurses, 174,000+ families supported, and a mission that has changed what a cancer diagnosis looks like in Australia. 

In this episode, Tracy shares the story behind one of Australia’s most loved charities - not from a corporate lens, but from the heart of a best friend who has spent nearly two decades honouring Jane’s legacy. 

We explore: 

How a difficult childhood taught Tracy resilience and the powerful lesson that helped her break free from the past 

Jane McGrath’s breast cancer diagnosis that changed everything and how one moment between two best friends sparked a national movement 

How one extraordinary nurse helped Jane navigate her darkest days and inspired a mission to ensure no family faces cancer alone 

What it really takes to build a lasting organisation from scratch, growing from a kitchen-table idea to one of Australia's most trusted charities 

Today, one in two Australians will face a cancer diagnosis in their lifetime. You may already know someone who has. 

It's a sobering reminder that the work of the McGrath Foundation is far from finished. Behind every diagnosis is a family navigating uncertainty, fear, and change and that's why the Foundation's support is needed now more than ever. To learn more, seek support, or contribute to this incredible mission, visit the McGrath Foundation website. 

Tracy, thank you for keeping your promise to Jane and reminding us that one act of care can become a ripple that reaches families we may never meet, in places we may never see. 

Sincerely,  
 
Jeremy Hutchings & the Farm Owners Academy Team

There’s an old saying that uncertainty creates opportunity. 

But if you're a grain grower right now, uncertainty can also create confusion, hesitation, and some pretty costly decisions. 

Over the past few years, we've seen massive swings in commodity prices, input costs, weather patterns, and global politics. For many farm businesses, it feels like the rules keep changing. One minute we're talking about record production and oversupply. The next, global conflict, fund money, and drought concerns are driving volatility back into the market. 

In this episode, I'm joined by Market Check’s Managing Director and Founder, Brett Stevenson and CEO, Nick Crundall to unpack what has changed in global grain markets over the past nine months and what Australian grain growers need to be thinking about right now. 

More importantly, we explore the mindset and disciplines that separate consistently successful grain marketers from everyone else. 

We cover: 

How global conflict, rising fertiliser costs, and speculative investment are influencing grain prices and market volatility. 

Why global wheat stocks are tightening after record production years and what that means for the outlook for Australian growers. 

Insights around hedging, forward selling and grain storage, including why many growers continue to leave money on the table despite producing excellent crops.  

The common mistake of allowing tax planning and cash flow pressures to drive grain marketing decisions instead of following a clear strategy  

Nick shares some compelling analysis comparing hedging versus traditional forward selling and the long-term performance difference between growers who actively manage risk and those who don't. You can access Market Check's analysis here. 

This conversation also reinforces themes I explored with Jeff McDonald around financial clarity, proactive planning, and leading your business with confidence rather than reacting to circumstances. If you haven't listened to that episode yet, I'd encourage you to do so here. 

Nick and Brett, thank you both for your time, your honesty, and your willingness to share what you've learned over many years working alongside growers. 

Here's to a great season ahead, 

Sincerely, 

Jeremy Hutchings and the Farm Owners Academy Team.

In Part 1, John Fargher took us back to the beginning, exploring the early days of AgriWebb and the farming families who backed a young ag tech company long before the rest of the industry could see what it would become. If you haven't listened to that one yet, we recommend starting there. 

In Part 2, the story gets bigger. 

Because beneath the global partnerships and the rapid growth, this episode is really about how farming families move from recording the past to actually getting ahead of it. 

At the centre of it all is still the farm business itself. The producer who knows their country better than anyone but is making critical decisions without the right information in front of them. The family navigating rising expectations around data, sustainability, succession, and performance, often without the tools or support to do it confidently.  

John talks openly about the gap between what is possible and what most farming families are actually doing, and how AgriWebb's direct to farm model is closing that gap every day. Their collaboration with Figured takes it even further, finally connecting the operational and financial picture of a farm business in one place, so that the decisions being made on the ground are backed by the numbers that matter. 

In this episode, we explore: 

How AgriWebb's two-part business model works and why the enterprise model is unlocking value for farmers in ways the industry has never seen before 

The Sainsbury's and ABP partnership, six years in, 500+ farms, and results th

John Fargher grew up on a remote family station in the Northern Flinders Ranges, where distance, drought, hard work and innovation were simply part of life. 

He saw first-hand how quickly farming can change. A station that once needed 40 people could later run with four or five. Horses gave way to motorbikes. Water runs that once took days could be done in hours by plane. Each shift changed what was possible, and left John asking one question: what is the next step change in livestock agriculture? 

That question became AgriWebb. 

In this episode, John Fargher, co-founder of AgriWebb, shares the story behind one of Australia’s great ag tech businesses, from a floppy disk sitting unused in a station office to a global platform now used across 28 countries, tracking more than 20 million head of livestock. 

He talks openly about the early days, the failed hardware ideas, the farmer who almost said no but then chose to back them, and why that moment still gets him emotional more than a decade later. 

We explore: 

What AgriWebb is seeing across global agriculture and why Australian agribusiness may be slower to invest than other markets  

How AI is shifting livestock management from recording what happened to forecasting what is coming 

Why the future of farm data is about planning ahead, not just tracking the past 

How AgriWebb now supports farmers across Australia, the UK, the US, Brazil and beyond  

For farmers, this is more than a technology story. It is a reminder that progress rarely comes from one big leap. It comes from practical people backing better ways of working before the rest of the industry catches up. 

This is Part 1 of the AgriWebb story, with more to come in the next episode. 

Thank you John, for sharing the story so openly, and for the work you and the AgriWebb team continue to do in helping move agriculture forward. 

Keep winning, 
Jeremy Hutchings & the Farm Owners Academy Team