Continual Improvement: The Key To Successful Beef Production

KwaZulu-Natal beef farmer Rustin Shawe was recently crowned the province’s 2018 Young Farmer of the Year. He told Lloyd Phillips that planning strategically and then putting those plans into action had helped him take his already thriving farming business to even greater heights.

- Lloyd Phillips

Behind his friendly and seemingly carefree demeanour, Rustin Shawe is an astute, highly disciplined farmer who keeps impeccable records in his stud and commercial beef business, and consults these frequently. Testament to this is his comprehensive analysis of his operation, Grassfields Beef, that far surpassed judges’ expectations in the Toyota/ Agri SA Young Farmer of the Year competition.

Shawe by no means spends all his time in his office, however. He values a hands-on approach to running his operation, and, while inspecting his cattle, can provide a production history from memory for most of them.

A third-generation farmer in the family business, Shawe has been farming in partnership with his father, Hubert, for the past 16 years. Shawe Snr, a veteran with 54 years’ farming experience, is slowly handing over the reins to his son, who already owns 50%.

“I’ll eventually own the entire business as I gradually buy my father’s shares from him. I already make most of the management decisions, but still use my father’s knowledge and experience,” Shawe says. Grassfields Beef is situated in northern KwaZulu-Natal’s picturesque Groenvlei area (between Wakkerstroom and Utrecht), which comprises largely grass-covered mountains and plains. Shawe currently owns 3 162ha of land and leases 3 875ha from his father and 1 560ha from two other local landowners. This brings the total area of his operation to just short of 8 600ha.