ActiveAg is providing state of the art management tools for your farm.
Welcome to Active Ag
Farm management tools to assist
with planning , risk assessment,
decision making and analysis
Agrequip Planning Tool
Agrequip assists in planning for the purchase
and replacement of plant and machinery.
Agriplan - Planning for the Future
This program enables the user to easily prepare “what if”
scenarios to evaluate the financial effects of
various management decisions.
Resource Planner
An online tool to summarise
Assets & Liabilities and Enterprise Activity
MORE INFORMATION
Agreview – Detailed analysis of performance
A tool to calculate farm specific key performance indicators
and monitor trends over time
MORE INFORMATION
All as easy to use online cloud applications!
The Beginning
The Active Ag interactive programs were developed as a result of a perceived need to change the way in which farm decisions are formulated and implemented.
As farm business consultants we have always had a dream that one day there would be easy to use on line software programs that would allow farmers and their business advisers to work collaboratively in analysing farm business performance, developing management plans and evaluating the financial and production risks of various options prior to plan implementation.
It was our view if programs like this were available it would lead to improved decision making which in turn will lead to increased farm profitability, improved viability and long term sustainability of each individual farming business.
The Problem
The manufacturing of food is a complex business that requires extensive planning, evaluation of a range of different management and financing strategies and decision making in a volatile changing environment.
To optimise the probability that the decisions that are made are the best decisions at the time, it is advisable farmers use management processes and techniques that suit their industry.
Unfortunately, many of the current management concepts, processes and techniques that farmers are encouraged to adopt and use have been modified from traditional cost and financial accounting theory designed originally for other manufacturing , retail and professional businesses.
It is our view, evidenced by the fact that most farmers do not use these traditional methods when it comes to managing their farms and making financial decisions , that a new approach needed to be developed.
Agreview
Having a clear view of the businesses key performance indicators and cash flow performance from one year to the next empowers farmers to improve financial decisions to increase businesses profitability and reduce current and potential financial risks.
All farmers need to know exactly how their business is performing. Formulating plans based on this information and measuring the outcome of decisions on a regular basis enables improved planning and decision making.
Agreview is a program that consolidates financial information with physical production data to provide a range of farm specific key performance ratios , reports and tables that provide a detailed insight into the financial performance of the business , including current and potential risks and trends.
Planning the Future – Agriplan
Agriplan is a program designed to assist farmers and their advisers with modelling the likely financial outcome of various enterprise and capital management decisions under different circumstances and conditions.
This process enables the farm manager to run multiple scenarios to assess the risk of various management plans prior to having to make a major financial decision. The program allows the farmer to select their enterprise program along with capital funding and acquisition plans and by changing a range of variables the farm manager is able model the financial consequences of a range of different weather, production and economic events .
It is our view to be truly successful in business it is just as important to consider strategic decisions in regards to how you spend your cash resources once they are generated as are the decisions that are needed to be made initially when it comes to generating the cash.
Too often the focus in farm management is about enterprise production and profitability as opposed to wealth generation and risk mitigation.
Equipment Purchase & Replacement – Agrequip
Crop production involves a large investment in plant and equipment that depreciates rapidly in value and condition. With regular advancements in technology farmers are constantly faced with the decision of whether to replace or upgrading items of plant.
As we move into the future it is becoming obvious that the cost of maintaining appropriate plant and equipment is escalating faster than the increase in farm production and profitability. As a result these decisions have become major financial decisions, that if made incorrectly, can have a significant impact on available cash flow , profitability and long term sustainably.
When it comes to these decisions farmers can control the timing of the acquisition, the amount paid and the method of financing the cash outlay. These are critical decisions that many farmers are failing to address due to the complexity of the process.
The Agrequip program assists farmers in this exercise as it provides a structured decision making approach , combined with financial calculators and visual reports so farmers can assess various purchasing and financing scenarios prior to making decisions. There are multiple ways in which to structure acquisitions and finance.
The whole emphasis of the program is to encourage the user to think about these decisions prior to out laying large amounts of capital inefficiently.