FROM getting the wheels turning on computer-based livestock auctions in the days before the internet to putting weaners in grass bullock Queensland channel country, senior agriculture executive John Griffith has continually forged new trails in the beef industry.
His phenomenal ‘think outside the square’ work was honoured at the 2016 Royal Queensland Show in Brisbane when he was presented with one of the industry’s most prestigious awards.
The RW Vincent Award, named in honour of the founder of the modern-day Australian Registered Cattle Breeders Association (ARCBA), is given only when true merit is identified.
Mr Griffith became the 17th recipient last week.
Now semi-retired, the Queenslander is perhaps best known for the way in which he moved the Australian Agricultural Company (AACo) into a 100 per cent cattle operation that has gone on to be the largest of its type in the world.
During his 13-year tenure as managing director, which began in the mid 1980s, Mr Griffith
segregated operations into breeding, growing and finishing facilities using country best suited to each phase and established a large feedlot to handle the finishing phase.
The result was a doubling of the productivity of the business, achieved by reducing the age of turnoff from six to two years.
Mr Griffith then went on to introduce a greater consumer focus through the creation of new composite breeds that provided for improved eating quality.
The new way of business enabled the company to provide continuity of supply of a high quality product, something not previously possible given the traditional seasonal turnoff pattern of northern Australia.
“It was revolutionary and set new benchmarks for the northern Australian cattle game,” said ARCBA president Malcolm Foster in announcing the award.
AACo, however, is only one part of the John Griffith story.
Before that, as associate director at the Australian Business Research Institute at the University of New England, he helped establish Breedplan - the concept of selecting cattle based on estimated breeding values.
He then developed the first sale-by-description computer based livestock auction system in Australia.
CALM was the forerunner to Auctionsplus and is regarded as being well ahead of its time.
Following AACo, Mr Griffith put in solid work in the live export trade as managing director of AustAsia, which became one of the largest exporters of live cattle into Asia, mostly Indonesia, exporting 80,000 head per year.
He managed Brazilian-owned cattle interests in Australia and today remains a director of North Australian Pastoral Company (NAPCO), which runs 200,000 cattle, along with owning the Queensland horticulture operation Coochin Creek Farms.
For his part, a humble Mr Griffiths jokes it was possibly the ‘bulletproof mindset of youth’, combined with opportunity, that allowed him to blaze new trails.
He does believe, however, that little can be achieved without a willingness to ‘think outside the square’.
“We should not be made afraid by those who think we might fail,” he said.
He regards his work with AACo has some of his best but said it was really just a matter of taking technology in everyday use in the temperate world and applying it to the tropical world.
Although, he does admit there were times when even his very supportive board said perhaps he should not try certain things.
Mr Foster said the RV Vincent Award was designed to recognise outstanding contributions to the Australian beef cattle breeding industry over a sustained period and Mr Griffith’s achievements were among the highest.
