Lucy Dodd

Supporting Australia's small scale poultry producers

Free range poultry producer and processor Lucy Dodd will embark on a Nuffield Scholarship to study how the industry can be better supported in Australia.

Lucy is the owner and CEO of Lowan Park Produce, a free range and pasture poultry business based in Bordertown, South Australia.

The business employs around 15 people and runs across two farms, with a free range turkey operation and poultry abattoir on one farm and pasture raised chicken rearing on the other. It sells poultry meat to butchers, retailers and direct to customers from Melbourne to Darwin.

Lucy will utilise the Nuffield Scholarship, supported by the Future Drought Fund, to study the topic ‘Supporting small scale poultry abattoirs and growing the free range turkey industry in Australia’.

“As a small-scale poultry farmer and processor in Australia, I have found that the biggest issues are in support for and development of local, direct to consumers supply chain management and regulation,” Lucy said.

“Our regulation, processing, supply chain and delivery models support large businesses and monopolistic agricultural policies. Some of the biggest barriers of farmers to sell their products direct to the market is not their ability to grow high quality food but the post gate processing.”

She hopes to explore ways to overcome barriers to entry into local markets including community processing facilities and cooperative opportunities for improving supply chain logistics.

“There are big opportunities to expand the free range and pastured poultry industry in Australia that would help farmers to diversify and drought proof their operations and provide for an increase in intensity of on farm operations,” Lucy said.

She intends to travel to countries that have a strong small scale poultry growing, processing and direct marketing focus including the United Kingdom, United States of America, Canada and parts of Europe, especially Spain and Italy.

Lucy said the USA, Canada and UK specifically have much larger free range turkey industry with which to learn from and apply in Australia.

“Regulation for small scale processing, while not necessarily easier in the US, seems to be less of a barrier and understanding the factors that make is successful are important. Overcoming the supply chain complexities of large geographic areas such as Canada and the US would be great to learn from,” Lucy said.