SERVICES
STRATEGIC ADVISORY SERVICES
Commercial agriculture is required by legislation, industry bodies and consumer markets to comply with a wide range of Environmental Management best practices. For many production managers, making sense of these diverse and overlapping requirements can be time consuming and confusing. It is important to understand that most of these Environmental Management requirements have been developed over time due to the lack of proactive, credible information flowing from the farm to stakeholders. However, these ‘broad-brush’ generic requirements don’t help farmers to identify the specific impacts of their production and business support processes on the unique ecological landscape in which they farm or to prioritise management activities in alignment with their broader business strategy. EcoFarms help farm managers to go beyond generic compliance by determining levels of risk and prioritizing mitigation measures in alignment with business strategy.
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Environmental Risk Assessment
An Environmental Risk Assessment (ERA) is the starting point for all management activities. We first need to understand the risks of negative environmental impacts from your specific production and business support operations on the unique ecological systems on your farm. Only then can we effectively prioritise Environmental Management activities that mitigate the areas of greatest risk on your farm. As part of the ERA, EcoFarms will compile a business process map, develop a risk matrix, produce a comprehensive risk register and draft a Farm Environmental Risk Report.
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Environmental Policy
Once the risk assessment has been completed and farm leadership have a comprehensive overview of where their operations have the greatest potential for negative environmental impact then we draft the Environmental Policy. The policy is a statement of intent by the landowner of company leadership for how Environmental Management best practice is to be implemented on the farm. The policy statement should provide a clear answer to the question, “How far are we prepared to go to ensure our operation do not have a harmful impact on the environment?” The answer to this question provides clear parameters for all subsidiary environmental management plans.
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Environmental Management Strategy
An EcoFarms Environmental Management Strategy is a simple spreadsheet that details the environmental management objectives and associated activities that are required to mitigate the risks identified in the Environmental Risk Assessment. The strategy also defines the indicators and targets for each management activity. EcoFarms includes a process to align priority environmental risk management areas with the broader business strategy in order to prioritise activities in the Environmental Management Strategy. Your Environmental Strategy will include the Year 1 Environmental Management Plan with budgeted management actions assigned to key personnel.
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Guidance on legislative compliance
EcoFarms provides clarity and explanation on relevant environmental legislation and all our products take cognizance of legislative requirements.
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Strategic Planning Facilitation
Andrew Purnell from EcoFarms is an experienced facilitator who also provides Corporate Strategic Planning and Design Thinking facilitation services. This experience adds value to the EcoFarms strategic planning process and can also be provided to serve other areas of your business.
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Sustainability Assessment
EcoFarms have in-depth experience helping clients use the SHERPA Sustainability Self-assessment tool which provides high-level insight into economic, social and environmental aspects of a sustainable farming best practice.
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Analysis of Industry Certification Requirements
EcoFarms has developed a comprehensive register of overlapping requirements from all major environmental certification schemes. Whilst we don’t condone the use of certification audit requirements to inform environmental management actions (these should be informed by a risk assessment), we can help you align your Environmental Management Plan with the overlapping requirements of different certification schemes to best meet market expectations whist still mitigating your unique risks.