Employing overseas workers on Australian dairy farms

As Australian dairy farms have expanded and herd sizes grown, the demand for skilled labour has increased —but finding local workers can be challenging. In this episode, we explore how employing overseas staff through various visa options and the Dairy Industry Labour Agreement can help fill the gap.

Migration agent Fadi Malek, who is Director of Global Skilled Employment Services and NSW dairy farmer Andrew Farr join us to unpack the process of registering, recruiting, and employing international workers. While not a one-size-fits-all solution, overseas labour—when managed well—can be a rewarding option for both employers and employees.

Join us in our milestone 50th podcast, to learn about the opportunities, challenges, and practical steps involved in bringing skilled workers to your farm.

Topics include:

• Types of visas – what might suit your situation
• Worker rights and pay rates
• Dairy Industry Labour Agreement (DILA)
• Registering as a potential overseas labour employer
• Effective working relationships and cultural considerations
• Assistance with recruitment and immigration processes

Learn more:

The People in Dairy – Hiring people from overseas.

Dairy Australia fact sheets:

Dairy Industry Labour Agreement (DILA) – What you need to know. 

DILA - Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) 

Global Skilled Employment Services. 

This podcast is an initiative of the NSW DPI Dairy Business Advisory Unit – further information and resources are available here - Dairy | Department of Primary Industries

It is brought to you in partnership the Hunter Local Land Services

Please share this podcast with your fellow farmers and colleagues and feel free to contact us with suggestions or comments via this email address thebusinessofdairy@gmail.com

Further NSW DPI Dairy channels to follow and subscribe to include;

NSW DPI Dairy Facebook page

NSW DPI Dairy Newsletter - Connect with us | Department of Primary Industries 

Transcript here

The information discussed in this podcast are for informative and educational purposes only and do not constitute advice. 

Transcript

The Business of Dairy

Episode #50 Transcript – “Employing overseas workers on Australian dairy farms”

Sheena Carter: Welcome to the Business of Dairy podcast. I'm your host, Sheena Carter. As Australian dairy farms have expanded and herd sizes grown, the demand for skilled labour has increased. But finding local workers can be challenging. In this episode, we explore how employing overseas staff through various visa options, and the Dairy Industry Labour Agreement can help fill the gap.

Migration agent Fadi Malek, who is Director of Global Skilled Employment Services, and New South Wales dairy farmer Andrew Farr, join us to unpack the process of registering, recruiting and employing international workers. While not a one-size-fits-all solution, overseas labour, when managed well, can be a rewarding option for both employers and employees. Join us in our Milestone 50th podcast to learn about the opportunities, challenges and practical steps involved in bringing skilled workers to your farm. I'd also like to flag that employing people from overseas, they still need to undergo further training. They've come out of systems which are a little dissimilar to ours and they won't solve all the issues with labour on farms. So, they still need further training. They still need upskilling and it's a journey for both the employee and the employer as part of this journey with employing people overseas. They see further training as they're very proud of it and very willing to undergo it because it upskills them and further training is important to them as their journey in a career, as their career journey.

Sheena Carter: Welcome to the Business of Dairy podcast, Andrew and Fadi.

Fadi Malek: Hi, Sheena. Good morning.

Sheena Carter: Fadi, you're a registered migration agent with Global Skilled Employment Services. Can you briefly introduce yourself and touch on the level of experience you have with the Australian dairy industry regarding employment?

Fadi Malek: Beautiful. Thank you, Sheena. So, my name is Fadi Malik. I'm a registered migration agent. I've been registered since 2008. We formed our company, Global Skilled Employment Services, in 2010. And we've been really fully involved in the agriculture sector. That's the dominant industry, mainly piggery, dairies, poultry, meat processing. We've got so our company has two offices one in Melbourne and one in the Philippines we're currently 17 of us working with together on helping employers and we really specialise in employer employee visas anything to do with sponsorship nominations that's our main main speciality right

Sheena Carter: Fantastic so you've had lengthy experience in intensive agricultural industries, I guess, mainly, but certainly dairy as well, which is fantastic. Andrew, you've been a dairy farmer for many years, based in the Hunter Valley of New South Wales. Can you give the listeners a brief introduction to your farm, your dairy system, and a bit about staffing on your farm, including overseas labour?

Andrew Farr: Yeah. Hi, Sheena. We're a dairy farmer at Singleton in the Hunter Valley. We're currently milking around 400 cows we have a split carving operation that carbs in in autumn and spring grazing-based operation and currently we have five employees, so we have we have three full-time employees and two backpackers at the moment and they are all from overseas so we sponsor two guys from the Philippines, and we have another woman that we're looking at sponsoring as well. She's a full-time employee. So, our entire workforce is from overseas.

Sheena Carter: Okay, great. And just quickly, how long have you been employing overseas labour?

Andrew Farr: We started three or four years ago with one employee from overseas and our current employees, I think Alan's been with us for two years now and the other guy's been with us for 12 months. So, we've been doing it. We started off slowly with it and we've been, yeah, So the last 12 months to two years, you know, we've shifted our employee base to fully from overseas.

Sheena Carter: Okay, we'll get into a bit more of your story and your journey later in the podcast. But I guess essentially, we're all well aware of the challenges of finding both skilled and non-skilled labour to work on dairy farms. And other ag sectors obviously have the same issues. But fortunately, we're able to sort of cast our net a bit further when looking for staff and employ people from overseas, providing they hold the right visa, and the employer has met their obligations as well. Fadi, can you give us an outline of the visas that are available that enable us to employ staff from overseas?

Fadi Malek: Sure. Beautiful. So, I think historically, the backpacker visas were the main sort of type of visa that was available to the agricultural sector. Mainly, probably daily was, until probably recently, was really depending on those as overseas sources. There is, of course, the backpacker, which, you know, being encouraged by the government, those backpacker visa holders encouraged by the government to work in regional and agricultural sector to renew their visas. So that is their incentive to do that. But I think the COVID showed how that system is probably a bit fragile. Meanwhile, the 482 so we've got two main visas that is used for employer nomination or employer sponsored visas which is 482 and 494 482 is probably more used more common more known visa and it's four years visa allows the employer to sponsor workers up to those four years and leads later on to permanent residency after a certain period of employment with the employers, usually two years as the standard program or three years under the labour agreement program. And from there, they settle, skilled workers, and most of the workers stay in their industry, just so filling on the gaps and continuing filling on those gaps. The other type of visa is the 494, which is the regional visa. It's a five-year visa, allowed the workers to bring their family, allowed them to access Medicare. So, it's really, really very useful to the overseas workers. And that's probably more to encourage the employers to use that visa. So, the government designed it this way for region area to encourage the employment to go more and support the regional regions or areas. And after three years of working in the nominated occupation with employer, the workers can go again for the permanent residency under a visa called 191. That's probably the main type of visa that is available there.

Sheena Carter: Okay.

Fadi Malek: Yeah.

Sheena Carter: So, given that the 482 and the 494, the five-year visa, the 494, typically has more benefits than the 482 for the overseas worker. Is that a fair statement?

Fadi Malek: Yes. Yes, definitely. Yes. The 482 is probably more commonly used because it's the extension of the 457 visas. If you remember, the 457 visas for many, many years changed to a 482. And that's why the employer is really familiar with the 482. 494 only came to have been legislated only in 2019. November 2019 so it's a bit recent visa that's why it's probably not really well known while it's actually offered a lot of more benefits to the employer and to the employees.

Sheena Carter: Right excellent we'll move on to the dairy industry labour agreements but is there anything you think we need to know further on visas?

Fadi Malek: Look I think it's probably cost in a way I mean again we can compare between the 482 and 494 in that way. So, the employers will have an obligation or when they're applying for the nomination, they have to pay something called SAF levy, Skilled Australian Fund levy. So, the 482, the government charged $1,200 per year per worker as a SAF levy for a business with a turnover less than 10 mil and 1800 for per year per worker for business with more than 10 mil turnover so the cost for a business with less than 10 mil to nominate a worker for four years would be $4,800 as a staff levy plus $334 as a nomination fee. So, all up, government cost is about $5,200. When you compare it to the 494 for the less than 10 mil, it's only $3,000. So that's a saving, big savings. And again, when you go to the PR, the permanent residency, the employer again needs to nominate the workers for 186. And the nomination stage, employers will need to pay another type of SAV levy, another government cost, which is about $3,000. So, when you go for the 494 to the 191, the workers apply on their own. Employers don’t get involved in the nomination stage or there's no nomination stage for the 191. So pretty much, if you look at getting a worker from overseas, an employee from overseas until they go to the PR, permit residency,

Under the 482-186, the employer will pay only in government cost. It's about $8,200, which is $5,200 for the 482 and $3,000 for the 186. If you compare that to the 494 going to the 191, they only pay $3,000. So, huge saving only on using the 494. And, yeah, I think it's worth definitely looking at and considering with employers.

Sheena Carter: Right. Okay. And just a quick question. Do overseas workers, are they generally looking for permanent residency? Is that the norm or the exception?

Fadi Malek: No, 100%. Look, again, they are risking and taking a huge cost on them, financial cost and emotional cost, leaving their family, coming to a new country. And the main, of course, you know, their main goal is to settle in Australia. And that's how the system works. That's why the immigration is offering that settlement. I mean, working period under the temporary visa and then going for PR. The 494 actually is provisional visa. So that's why they consider it, that's why the government offered the Medicare because they consider it as, permanent residency with a condition, which is filling up those three years. So, the system is designed for them to settle because that's how they pretty much fill up the ongoing gaps and workforce shortage. And that's definitely their main goal.

Sheena Carter: Right. Excellent. Great clarification. Now, dairy industry labour agreement. Many people may have heard of this, but can you explain what the Dairy Industry Labour Agreement is and some details about it?

Fadi Malek: Sure. So, any overseas workers, when they're in the process of getting overseas employees, again, any Australian employer, when they're in the process of getting the overseas workers, they need to be approved as a sponsor. So, there's two types of sponsorship. One is the standard business sponsor, which is available to everyone, every active business, as long as active and lawful to apply for. The approval lasts for five years. They need to nominate under that standard business sponsor an occupation that is available under a list the government issue that lists every few years update that list every few years so that is open to any employer that is active and lawful and can identify a genuine need for a particular position in those lists so that's one way the other way is that the industries so the labour agreement is a unique vehicle, if you want to call it, a unique product in the immigration where an industry can identify an ongoing workforce shortage and then negotiate with the department particular conditions and particular benefits for the industry. And then once that industry labour agreement is approved, then anyone that falls under that industry, any employer that falls under that industry can enter that labour agreement directly with the government using the same template so the industry negotiate the conditions negotiate the concessions negotiate the benefits and occupations and then once that is done then any employee enter this they cannot change any of those conditions but they can use it as the template for for their business so what happened is that so an example we currently have pork industry labour agreement Meat Industry Labour Agreement, Dairy Industry Labour Agreement, Fishery Labour Agreement, Horticultural Labour Agreement, HK Labour Agreement. That was the most recent one. And then we've got the Dhamas, which is another product, but we're not going to talk about the Dhamma now. So what happened is that the 2017-18 Dairy Australia identified the needs for a solution to overcome the workforce shortage and identified a main occupation called senior daily care worker as the targeted occupation.

Negotiated the labour agreement with the department had that approved and now it's available to any daily employer to use that labour agreement and using the benefit, using the concession in there to start employing overseas workers. If you look at the daily industry labour agreement, the occupation that covers now, we've got two occupations. We've got senior dedicated farm worker, and we've got dedicated farm operator. Between those two occupations, you probably got more than 70%, 80% of the tasks and duties on farm covered under that occupation, under those two occupations. So pretty much can really fill up the shortage of a workforce challenge with any employer, just get that fixed using that particular labour agreement. It has a lot of benefits. So, number one, it gives the employer the assurance and stability of planning ahead. So, you negotiate a labour agreement. When you apply to access that daily industry labour agreement, it's between the employer the abn and the government when you negotiate that and get approved you have five years approval you can negotiate the first three years ceiling so what is the ceiling ceilings is the number of allocations number of positions that you can fill per 12 months for any 12 months okay so you get the first three years approved with the first negotiation so you can go up to from one year up to to three years but it's again it's it's really just a negotiation have that approved and then from there you know that you have access to overseas workers in the first three years

The other condition as well, the other concession as well and benefit is the labour market testing. So, because the government understands that this has been identified as a real genuine shortage by the industry itself, which is Dairy Australia, they allow the employers to do labour market testing instead of the standard program of four months, they allow that for 12 months. So, less burdens, less admin work on the employers. And in a way, I think it's looked at from the government, from the department processing side is at low risk because of that established genuine shortage in there. So, we still have to do the part, but it's looked at as way easier than this end of the program. Right.

Sheena Carter: And just quickly, market testing refers to.

Fadi Malek: What is market testing? Market testing refers to, as part of the legal obligation of the employers in general, whether the standard program or labour agreement, the employers have to prove that they've advertised the position for at least four weeks with a particular information there, which is the salary, the occupation, the location, and the duties, and prove that this position cannot be filled or there is no readily available Australian citizen or permit resident that can fill up that position, which is for the standard program, this has to be done within four months of lodging the nomination, the application with the department. For the labour agreement employers, it's within the 12 months. So, it's less paperwork, less headache, yeah.

Sheena Carter: Right, right. So, there's a few things you have to line up. So, if I'm interested in applying to get a dairy industry labour agreement on my farm, it's already sounding quite complicated, but I can actually do that myself online?

Fadi Malek: Yes. And I think Daily Australia have as well a fact sheet or booklet explaining how that works, how you can do it yourself. Information is available online. It takes a bit of effort and time to do it but definitely can be done. The employee can do it themselves or you can engage a migration agent. Information is valuable. It's not a secret recipe. It is ready to get available. Yes.

Sheena Carter: Yes. Okay. I've gone down the path. I'm interested in employing someone from overseas. I've tested the market. I've applied for a dairy industry labour agreement, or I've used a migration agent such as yourselves to do it, How do I find the workers?

Fadi Malek: Okay. So that's where we are very unique in what we do. So, our company actually wears two hats. So, we wear two hats. We wear the immigration hat, and we wear the recruitment hat. So, because we know what the employers look for, we have a database full of qualified applicants. And that's where we can help the employers to interview and identify the suitable workers for their farm. So, we usually organize the interviews and CVs, work with the employers on lining up the interview, running the interview, and once they're shortlisted, we take, so the recruiting hat is off and then we'll put the immigration hat and start working on lodging the nomination application, working with the workers on these applications and get the visa approved. So, we definitely can help with recruitment and then take it from identifying and creating the labour agreement until the settlement when they arrive. We work with the employers on the tax file number, settlement, picking them up and all the stuff. And we continue that relationship until forever sometime. So, we've got some links with, and we still receive invitations for weddings and birthdays and all that from employees that came back in 2011. So that's how we see ourselves. We're part of the journey and we're part of the life of the employers and the overseas workers.

Sheena Carter: Yeah, fantastic. That is awesome. I think it is – from the outside, I think it can be quite a confusing space. And you might just, sort of, think how on earth do I navigate this? So certainly, as we were saying before we started recording, there's lots of pieces to this jigsaw puzzle. And as an employer, you could try and navigate themselves or you can potentially use services of businesses like yours to make things a lot easier and put the jigsaw puzzle together a bit quicker. Andrew, we might just take a different tacker and flick to you, you recruited your initial overseas staff, slightly different to going through that journey from my recollection. You employed someone who was already in the country. Is that correct?

Andrew Farr: Yeah. So, we'd had a previous employee in 2019, 2020, and we'd already passed the government protocol, I suppose is the way to put it. And we'd advertised for another employee, interviewed one of our employees, decided not to go with him, and then he went to a farm in Victoria, then he contacted us. We were looking for another employee, and he contacted us. So, because we'd been registered with the department, we could employ someone on a 482 visa that was already in the country. So, we decided to employ, and he joined us after being at another place for about six months.

Sheena Carter: Right. Fadi, can you just talk us through that? So, Andrew's had to register to employ that person. So, if Andrew hadn't been registered, he would not have been able to employ that overseas worker.

Fadi Malek: Absolutely. So that is the standard business sponsor that you have to apply for and be approved before you can nominate an employee. So when I'm saying the nominations, the process, if we start from no registration, nothing, no approval, the business needs to apply for a standard business sponsor or a labour agreement that lasts for five years. Once you're approved, whether a standard business sponsor or a labour agreement approved employer, then every time you identify an overseas worker, the business has to lodge something called nomination.

Nominating that particular worker per name to that particular position, identify the position. And then that's the majority of the time that, you know, every time you identify a new worker, you need to lodge this. That's if someone already on shore, they can be they can move around to another employer. From the 7th of December From December last year Immigration increased So the visa condition changed And increased the period between employment Up to six months So workers can leave their previous employer Give notice and leave And then from there they can have up to six months To find a new employer That can nominate them and take them over So it has to be done within that six months but immigration increased that it used to be 90 days and increase it to 6 months and immigration

If the workers have their own visa already onshore, workers don't need to apply for a new visa. It's only linking the current visa to the new employer through the nomination. So, they continue on their own visa with the same expiry date and all that.

Sheena Carter: Okay, great. Thank you for clarifying that. So back to you, Andrew, you mentioned at the introduction that you have numerous, or all employees are overseas workers. How have you gone about the recruitment of the additional workers?

Andrew Farr: So, our second employee came as a referral from our first employee and apparently that's quite common. So, our second employer was a referral from our first employee and that's really handy for us to have people that know each other, that work together and are happy to work together. Our third employee, who's a young Japanese woman, she was on a backpacker visa and wanted to further her career in Australia. She's had experience in the industry before. So, she's been with us for about a bit over six months. and part of our, we've sent all our employees away to courses and further training and that sort of stuff. So, she's currently started the 2IC course with Dairy Australia and those links with her have enabled us to get to employee backpackers. So our staff are actively helping us recruit at the moment.

Sheena Carter: Recruiting for you.

Andrew Farr: Yes, yes.

Sheena Carter: Yeah, well, and it's the power of networking, isn't it? How far the web or the tentacles spread.

Andrew Farr: Yeah, so we decided to employ two more. We had a Japanese backpacker before, and we decided to employ two more. And, you know, within a few days we had eight applications, and Yui was doing the interviews and, you know, within a week or 10 days we've got two more staff.

Sheena Carter: Wow, that's not a story you often hear on dairy farms when trying to recruit labour. It could be a much more protracted process than that.

Andrew Farr: And I'll add, you know, one of the strengths for us at the moment is having a settled workforce. You know, we're not, you know, we use backpackers as part of a strategy because we split carbon. when we're really busy, we'll bring more people in to work for us because we have really busy times of the year and quieter times of the year. So, you know, especially after Christmas, we'll be back to our core staff and then around our two carving times and joining, you know, we're looking to bring people in. So having a stable workforce and those contacts has really become a strength for us. And I can't tell you how much of a relief it is.

Sheena Carter: Well, I can hear it in your voice and see it on your smile. Not that listeners can see you smile, but absolutely, it's wonderful to hear. And we'll come a bit back to the dynamic, I think, of the employees on the farm in a minute and some of the considerations around that, both from the employer and the employee perspective. But before we do that, Fadi, could we just quickly touch on pay rates? What's the deal with pay rates and overseas workers and worker conditions?

Fadi Malek: Sure. So let me, before touching on pay rates, I actually want to, again...

Second, what Andrew said, it's a very, very common that the first couple of workers comes in, they usually start pulling out their own team from overseas, and then you end up with a very, very stable and happy team. Probably dairy came to using more of that type of employment you know long-term employment on 42 bit later than than piggeries but i can tell you from my own experience look we're serving probably 70 percent of the pork industry we're probably serving about out of the labour agreements employers in the dairy industry probably 65 70 percent of the labour agreement holders in the industry so i i i've heard that yes i've seen a lot so i can tell you that some of the workers that came back in 2011 12 13 14 now is senior leaders in the pork industry overseas workers and became you know citizens of course you know pr and they became citizens and now they actually taking the role of young leaders and actually contributing to the growth of the industry, in the pork industry.

So, I can see the dairy industry going that way as well in a few years time with that type of building up a skilled, dedicated workforce.

Okay, back to your question, Pay rate. So, look, again, the pay rate has to be, overseas workers have to be paid the same exactly rate, pay condition of Australian employees, whether permittressants or citizen employees. Is we're usually for the dating industry, and that's where the labour agreement probably would be the ideal product to use because the labour agreement is designed for employers to start using the FLH3-level employees. So you go under the award, same employment condition, you package the salary, depends on your roster. There is a minimum salary that has to be paid though. So, there is, in the standard program currently until the 1st of July this year. So, it's $73,150.

From the 1st of July, the standard program has to offer, so standard business sponsor employer has to offer $76,515 as the minimum salary from the 1st of July. But the labour agreement offers 10% concession on the minimum salary. So, the labour agreement employer only needs to offer $68,863. So that's one of the benefits of using the labour agreement. You've got 10% concession. But again, it all goes back to the award, all goes back to the same employment condition that you have. So, if you have employees that have been paid above the award, you have to match that. If you have the employees being paid by the awards rate, it's the same award rate, same condition. Work on overtime included in the package. The labour agreement offers up to 45-to-50-hour package. So, the immigration can recognise the salary packaging to meet that minimum salary.

Sheena Carter: Okay, great. And I'm just going to highlight, given podcasts live for a long time, this is being recorded in June 2025. So, this is why Fadi has just mentioned the change in pay rates come the 1st of July, which is a standard thing with Australian pay rate and pay rate systems, award systems. So hence the increase comes the 1st of July 2025.

Thank you, Fadi. We might just now flick back to where we were heading with you, Andrew, and I'd like you both to contribute to this discussion jointly because it's really about we've, you know, obviously you've mentioned, Fadi, that we're bringing people from overseas to Australia. They come from a very different culture to ours generally. And so, there's that initial culture shock from their perspective. It's a significant investment on their behalf, both financially and, as you were saying, with their upheaval with families, often leaving families and then potentially bringing them over as well. And also, Andrew, a challenge for the employer, I would imagine, trying to accommodate, for want of a better word, that different culture and adapt and make that transition for them relatively seamless and welcoming to support them on farm. So, I guess we might, a quick one to you, Fadi. Where are, I guess, the majority of the overseas labour workforce coming from?

Fadi Malek: So, historically used to be from New Zealand. So, I used to have a lot of overseas workers goes from the Middle East or Japan or the Philippines, goes to work in New Zealand. And then, because New Zealand used to not offer a permanent residency, so australia was the next step from there they gain experience in the same type of farming you know grazing exactly like similar to ours here and then they come from there to australia and then during the covid new zealand start offering permit residency and that's where supplies start to you know be really dry but the majority of their experience so nationalities that the majority of nationalities that we usually come across is Filipinos, probably 60%, 50-60%. They've got a number of African nationalities, you know, from Nigeria, from Ghana, from Kenya, Ganda, South Africa,

Some Nepalese, from India, Pakistan, different nationalities, but the majority would be Filipinos and from Africa. And the reason is that mix exists because that is probably the majority of the mix in the source countries. So, we've got ourselves, our company, sourced from two main sites. We source from the Middle East. So, there is a really, really, the largest dairy company in the world is Al-Mari in Saudi. We source from there. Yeah.

Usually, the workers stay there for about three years before they come to Australia, getting exposed to different side of the production cycle. Not all cycle. They usually don't get the full cycle, especially the grazing. They don't get exposed to that. And the other source is Japan. So mainly the Philippines have a program with Japan where they send trainees for three years to Japan in Dairies to do a training certificate in Dairies. They call it Advanced Training Certificate in Japan. So, they spend three years in Japan, and then that's where we get them from to come to Australia after those three years. Yeah, so that is the majority of the overseas workers.

Sheena Carter: Very interesting. So, Andrew, as an employer, what are some of the things that you might have done on farm when you've employed these people to help, you know, help make it a good experience for them and for you?

Andrew Farr: Yeah, for us, I think having two people from the same country, that definitely helps, you know, that helps people settle in. You know, there's always, you know, one person that, what's the word for it, that, you know, breaks the ice, I suppose, and that was Alan for us. He'd been in Australia for a while, so I think that helped that integration a lot better. You know, definitely accommodation on farm helps, and that's one thing you have to have as part of the agreement anyway is accommodation for them. And it's also recognising their culture as well. You know, these guys, they're quite religious in terms of, you know, church is a big thing for Filipino people and it's a big part of their life and recognising that. And, yeah, but they've settled in quite, they've settled in reasonably well. One of the more difficult parts is communication and English, you know, English being a second language. So visual communication, writing on whiteboards, that sort of thing goes a long way.

Sheena Carter: Yes. Can I just make a comment about your writing on whiteboards? Andrew had a Facebook post during the week of his whiteboard, which was partially in English, and I'm assuming the rest was Japanese. Yes. Yeah, which is fantastic. So, you're fluent now.

Andrew Farr: No, it's not me. But the funniest side to that is that one of the Filipino guys is a manga fan, so loves the Japanese guys and they're trading phrases and learning little bits and pieces of one another. So, it's quite interesting, that interaction. Yes.

Sheena Carter: But a real challenge though.

Andrew Farr: Yes. Yeah. But the communication is the hardest, is the most difficult part. And just to reiterate, it's easier if it's visual.

Sheena Carter: Okay. Yep. Good, good, good. That's excellent. Any other challenges, considerations that you can think of?

Andrew Farr: No, we've had a reasonably seamless transition and we've been at it for a number of, you know, a few years now as we were introduced to. So, there's, I don't know, there's still, it's being aware of the different cultures you've got in your workforce. I suppose would that be the best way to put it, being aware of different cultures? And I just lost my train of thought, sorry.

Sheena Carter: We can cut that bit. No, that's a good, that's a good. Okay, so look, I think we've had some fantastic discussion, and we could really talk about this for much longer and we've already probably gone over time. But just to pull the conversation together, I might just flick to both of you just to ask of you to share two key recommendations or pieces of advice you would have for someone in the Australian dairy industry looking to employ overseas workers. So Fadi, I might start with you.

Fadi Malek: Okay. I think from immigration, so I'll give, I think I'll pick two points, one from immigration side and one from recruitment side. So, the immigration side is plan ahead. So, if you want someone to come for the next season, start from six to eight months before, because the process usually takes about four months, but plan ahead. Don't put yourself under that pressure, and then you will be really going through a good experience.

That's from the immigration side of things. From the recruitment side of things, the main point is to understand that the workers want to get this working, wants to have a good success story. They want to come and live here. You need to understand that they have a limitation. They're always coming with fear of failing, fear of unknown. So, if we consider this and treat them the first three to six months, understand that they will never give you 100% of their ability and they will always have challenges. If you pass that three to six months as a settlement period, understanding that and working with them on assuring them that you are there for them, assuring that you want them to succeed, you will end up with having a family member forever. They want to be with you. They want to make the business successful and thrive and all that. But give them a chance and understand their background and understand the worries and the heavy load that they have on their shoulder coming from a different country. That's the main thing.

Sheena Carter: Put yourself in their shoes. 100%. Yeah, that's fantastic. Great points, Fadi. Andrew?

Andrew Farr: I think for us, definitely using a migration agent through the process. It's a highly involved, highly reasonably complicated process and it just takes, it's a lot easier to work with someone to step you through the process and ask you for the information that's needed. In terms of the employees, our experience is all positive in terms of employees. They, you know, this is a really, I'll reiterate what Fadi said, this is a really big opportunity for these guys. So, both of our guys, you know, one's bought a house back in the Philippines, one's looking to pay his house off, one's looking to bring, you know, his wife and kids here. This is a generational change for them in terms of an opportunity. They're very proud about their job and what they do. We share our quality data from the pickups with them, and they follow it religiously. So, they follow cell count. They're on top of it. They are fully engaged in making this a success for them and a success for us. And as an employer that makes my job so much easier.

Sheena Carter: 100%. That's wonderful. I think it's, look, there is such fantastic opportunities here for any agricultural industry that's eligible to participate in this, but particularly for the dairy industry. If you can't find that labour that you need locally, rest assured, there's obviously solutions to help you down that journey and make it a lot easier. And you sound like you're in a really good place, Andrew, on your farm with employment, which is wonderful to hear because sometimes you get very differing stories and challenges. So, I would like to thank you both sincerely very much for participating today, Fadi, for sharing your wealth of knowledge and expertise in this field, and Andrew for sharing your experience, which has been a very successful one to date with overseas workers. For listeners, we will put some links to resources in the show notes that may be of assistance, but I would, including, you know, perhaps contacts for Fadi and for Andrew and encourage you to reach out, to where the experts are when you're looking to employ people on farm to make it a good experience. So, thank you both very much for your time.

Fadi Malek: Thank you so much, Sheena. Thank you so much, Andrew. It was really lovely to chat to you this morning. I think, yeah, hopefully we can help. So, yeah, that's the main thing. That's the main thing.

Andrew Farr: Thank you, Fadi. Nice to see you again. And thank you, Sheena.

Sheena Carter: Thanks, Andrew.