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After a wet start to the year, the dry, settled spell that followed was welcomed by farmers. Silage ground came together earlier than usual, and a lot of farmers got strong first cuts in while conditions held. But that same dry weather has now lasted through July and doesn’t look like changing anytime soon in. This drought was an annoyance 2 weeks ago is now becoming a concern. Soil moisture deficits are significantly negative in many parts of the country, grass growth has stalled / slowed, and further good cuts of silage are looking less certain than they did a few weeks ago.
We're not in a fodder crisis, and hopefully we won't get anywhere near one. But there's a real and growing question mark over how the rest of the year plays out, and that uncertainty is exactly why now is the time to look at your fodder budgets.
What buffer feeding will be needed between now and when your animals usually are housed on a full winter diet?
Do you have enough fodder to cover all of this?
And finally what are the cashflow implications of this extra fodder / workload on the farm.
It's time to review your fodder budgets and the implications on cashflow now rather than waiting.
Plan for more than one outcome
Nobody can control what the weather does next, but you can control how prepared you are for it. That means looking at more than one version of the year ahead:
a scenario where conditions improve and fodder stocks come right, and
a tighter scenario where they don't, and extra feed or forage needs to be bought in.
Mapping out both now, while there's still time to act, puts you in a far stronger position than waiting to find out which one you're in.
Start with the basics: what's coming in, from milk, stock sales and scheme payments, and what's going out, covering feed, loan repayments, tax, contractors and household drawings. If a tighter fodder position later in the year would mean extra spend on bought-in feed, build that into your numbers now so it isn't a shock later.
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Don't wait for certainty before you act
It's natural to want to wait and see how the weather turns before making financial decisions, but the farms that come through a difficult stretch best are usually the ones that started planning before things got tight, not after. If your budget shows a squeeze coming, that's valuable information. It gives you time to don the following, if applicable:
talk to your bank early,
look at cashflow shortfalls before demand and prices rise, or
hold off on non-essential spending until the picture is clearer.
Equally, if you built up a reserve during the better weeks, or if your feed costs so far this year have come in lower than budgeted, now is a good time to think about where that goes: towards a buffer for the months ahead, or towards debt repayments, rather than it disappearing into day-to-day spending unnoticed.
Talk to your accountant
Weather uncertainty is part of farming, but going into the second half of the year without a cashflow plan doesn't have to be. Whether you want help stress-testing your budget against a tighter fodder scenario or just want a clearer view of where you stand, now is the time to have that conversation, while there's still room to act on it.
If you'd like help reviewing your cashflow or planning for the months ahead, talk to your local ifac team. Visit www.ifac.ie or contact your nearest office.
Contact our team
Contact a member of our expert team and find out how we can support you.
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