Alkira Organics’ Nathan Free from Tresco West has horticulture in his DNA

HE’S only 26 but he runs the biggest organic farm in Victoria — if not Australia — and has plans to keep expanding.

HE’S only 26 but he runs the biggest organic farm in Victoria — if not Australia — and has plans to keep expanding.

Nathan Free, of Wattle Organic Farms, has horticulture in his DNA. His parents, Kelvin and Deanne, have been mixed farmers at Lake Boga, in northern Victoria, his whole life and his uncle, Colin Free, grows wine grapes.

Despite his young age, Nathan travels across Australia attending organic and horticulture conferences and even presents at agribusiness for­ums. He grows 23 lines of fruit, vegetables and fodder.

“What we can’t grow we buy in,” Nathan said.

“Until we hit a saturation point in this market we’ll probably keep expanding.

“We have enough land to do the full organic system properly.”

Nathan’s attitude — that “the only way is forward” — has helped him transition his family’s conventional farming blocks into highly-productive organic lots that produce fruit and vegetables for Woolworths’ Macro organic brand and for wholesale markets across the nation.

The heart of the operation is at the original 350ha family farm at Tresco West, 2km from Lake Boga.

The family has just certified a 300ha property 20km to the east at Little Murray, while another small property beside Lake Boga is in the process of organic conversion, which takes three years, including one year of pre-certification and two years of conversion. Soon, they will have close to 800ha under production.

WAKE UP CALL

THE Frees decided seven years ago to convert to organic production after watching the quality of their soil degrade under conventional production.

“We now have a lot of hectares that are A-grade organic certified and have the knowledge to certify more,” Nathan said.

“We’re trying to tailor ourselves to meet the needs of consumers.”

Kelvin and Deanne work in fresh produce production with Nathan, who as well as running the company, also handles the marketing of the produce — branded as Alkira Organics.

Because there’s still so little education available in the organic farming space, Nathan and his family taught themselves the ropes.

He has won a Nuffield Scholarship for next year and hopes to spend it discovering world-best practice for organic farming.

Wattle Organic Farms grows 60ha of organic fruit, 50ha of organic vegetables and hopes to start growing organic mixed grains for dairy fodder at the Little Murray property.

There is already 50ha of stonefruit under production at that property.

“We’ve got our first block of organic hemp coming in,” Nathan said.

“The first block is for fibre and then seed later on.”

He’s a natural: Nathan Free in his organic sweet corn crop at Lake Boga.

MAKING A CRUST

WHEN it comes to margins, organic certification has made all the difference.

“We were actively finding new sustainable ways to grow our fruit and vegetables away from conventional synthetic products, but were not rewarded in the market place for the extra effort,” Nathan said.

“It was only when we converted our whole stonefruit and vegetable production land to organic that we saw a following for naturally produced food.

“We’re strong believers it was a better way to do agriculture than the conventional methods. We sleep easier at night knowing there are no chemicals floating around on our produce, going to market and going into people’s homes.

“It’s a cleaner, greener and more economical way to produce food. Tastier too.”

Each year, the Frees have seen their soils develop and improve under their organic production systems.

“They just keep getting better,” Nathan said.

“Every year more and more organic matter is on our soils.

“The trees are responding well to natural methods of nutrition too. They look just like conventionally-managed trees.”

But there is a difference in output, with lower tonnages than with conventional production. “It  is   a  lot  more   apparent  in the vegetables,” Nathan said. “The density of plants per hectare is far less than with conventional production — 15,000 heads for organic versus 45,000 heads for conventional. Stonefruit produces about 30 per cent less than conventional yields.”

TEAM BUILDER

WATTLE Organic Farms employs six full-time staff that aren’t family and 15 to 20 people in the packing shed at peak production. In the field, 20 to 30 people are employed during peak harvesting times.

The Frees pack their produce into Macro branded packing for Woolworths supermarket organic line on-farm, using the latest machinery that cuts out the middle man and means they don’t incur packaging charges.

The majority of Alkira Organics produce goes to Woolworths (80 per cent). The remainder is sent to the Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Adelaide wholesale markets, with a small amount exported.

They also pack and distribute for five or six other organic producers in the area. The attitude to organic produce is changing, Nathan says.

“Organics isn’t hidden away in specialty shops anymore.”

PICK OF THE BUNCH

IN vegetables the Frees grow zucchini (100 tonnes), corn (50,000 cobs), beans (five tonnes), kale, broccoli (40 tonnes), Japanese and butternut pumpkins (100 tonnes) and field tomatoes (50 tonnes). In fruit it’s melons, stone fruit (600 tonnes) and they are trialling field strawberries.

The Frees make all of their own organic compost — about 1500 to 2000 tonnes — on site each winter. The silage is mixed with cow manure, pig manure, chook manure, saw dust, almond hulls and grape skins. Fertiliser is basalt rock dust, palletised chicken manure, seaweed and fish emulsion to help stimulate the soil.”

The farms sit in the Murray River pipe district and use 1.1 to 1.2 gigalitres of water a year.

In the future, Nathan hopes to produce more grains and fodder for livestock and also produce organic lamb. He may look at other meats, but for now, he’s taking organics one (pretty large) step at a time.