Tractor and Machinery Association board member Adam Fendyk hopes to use his time in the role to deliver benefits to Australian manufacturers
After more than 15 years being a Tractor and Machinery Association member, Adam Fendyk decided it was time for more.
The Burder Ag Attachments general manager is now in his second year as a director on the TMA’s board, which aligned perfectly with the association’s ambition to have more Australian manufacturers involved at a high level.
“I’m obviously very enthusiastic about Australian made and felt that we needed some representation on the board for a local manufacturer, not just importers as such,” Fendyk says.
“It was an opportunity that came up to put myself forward for a position, which is now a stated position of the TMA to have a representative of Australian manufacturing on the board.”
Burder Ag Attachments is based in Wangaratta, northern Victoria, and Fendyk describes it as an engineering company that specialises in design, manufacture and wholesale of front-end loaders, forklifts and materials handling equipment for the Australian market.
While Burder does also import some products, the high volume of work it undertakes at its Victorian factory means Fendyk is well aware of the issues facing Australian agricultural manufacturers.
He believes getting local manufacturers together under the TMA banner will be beneficial in presenting a united front on issues impacting the sector.
“The TMA is focusing heavily on recruiting other Australian manufacturers into the TMA group and is also setting up a subcommittee that will focus entirely on the needs of Australian manufacturers in that space,” he says.
“I’m really the representative of that group on the board and when I wave the flag for me, for the most part I’m waving for everyone anyway.
“To have a body behind that of like-minded people that have great ideas about what the TMA can in fact achieve will assist us in remaining competitive and relevant in the marketplace.”
Proven performer
While Fendyk may be relatively new to the TMA’s board, his experience as an engaged member over the past 15 years has shown him what the association can do as a lobby group at critical times.
“Certainly from our perspective, the TMA is our peak body,” he says.
“As a peak body, it naturally gives us someone to work with regulatory groups like WorkCover and lobby with the Australian government.
“During COVID, we were very quick off the mark to make sure the TMA would lobby on our behalf as an Australian manufacturer and that the agricultural industry would be considered as an essential industry so we could keep going.
“They were able to contact the politicians and make sure they got that position and that statement given for us, as we knew it was very important that we weren’t considered the equivalent of a coffee shop or a restaurant and get shut down by the government.
“The vast majority of our product goes into the food chain and the food industry, from the front end to the back end of animal feeding and fodder and materials handling on farms, as well as vegetable harvesting with our forklifts.”
Broad scope
This is one example of how the TMA has been able to serve the industry through advocacy and lobbying at critical times, something which inspired Fendyk to step up and join the board.
“The TMA is representing an industry value in excess of $6 billion per annum with thousands of employees, so it’s quite a substantial group and the potential for that to be a substantial lobby group is quite high,” he says.
“All of us have the same issues in industry with regard to recruiting and retaining people.”
Beyond just being an advocacy body, there is plenty which keeps the TMA and its board busy throughout the year.
TMA members gather every year for an annual conference, which was held this year in Melbourne in July.
“The conferences are wonderful. I know that every time I go there I always take an endless amount of notes and then always know that I’m learning something on the day,” Fendyk says.
“The networking and fellowship of the alumni is extremely good as well.”
One regular presentation at the TMA conference relates to tractor sales data.
TMA members are provided monthly figures around tractor and other machinery sales, which is also published in Farms & Farm Machinery.
This data is broken down by size category and state, with figures compared to the same point last year to give market insights.
Fendyk highlights this data as one of many valuable benefits of TMA membership for Burder Ag Attachments.
“The published data of tractor sales information for the market is essential for us in terms of understanding where the market is, where it’s come from and where it’s going to, so we’re able to plan our production capacity, our purchases and workforce along with that as well,” he says.
“There are resources available at the TMA that probably a lot of dealers don’t know about, but more importantly, other manufacturers don’t know about either.
“On top of that is the advocacy element of the TMA who are working on things like right to repair at the moment, and farm automation in terms of autonomous vehicles.”
Future goals
Looking ahead to his time on the board, Fendyk sees automation and mechatronics as being an issue which will require attention for Australian manufacturers such as Burder.
“All the machines that you require in the factory to be competitive and consistent and maintain the quality standards you need aren’t particularly different to those that are used on farms today,” he says.
“As automation gets more prevalent, we’re all going to need people to be able to look after those machines.
“That skill set currently is mechatronics, which is currently a university degree.”
Fendyk believes opening this up to becoming more than just a university degree will bring significant benefits to the agriculture industry, particularly when attracting staff remains an ongoing challenge.
“It’s certainly my position that the mechatronic skill set should be run as a trade skill set, not just a university skill set because we need these people desperately,” he says.
“The university degree is primarily aimed at system design and install, so it’s a higher-level outcome, but what we need are the people that want to get their hands dirty and get in amongst the machines but also have that knowledge sitting behind them.
“It’s a long shot for a tractor mechanic to be the automation mechanic when you need to know electronics and you need to know IT systems, then you need to know the mechanical side as well, and you must bring those three skill sets together to become a tradesperson.
“One of the things we’ll be advocating for in terms of recruiting and retaining is the development of this mechatronics trade.
“That will allow us to have people to repair the tools of industry, both manufacturing and agriculture, which will allow us to keep moving forward in an environment where we’re so short of staff.”
To become a TMA member or learn more about the association, visit www.tma.asn.au