Irrigation Benchmarking

Irrigation benchmarking - what is it?

Benchmarking has become very popular in recent times, and is being adopted readily by many agricultural enterprises to measure farm performance. There still seems, however, to be some confusion as to what exactly is meant by the term "Benchmarking".

The following is a relatively simple and informative definition of benchmarking, albeit with a corporate business flavour:

 

Benchmarking compares how your company does something to how others do it. Compare widely enough and you'll find who does what best. Measure the activity carefully enough and you'll know how far you have to go to beat the best. And, not least important, ask the right questions of benchmarking partners and you'll get a pretty fair idea of how to beat the best (Hequet, from Evans, 1994, p. 4).

 

Hequet's definition identifies three stages to the process of benchmarking.

  • The first is identifying the comparison group. Bearing in mind that the aim is to beat the best, it is important that comparisons are made with the best, rather than just making comparisons with others at a similar level of performance.
  • The second stage is measuring the performance of participants. Relevant quantitative measurements are necessary in order to make meaningful comparisons.
  • The final stage is identifying the factors behind the superior performance of some participants over others. These are usually referred to as best management practices.

It is important to also note from Hequet's definition of benchmarking that the absolute level of performance is not critical; it is comparison of the relative performance that is important in a benchmarking study. The indicators are important for comparison between sites, and in the process of identifying best management practices which lead to high tonnes per megalitre (for example).The range of things that can be benchmarked is endless. The level at which comparisons can be made also varies widely. Comparisons can be made at a whole industry level, across international boundaries. On the other hand, a single process can be compared within the same company or enterprise.

 

For this project, comparisons were made at the level of irrigation units. Sites were identified in three crop types, citrus, winegrapes and potatoes, across the Riverland and Sunraysia regions, near the borders of South Australia, New South Wales and Victoria.

 

A number of indicators of irrigation performance were calculated for each site, and comparisons made between sites within each crop type across the different indicators. A group of Best Practice sites were identified in each crop type, and the managers of these sites interviewed to identify common Best Management Practices used by this subset of the group.

 

 

____________________