| Sumario: | A profit thinking framework was used to select a multidisciplinary farmer support team (FST) to
implement a focused participatory approach among livestock farmers in the Limpopo and North
Western provinces of South Africa. Farmers were subsequently organised into teams, which
meet once in 30 days to identify needs, set objectives, take actions with support from the FST
and report every 90 days to measure progress. These meetings are also used to identify new
opportunities for future actions.
The results show that farmers recognise that profit maximisation should be the main focus of a
beef enterprise with all other activities oriented towards this goal. Farmers were more eager to
take actions that improved profit. Accessing new markets, learning pricing techniques and
addressing issues such as transport costs, improved prices for beef. The FSTs obtained an indepth understanding of technical challenges in farmers’ operations and assisted farmers to
implement appropriate solutions. The results showed that partnerships involving a dynamic mix
of scientific knowledge and socio-economic conditions assist researchers and extension workers
to considerably improve the performance of emerging beef farmers through participatory methods.
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